Since building the shooting range I am spending quite a bit on ammo. I like to stock ammo for the folks that come and shoot since they permit me to shoot their guns and don’t want to shoot up theirs. I have been looking into reloading and was hoping someone could give me some numbers regarding the savings vs purchasing for 1000rds. I know the cost is different for different calibers so if you could give me a ballpark in percentage saved and time dedicated to do 1000rds, that would be great.

Thanks

I can't give you accurate figures for today's prices , but a few years back , it cost me about 1/3 of pre made ammo.

Biggest tip I can give you to keeping costs down , is buy good equipment. I have Dillon. Expensive , yes. But the money I save pays for it many times over.

The trap with cheaper more affordable presses is you start to put together a reloading set-up to upgrade to a better press you have to abandon/sell your older set up as only the dies and a few other things can go with the new set up.

Buy once , cry once.

My Dillon is very accurate and very easy to make 500 rounds an hour. A cheap Lee press would take a whole day to make that much. At bear minimum , get a RCBS.

what calibers , it costs to set up every different caliber

lets say you want to load your own

9mm , 223, 308

the tools to make volume reloading practical like A Dillon press you are probably getting 3-500 a caliber in stuff and 1200 for the press

then your friend shows up with a 6.5 creed or 7mm-08

then you have time

if you want to take a few shots with their gun look up the going price on midway and order them a box

my son makes 9 and 223 on his dillon , he is working on 308 as well
there is definitely setup time , he leaves it set for 9mm most of the time as it is what we use the most of
cost per round is about 20 cents currently and you can buy freedom bulk for 26-27 cents a round

ordering bulk components can get it closer to 16 cents a round.
but when I say bulk I mean 5K primers and 5K projectiles at once possibly more.

it comes down to how much do you need

are you getting a deal ordering a dump truck of gravel for 300 dollars or buying bags at the home store for 9.99 a bag
it really depends do you need 3 bags worth or 300 bags worth?
sadly ammo and gravel don't share a huge spread in bulk purchasing discount.

then that gets the question , should you be running your reloads in another persons gun?

for the boy and I it makes sense in 2 ways , he gets to running 1000 rounds a month or more some times and the loads are not just generic they are tailored to run just above power factor to make the best for playing the pistol games he is playing.

Thanks Cragar.

Thanks GCP.

I guess I should ask about running the reloads through their FA. I can probably just give them “gas money” on the oddball calibers.

Good points to consider.