What about those of us who have two or three rifles that shoot around MOA with factory ammo? I was never a big paper puncher but wanted my guns to do what I wanted.

I respect those who search the ultimate load, but at a certain point it seems spending lots of money and time finding that perfect load just to hit a target is not my thing.

My 220 Swift shoots factory Normas just about as well as a load my buddy worked up 20 years ago and can deal with a red fox at 200 yards. My pre 64 270 shoots Remington 130 grain ammo about the same and my pre 64 35 Whelen shoots a 2 inch group at 100 yards which is fine here for shooting at running stags or boars in an oak forest.

Just curious how many guys or gals on here are happy to just have a rifle that gets the job done..

I'm also just a guy who's killed a hundred turkeys with a factory Remington or Benelli full choke and 3 inch copper 5's.

Good luck to all.

Pete

For the average person factory ammo sure gets the job done. I can usually find superior accuracy by hand loading, but at the range I shoot critters it doesn't matter. Some folks just enjoy the hobby of it. I shoot a few obsolete cartridges, so it has become a necessity if I want to keep the old iron shooting.

Factory here, it shoots darn good in my stuff, doubt I could get it much better...

The hand loader shoots more.
Core lokt terminal performance sucks.
Try the Nosler partition Fed Gold Premiums,
if, they are still made.
It's not a contest. And reloading got pricey.
The hand loader shoots more.

x2 Sam especially nowdays when todays newest and bestus is forgotten 2maro gun shops cant afford to stock every cartridge that shows up so they opt for whatever is popular for that year
On the other hand i bought 25-35 loaded ammo S&B brand cheaper then if i bought all the components for reloading I have gotten super accuracy and bullet preformance from Czech and Serbian manufactured ammo in several rifles And yes i'll keep the brass

Feel like that a majority of people honestly. Gun is a tool and as long as it does th job good enough when needed why mess with anything?

Let's be honest, a 2-3 MOA gun with a half decent bullet is more then enough for 90% of people . Most guns with decent ammo no days are shooting MOA or less out the box . Gotta shoot a lot or have a very specific deal to really get into reloading. That or your just really particular. I mean yeah I can clone factory or speciality ammo for pennies on the dollar vs buying .... But I also shoot way more then most . Convince more people to NOT get into reloading or gun modding more then I do . Like bro you shoot less then a box a year if that... Buy a nice proven gun get some good proven ammo and just be happy with life

I do have a few that just work . Have a few boxes of factory ammo . They sit on the wall until I really really just wanna get something done with no fuss but other then that ..meh no real interest to me

But most people are like that with a lot of stuff. Some wanna rip apart and tinker with their computer, car , gaming systems , yards ect ....but other people just want that stuff to work . Ain't gotta be the best just reliable. Nothing wrong with either imo... Just gets weird when people try and tell you you HAVE to do stuff .

Have a friend that has hunted all over, the West, Alaska, Africa, etc....He only shoots factory ammo and has killed everything from Elephants, to prairie dogs, and he can't shoot for beans, lol
He's happy with a 6" group at a hundred yards.....

If you shoot a lot you can shoot cheaper and get better accuracy and loads not offered off the shelf. I used to shoot a lot and chase groups you couldn't tell 5 rounds went through the same hole.

But I started to begin with when I was broke and wanted to shoot more. I started off with a Lee anniversary kit I bought new for $79 added 270 win dies for $21 lb of 4831 cci primers and Speer 130 gr bullets and was off. Lucked out my first load ever shot in 3/4 group and I was hooked.

Joke was on me I didnt save money I just shot a lot more.

I do understand what your saying. I bought my daughters 7mm-08 purring a panic time and could not get brass so bought some of the cheapest factory loads on the shelf for the brass figured my daught could burn them up for practices. But that factory gun shoot that hornady load so well inside a nickel group about 2.25" at 300 i just stuck with it. I did load some barns for it for a while but not having time these days and not shooting much factory ammo shoots great and more than good enough in that gun.

Working up loads and trying for that perfect group or shooting longer range where accuracy matters more can be fun. But I only have 500 yards at home thats not long range and dont have time to shoot and play and for hunting distances absolutely any ammo with good bullet will do.
That asid I have enough ammo loaded in a few calibers I have not loaded for in 10 years and I still have enough ammo to last me the rest of my life in those calibers.

I also am not someone that is happy having a few boxes of ammo preferring to have much more on hand.

Most guys down here are happy with being able to hit a five gallon bucket @ 100yd a beer can at the same distance is viewed as some sniper level stuff lol.
I mean when you honestly look at the kill zone of most lager game ....I mean honestly.. if you can hit a friggen pie plate you can lung a deer with is what most do anyway. I mean my eye twitch's when I cant get five rounds in under an in inch ...but at the same time if I'm taking a normal heart and lung shot.... Pie plate ....

Always find it odd watching them hunting shows when they have basically a sniper rifle with a 30x scope shooting a deer off a rest from a box blind .afer bragging about bug hole accuracy....and the still just bolier room a deer @ 75yd .and watch it run another 50-300yd ....idk at that point might as well save $2000 and just use a savage axis

For just hunting, anyone can afford a box or two of shells for their deer rifle a year. Same for pistol or shotgun ammo for defense. A box or two is plenty.

Reloading just allows you to shoot more. And can be made more accurate than factory ammo in scope sighted rifles capable of good accuracy. Factory shells have to be made to function in all brands of of rifles in that caliber. Reloads can tailored to the individual rifle.

Folks shooting an iron sighted 30 30 or a pistol wouldn't know the difference between factory and reloaded ammo.

Pie plate?
Yesterday they were on here shooting
neck bones at 300yds. Or some such,

If a random shooting contest,
My money be on team trapper.

Got to reload my 221 fireball. Don’t even have a set of dies for 270. Over the counter shell nosler130 grain partition. Not a big deer hunter like to shoot a couple of skin heads a year to eat. .41 pistol I reload. Use to shoot skeet sporting clays and 5 stand. So I reload 12 20 and 28 gauge. In this day and age it’s probably just as cheap to buy AAs. Enjoy shotgun reloading also 10 gauge reloader used when Swan Lake had geese don’t like punching paper but that’s me. Lot of people enjoy it so more power to them.

If you're happy with what ur using keep on keeping on. Reloading isnt a $ saver now a days unless ur shooting a ton and then if u figure ur time in ur losing money. But having enough Reloading components for your kids life time is nice and who knows what the future may bring. If your hunting at longer ranges handloads an advantage for the most part.

Wasn’t long ago a guy couldn’t find factory ammo for many popular cartridges. I was in the gun store a couple weeks before deer season and guys were buying guns off the shelf based solely on what ammo the store had available when they found out no ammo was available for the guns they owned.

take your factory ammo, do this at 1004 yards

if you have no desire to do it, then what are you complaining about?

Shoot for the price of an ammo test where I got one of each of these ( bass prk is way worse Walmart is the cheapest I've found ) to see what worked the best in a given rifle I'd have close to enough to get a small reloading set up , used of course.... Hard for me to buy factory ammo now because I automatically start thinking ," for $45 how much powder , bullets , brass , ect , could I buy ?"


Standard hunting ammo is one thing , same with FMJ or , back in the day , stuff like steel cases HP or SP for hogs in 7 62x39 ... But when it comes to more speciality stuff pennies on the dollar . Especially when it comes to something like subsonics cant help but laugh when I see the prices for stuff like subsonic.300blk

If I was shooting more then like three boxes of most stuff bigger then like .223 and was shooting quality ammo I'd have a hard time not reloading unless it just really really annoyed me to do it .

But again ...300yd an in box or so a year common calibers, no real point

I prefer reloading over factory. Factory loads seem to be max pretty much. I shoot a .338 (restocked mod 70) used to use my 06' (first rifle I made while in school) Also worked for C Sharps making their custom guns and those big bores and hand loading cartridges for them is best and sometimes only route. Same with a lot of old guns,my .450 bp Express for instance. When it comes to the .338 my load is a bit slower but kicks WAY LESS and with the stock fitting me is very easy to handle and kills with no problem at all.. I make reduced loads for different applications too. Reloading is so much more versitile there's no comparison

When I was shooting competitively, yes did reload. When the kids were growing up, reloaded for them too for reduced recoil, long before reduced loads were commercially available.

Now, with old age and bad joints, I'm able to hold 1 moa. I don't shoot nearly enough; but, still good enough to take table fare. Commercial ammo has greatly improved over what was available years ago; so I buy a couple of same lot # ammo boxes a year from my local store. If ammo should become in short supply again, there are still enough supplies and powder squirreled way to supply the whole family and grandkids for a few years.

I can almost always get my rifles to shoot better with handloads and the bullet/powder combinations to try are endless. I've seen huge variances in powder charges in the same box with mass produced junk factory ammo. Remington and Winchester being the worst. Some factory loads shoot pretty well but they're always changing something with them. Many shoot horrible and if you're happy with 4 inch groups or hitting a dinner plate at 100yds then more power to you.

Some just enjoy reloading. If you can reload and have components you never have to worry about ammo availability. I personally know someone who could reload several hundred boxes of .222, 243, .270 and 7mm.

The closest equivalent factory load to the custom load I’m shooting in my main rifle is $2.15 a round right now. IF you can find it in stock anywhere.

And it’s just a generic load.

I can reload it for a touch over $.90 a round.

And it’s a tailored round capable of sub 1/2 MOA accuracy in my rifle. At distance.

If you shoot a lot, there’s still some significant savings in reloading.

And this is coming from a guy that really doesn’t enjoy reloading. I love load development and seeing it all come together. But I find reloading itself tedious.

My CZ 550 in 9.3x62 gets 1 inch 5 shot groups at 100 yards with factory Hornady Dangerous Game (Was the model used by Hornady to test their ammo to get the ballistics chart on the ammo box), my made for snowmachining (Very light, very reliable in extreme cold) ar15 shoots 1 1/2 inch 5 shot groups at 100 yards with factory 55gr. fmj 5.56. Loose powder and primers have to be flown as cargo to a bush village paying hazmat fees, it's cheaper to fly factory loaded ammo in your checked bags.

I started reloading in the late 70's. Was pretty easy to produce more accurate ammo than factory and much cheaper. Collecting stuff a little at a time. I A LOT of quality ammo available ammo at stores now. Not cheap to find something you really like then when you do you really need to buy a lot of it. You can order almost anything from sites like ammoseek today. The biggest advantage if your not a competition shooter is in shot shells. Keep a variety of shot sizes and a couple 3 different powders on hand and you can load any kind of shell you want. Dove to deer. Never hunted with them but a 69 caliber round ball mould throws a ball that fits nicely into most any wad and works with whatever 1 1/8 powder charge in your data. Shoots good to 50 + yards out of my smooth bore slug barrel.

Same with rifle bullets. If you want a light low recoil load for say a big magnum, thats very doable. Sure you need to shoot a few and fine tune your scope setting switching from one to the other but makes the one rifle guy more versatile.

Its also fun.

So yes, I like to hand load.

Factory ammo nowadays is pretty dang good. A lot of the new rounds are pretty hot too.
When I started with a single stage, it just got me out shooting waaaay more, with all the shooting, I got to be a way better shot too. Then I started compitition shooting, pistol mostly. A Dillon 550 paid for itself on a Sunday afternoon of reloading. I’m not even sure what a box on cheap ball 40S&W goes for now, but it was stupid expensive 15 years ago. Shooting 6-800 rounds at a shoot, hotels, meals, plus practicing during the week…….. if not reloading it’s a rich man’s game.
Then I got into long range. Now you need a good single stage, and you’ll add to your reloading gadgets from there. There’s a lot of variables that a guy can play with.
Having said that, my old 270 still liked the cheap Winchester 130g Power Points. I tried the premium bullets, but the groups opened up.
I should look into reloading shotshells for goose hunting. I throw a lot of steel in the air…….and they certainly ain’t cheap……lol

Back before Covid, I began to steward for a 308 Win and needed some ammo to sight it in and to see how it shot. Went to a Bass Pro and walked down a 30 foot isle......ammo piled from floor to about eye height, both sides. Anything you wanted and in abundance. Shelves looked like Wolfie's picture above. Went back 6 months later and the only ammo on that isle was a few boxes of 22 long rifle bird shot. Not anything else......and no reloading components. A relative had just bought a new 6.5 CM and one box of ammo, which he shot sighting rifle in. He went back for more and shelves were bare. They stayed that way for about 8 to 10 months. It was about that time I woke up to realize that 3 of the 4 primer brands made in US were all under VISTA Group.......and if wrong sort ever got control of that, those ammo shortages could easily become permanent. So I began reloading and am now my own ammo factory.

The VISTA Group has since sold all that to a foreign Czech company. That is who now controls most of your ammo supply.

If you rely on factory ammo, my suggestion is to not live hand to mouth. While you can, lay in enough supply to last at least 10 years for any weapon you care about.. Then if day comes when shelves go bare, and stay that way, you can last a bit longer than you can now. When it's gone, it's gone.....you don't get to go back in time after it's too late.

BTW, one of those rifles I load for was once a popular caliber and now it's not. If you can find factory ammo for it at all it's $40 to $45 per box. My cost of about $15 per box.....and have enough components for it to burn out the barrel. That seems like a better position to be in than an empty shelf.

HayDay, I hear ya.

My 4 main rifles are:

.222 Rem
7x57
.243 AI
.35 Whelen

I've never even looked for factory ammo other than .243 way back when I needed it to fire form brass.

To elaborate, for any rifle, handgun or shotgun you care about, my suggestion is if you have a favorite load........at the minimum........lay in one case of ammo for it now while you can. Ammo that you don't touch, or if you do shoot it, replace it as you go. Then as you shoot it, save the brass and empty hulls. When the chips are down, you might find someone like me willing to help you reload something, but you can't reload empty air. You need the brass or hulls.....and if you save them when you shoot them, they are free to you........and could become priceless someday down the road.

for some things I definitely just buy factory. I just buy 300blk 150gr deer season XP I shoot maybe a couple deer a year and that is all that gun is getting used for. they don't even sell that projectile for reloading.

for me reloading is about volume and availability I get around 1moa and I am done chasing groups.

I also don't stay at the bench much , benches are for getting and confirming zero.
then it is time for position shooting and skills.
we reload some really boring stuff like 308, 30-06 , 9mm , 38spl , 223
very common stuff , also makes brass available
all of the 30-06 is reloaded to be M1 safe

reloading is a hobby , a way to spend your time doing what you enjoy

some people think of reloading as a chore and others don't.
if it is a chore for you, don't reload.

there are so many facets to reloading you can keep learning and applying knowledge without finding an end to it for a very long time.

some people watch ball games many hours a week , If I get watching ball games hours a year that is a lot and I was probably with someone who wanted to watch a game. I Like a packer party I'll bring food , I will put a Packer game on the radio while I am diving but zero ball games have been on my home TV in years. my son watched the superbowl a couple times to see what it was about.

Probably watched more baseball in one week visiting my dad this year than the previous 5 years and we still got a bunch of fishing in.

reloading is definitely not something you have to do , it is something you want to do.


that said

you should have a supply of ammo , because it becomes difficult to find at times , your favorite load changes or gets discontinued.
you decide what that supply should be I would start at if I deer hunted every year till I was 100 I would have 5 rounds to confirm zero and 5 to hunt with. so if your 50 have 500 rounds set aside that should be a lifetime supply for your deer gun. if you stop hunting before 100 it is a good start for a grandkid or great grandkid

some people build lures and cast jigs , melt and pour soft plastic , it is really the same thing , I buy that stuff and spend the time on the water , but many fill their fishing off season making tackle.

Thanks for all the great replies. I've learned a lot about why people re-load and why some don't.

I was never complaining about people who do, but I did learn that many here are happy with a rifle that just shoots well enough to kill a deer/elk/moose/red fox at 150-200 yards

My friend who was an avid re-loader shot a couple rifles that you couldn't buy factory ammo for, and he also loved an old bullet that was made by a guy in Montana, Bitterroot Bullets, and he hoards those to this day.

I wish everybody a nice weekend.

Pete

When I grew up indiana was a bow, shotgun, hand gun or muzzleloader only state. When you chose between a smooth bore Foster slug or muzzleloader the accuracy difference was large. I would not even hint with a gun that grouped like my first old 12 did at 75 yards now. My standards have been progressive as avaliable equipment ( rules ) have changed. I have always been value focused so hunted with black powder. It was cheaper more accurately and I could hunt firearms season and muzzleloader with the same gun I could afford to shoot more often .

For a time I wanted as small of a group as I could get. Then one day I decided there was a difference between accuracy and practical accuracy.

For example one of my loads for an ar I could shoot inside of dimes with at 100. But the bullets were 2x more expensive than soft points from mid south that I could keep inside of quarters. Big difference in group size BUT was it necessary vs the added cost. I was shooting coyotes with that gun and seldom over 300 yards. So the cheaper load was perfectly acceptable for the purpose . A few years before I would not have been happy if not shooting tha absolutely tightest shooting combo.

I found Its relaxing and also satisfying to work up a load cheaper and better preforming than factory then fill up the ammo cans with that load. Looking at thw full stacked ammo cans is very satisfying. For me its a similar feeling to looking at the barn full of fresh cut hay, over flowing firewood supply, full freezer and shells packed with canned garden produce.

The price of powder has gotten ridiculous. I was in a local gun store today and a pound of H4198 was $81 and others were $60+. It wasn't all that long ago that I could get a pound of any kind that I wanted for about $35 tops. This mess is never going to get better.

Hey, Pete. Just took a reloading class from Hornady. I feel a new obsession coming on. It will take me years to catch up with Zim.