06.05
How To Reload Your Own Ammo
There’s a lot of talk about guns and ammunition going around right now with the liberals being in charge. Gun control is an issue on lots of people’s minds. It seems like I see an “ammo shortage” story in the news about once a week these days. This got me thinking about those folks who would like to learn how to load their own ammo. You can find lots of information around the internet about everything under the sun in regards to loading ammo, but I haven’t found a decent all-in-one tutorial for the beginner yet. So that means it falls to me to make one. First, I’ll show you the bare basic equipment you’ll need. After that I’ll show some average pricing and tell you what bullet components you’ll have to have and where to get them. Then I’ll explain the process that I follow to actually load. I’m going to show how to load .45 ACP pistol ammunition throughout, but the method is the same no matter what handgun ammo you load. Rifle ammo is a little bit different, but the same basic rules apply. Let’s get started.
Before we start, I want to give one hugely important warning: never use hand loaded bullets for self defense. Only use them for practice. Your true self defense rounds should be bought from a reputable manufacturer. Hand loaded self defense rounds are a no-no for about a hundred different reasons. Trust me. Don’t do it.
First, the tools. There are quite a few things you’ll need if you are starting from scratch. I’ll list and link them here:
- Progressive Press – Lee Pro 1000 (.45 ACP kit)
- Case Tumbler – Frankford Case Tumbler and Separator
- Calipers – Frankford Calipers
- Scale – Frankford Micro Scale
- Bullet Puller – Frankford Bullet Puller
- Primer Pocket Cleaner – Primer Pocket Cleaner
- Case Lube – Case Lube(Spray)
- Ammo Boxes – Ammo Boxes
- Single Stage Press – Lee Single Stage(for priming/decapping)
- Decapping Die – Lee Decapping Die
- Priming Unit – Lee Ram Prime
- Shell Holder – Lee Shell Holder 45ACP
- Reloading Manual – Lyman Reloading Manual
Now that is the main equipment you’ll be needing. You can expect to spend about $350 on everything. You will easily make your money back after a few months of reloading if you shoot often and pick up your brass at the range. Off the shelf .45ACP ammo will run you about .50 cents per round right now. When you load your own you can get that cost down to about .12-.15 cents per round. You can even get below .10 cents per round if you take care of your brass and cast your own bullets. You’ll find that you will want/need more stuff as you learn more about it, but the above list will at least get you started and let you recover your investment quickly. Next, lets look at the basic cartridge components you’ll need:
And that is what you need for the actual ammunition itself. I chose these bullet components because they are relatively easy and foolproof. As you get more into it, you will want to reduce your costs by buying lead bullets and recycled brass. You may even want to cast your own bullets, which I’ll show how to do in a future post. But for now, this will get you started. One last thing though. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that right now(6/4/2009) is perhaps the worst time to get started reloading in the last decade or more. You’re going to have a really hard time finding primers. They are simply out of stock everywhere. The demand is astronomical. If you can find some, buy them quick. All the other components should be readily available. Even powder seems to be in good supply. Just be sure to go to gun shows to buy your powder and primers. You’ll save yourself a lot of money, because ordering online incurs a $25 hazardous shipping fee for all explosive material.
Here is the outline of basic steps you will do in order:
- Dump the brass in the tumbler and turn it on. Let it run overnight.
- Take the brass out and put it through the separator to remove all the cleaning media(corncob or walnut).
- Mount decapping die on the single stage press.
- De-prime(decap) each brass cartridge on the single stage press. (if it’s not new)
- Clean the primer pocket of each brass cartridge. (again, if it’s not new)
- Mount priming mechanism on single stage press and prime each cartridge.
- Lay out all the primed brass with the case mouths pointing up.
- Spray them all with case lube.
- Load all the primed, lubed brass in the progressive press.
- Look up 45ACP in the loading manual and note the max cartridge length listed there.
- Run a few cartridges through the press and adjust the bullet seating die to the proper depth using your calipers.
- Disassemble these test bullets with the bullet puller.
- Now, Look up the starting powder charge for your type of powder in a loading manual or on-line.
- Set the powder measure mechanism to dispense that much powder and load the hopper with powder.
- Run about 5 cartridges through the press without placing bullets to normalize the powder dispenser.
- Dump the powder from these test charges back in the powder hopper.
- Put a cartridge on the scale and zero it out.
- Now, run that cartridge through the press and re-measure it.
- Make sure it equals the correct charge you desired.
- Now begin loading all cartridges using bullets.
- Stop and check every 25 rounds to make sure you are still delivering the proper powder charge and proper cartridge length.
- Do any post-press sizing you want and put in ammo boxes.
That looks like a lot of steps and I guess it is. But, once you know what you’re doing you can zip through it pretty quickly and turn out about 300 rounds in a couple of hours. I know many people skip the extra step of de-priming/re-priming and just let the progressive press do it for them. I don’t like doing that for two reasons. First is safety. If you were to have a primer detonation while the cartridge is actually on the press then you run the real risk of detonating the powder in the powder hopper also. Secondly, the Lee press that I use and recommend above has a truly horrible progressive priming mechanism. But, other than that it’s the best press for the money on the market. So it just makes sense to use a little of the extra money you save and buy the stuff to prime seperately. This has the added benefit of getting you set to load rifle cartridges down the line. You’ll have a full single stage setup to use, since loading rifle bullets on a progressive press is a no go.
I’ll update this post with a video later, showing each step of the process. If you decide to go ahead and take the pluge, just do me two favors. Always wear safety glasses during reloading. I don’t want anyone to lose an eye because of me. The other thing is to read the first sections of the reloading manual thoroughly before diving in and starting to reload. This will give you plenty of good background about how ammunition actually works and what to look for at each step to keep yourself safe. Happy Loading.
