Factory ammo

Think about this:

Some of us reload to shoot, while others (myself included), shoot to reload.

Reloading is an enjoyable hobby all by itself, especially if you have obsessive compulsive disorders. :D:D:D
I can relate to that. I bought a .338 Win Mag a couple years ago. It came with 10 boxes of factory ammo. I shot 2 boxes at the range one day just so I could reload them. The rest of that ammo is still unfired until I need new brass.
 
Think about this:

Some of us reload to shoot, while others (myself included), shoot to reload.

Reloading is an enjoyable hobby all by itself, especially if you have obsessive compulsive disorders. :D:D:D
Does that mean that you reload the same round over and over again. I feel bad for them that are truely Obsessive compulsive.
 
I reload because I like a bunch of the boutique bullets that you can't buy as loaded ammo. Between that and choosing the correct powder, you can eek out another 100 or so yards out of that round than out of factory ammo. That lets me not shoot magnums, which means I shoot more, and I am very confident pulling the trigger on animals out to that gun/bullet's max range.
 
Does that mean that you reload the same round over and over again. I feel bad for them that are truely Obsessive compulsive.
Not be the Debby downer here to go down the rabbit hole but I struggled with this in my youth and still do but I've mostly wrangled it, and yes diagnosed.

Probably depends a lot on the specific person and how theirs manifests. It could be from as simple as wanting to know and do every single step in the process and loving reloading, to someone that needs to check powder charge 5 times on every case, to someone that disassembled perfectly good ammo because they had a panic attack that they put rifle primers in their pistol brass.

It's honestly hard to say. For me, reloading doesn't have many if any stress triggers luckily, it's much more like my day job as a scientist when you have a process and an understanding of it and can execute pretty freely without concern.

All that said I'm definitely in the reload to shoot category. If someone would make me my specific loads for 20 cent over what I load them for I'd order thousands and sell everything
 
With the companies out there now that offer "Custom Factory loads" you can get the best of both worlds in some guns. And a few even offer custom load development with you sending them your rifle on top of it. Here's a few that I know of.
North American Ammunition-here on the site
Hendershots
Choice Ammunition
Reloads of Dallas
 
A lot of good points made for both sides of this. Don't think for a second that am not worried about the government screwing around with ammo sales. I'm sure it's coming and it's quite worrisome. That being said, I got into reloading back in the mid/early 90's simply out of necessity. I certainly don't do it because I enjoy it, it's a task in a series of tasks that is required to achieve my desired end results. Factory components and QC were terrible thus factory ammo was just junk. I don't think that's the case these days. That being said, I've found myself going 100MPH down a never ending rabbit hole chasing the best possible groups and never being satisfied. It can always be better. All of it is my fault and all of it could be prevented. But it is what it is, when I step back and look at things and what my objectives are and how much I shoot, reloading just doesn't seem necessary.

At the end of the day I want to shoot and ethically kill an animal at under 500 yards. At this point in my life all the shooting I do with rifles capable of doing this is simply in prep for the hunt.
I can`t for the life of me figure out why the Biden administration hasn`t been more aggressive in going after ammunition, especially .223/5.56. It is not only the primary round for the dreaded " assault " weapons but also the most popular round for American rifle shooters in general, I believe. You don`t have to " ban " anything, just starve them to death. If the ultimate objective is to limit/eliminate private ownership of firearms, you make purchasing/owning/shooting said firearms such a colossal PITA and so obscenely expensive that people just say, " Screw it." and give up.
 
Like some, I started reloading many, many, many moons ago, when factory ammo was manufactured using military surplus powder and quality control wasn't what it is today.
This last week I took out my newly built 7PRC (on a Tikka receiver with a Preferred Barrel Blanks barrel) and shot Hornady Precision hunter 175gr ELDx out of it. The barrel is 22" so I wanted to get an idea of how the shorter barrel impacted speed, so I chrono graphed 2, 3 hot strings.
The results were 2805, 2798, 2805 for the first string, and 2806, 2798, 2805 for the second string.
Far better results than some of the older factory (90's era) factory ammo that I had in my cabinet not of the same caliber obviously. But the results tell me that quality control is much better today. In addition, unlike the factory ammo of old, you can find factory ammo with Nosler Accubonds, Hornady ELDx', Barns TTSX, or Bergers, something you couldn't find 10 or so years ago.
I still buy powder, primers and bullets whenever I find what I want and stockpile for a rainy day but find myself buying factory ammo for several of my guns, so I can spend more time shooting and not at the bench reloading, expect for the hard-to-find ammo like for my WSM's.
 
I enjoy finding the load. I do not enjoy loading the 100 cases after once I have found it. You do get "match" ammo tuned to your rifle with whatever pills you decide.

I think as technology has changed, QC has improved for the most part. This has driven ammo companies to improve their offerings as we demand it. You used to be able to buy "match" ammo, at a price. Seems now all is "match" and you pay for it. Every once in awhile you find the old Corelokt that sings in a rifle, but I think most hunters are happy with 1+++ inch groups for a hunting rifle. The crowd on this site is a-typical in that regard. Most want to stack them.

If I stopped reloading, my yard would be immaculate...
 
I can`t for the life of me figure out why the Biden administration hasn`t been more aggressive in going after ammunition, especially .223/5.56. It is not only the primary round for the dreaded " assault " weapons but also the most popular round for American rifle shooters in general, I believe. You don`t have to " ban " anything, just starve them to death. If the ultimate objective is to limit/eliminate private ownership of firearms, you make purchasing/owning/shooting said firearms such a colossal PITA and so obscenely expensive that people just say, " Screw it." and give up.
They don't need to do anything. We do a great job of starving the market ourselves. Please don't give the village idiot anymore ideas though.
 
Top