Who is the laziest reloader?

[MOD7NUT1]

I am your "Guy"!!!

 

[matemike]

I've never annealed. I full length resize every time because it's the only dies I have (besides the seating dies.) Brass is all mixed companies. I've only bought new batch brass for each cartridge I reload for once.
I do always tumble or ultrasonic clean my brass and I usually quickly brush primer pockets, never scrub clean. I debur the case mouths with a camfer tool.
I always measure case length, trim if necessary and of course COAL.
I found my bullet, powder and primer recipe for 7mmRM and 308 very early on and I stick with it.
I use a chargemaster for my bolt guns for every single round. But I do solely quick throws for 300 black out because I usually load that in bulk even with a single stage press.

I shoot sub moa with both bolt rifles and my reloads. About 1.1 moa with factory rounds.

I don't know. Is that lazy?

 

[ntsqd]

IMHO, no.

Until you compare yourself in this rarefied air. Then, maybe minorly to moderately so.

 

[YZ-80]

IMHO, no Hand Loader is lazy. They are self-sufficient and ambitious. As long as they are doing it safely and effectively (for their own purposes) hand loaders are Productive people.

So are brewers, distillers and wine makers for that matter.

 

[milo-2]

I guess when it comes to knocking ammo out, I am lazy. I feel having ammo on hand is like a fridge full of beer, if you have it, it will be gone shortly.
I pay my dues during load dev, and then get by with minimal prep if I can. Make no mistake, I own a Giraud trimmer, AMP II, decent powder system, it is in place.
After all my brass is fired, I process 10 pcs and verify before proceeding with the rest of it.
I'd prefer you guys just called me less than totally motivated.

 

[348 fan]

My kind of thread here. ...I'm a Lee dipper kinda guy....haven't touched my primer pocket tool in years....if the brass needs trimmed...I just put it aside....I still get respectable 1.25 inch groups with my 06 BAR that's has I dont know how many thousands of rounds through it. Also....anyone that snickers at 1 inch and 1.25 inch groups at 100 yards with sporters really needs to just chill.

 

[codyadams]

Also....anyone that snickers at 1 inch and 1.25 inch groups at 100 yards with sporters really needs to just chill.

I don't snicker at 1.25" groups at 100 yards, nothing wrong with that! Not even 2.5" 200 yard groups, heck, even 3.75" groups at 300 yards will kill any big game in North America. However I would be less than impressed with the same gun shooting 10" groups at 700 yards under perfect conditions, worse if less than perfect, if it was to be used for hunting! But then again, that just isn't what some guns are intended for. For my close range guns, I don't put as much effort into the reloading process either.

 

[TRexF16]

simple, he has gear but buys commerical ammo.
define " impressive results "
1" maybe ok for a hunter, but not for a target shooter
I got no use for 1" rifles

Well I'll take every 1" rifle you want to get rid of then!

Sorry, but I'm not a contender for the lazy reloading poll. I do all the nit-picky stuff even though I realize testing has shown not much of it really matters in the hunting fields except for even neck wall thickness and straight ammo with minimal runout. But like the other respondent, I'm retired and enjoy fiddling with brass and loading.

Cheers,
Rex

 

[Zen Archery]

Lazy?! Mwh....
But hunting rounds vs target rounds are treated completely opposite.
Now guess which one has less details.

 

[Canhunter35]

On my 22-250 and 204 I've tumbled, resized, primed and loaded, then shot gophers at 200-300 yards. But eventually necks get so hard, I can't help myself and I anneal and trim them back, I just can't bring myself to trash them instead of putting a little elbow grease into them

 

[Hand Skills]

The laziest reloading I've done is purchasing new prepped brass, loaded it and then sold as 1F.

I could get used to that, but unfortunately I have a pretty good supply of brass for my 'keeper' cartridges.

 

[memtb]

I used to de-burr and uniform primer pockets, weigh and separate brass, turn necks, anneal and trim cases 2 to 3 times in their life. However, with my hunting rifle for the last 20+ years, I've done none of the above. I weigh each charge, only clean carbon from primer pockets, and chamfer the necks....and rarely clean/polish the cases. It spite of my laziness, I can with pretty good consistency, get sub- 2", 3 shot groups @ 300 yards. Which, at least for me, is acceptable for a 9 pound, high recoil, "hunting" rifle being used to a maximum of 600 yards.....my self-imposed "game shooting" distance! memtb

 

[pig ranch deadeye]

You don't mess with primer pockets, your powder thrower is good to maybe 0.1 grain, you definitely don't neck turn, you still need to buy that one Hornady tool that measures stuff, you might have mixed in a different head stamp or two, you've never annealed anything...

But you still get impressive results out of your ammo. I want to hear from the guys doing the minimum. And by lazy I don't mean dangerous or careless. Not stuff that risks a kaboom, just dotting the i's and crossing the t's to get your ammo made safely, nothing more and nothing less.

I hand load to save money and turn out a huge pile of cartridges tailored to my particular gun so I can stay in practice. I started loading in 1963, in the third grade, when I would take a half gallon milk carton, cut off the top third, and fill it with .243 loads using military 4831. I loaded down in the basement after school. I buy Winchester power point or Remington core-lokt bullets in bulk, or when I get fancy, Speer Hot Core flat base bullets. The Speer bullets seem to be the most accurate and the price is fair. I am grateful to Speer for, over a life time, supplying me with a product that truly provides value. I go with spitzer bullets of high sectional density. My favorites of all time: Speer 200 grain in thirty caliber and Speer 150 grain in the .270. Simple and deadly.

I never compress the powder because that just seems "wrong" to me. I do measure things on occasion, but usually not. I just seat to the crimping groove and I crimp it. I never anneal or turn necks and don't intend to. When I feel like getting fancy I will buy a higher grade of brass, like Norma. Usually I buy Winchester Western. Primer pockets seem to work fine without doing anything down on that end of the case. I do trim to length, however.

The thing is even with my "lazy" reloads, every now and then I get a three shot group at a hundred yards with all rounds touching! Sometimes you just get lucky. I vary the charge a bit (I do a ladder) and when the primers start to flatten I back off. A crater in the primer is a definite warning to cool it on the powder. I have an opti-visor binocular magnifying glass, ten power, to get a close look at what the primer is doing.

Here the important thing is good record keeping. While shooting I always have my notebook open with the loads expressed in a table, and with the loaded cartridges marked in their labeled plastic box. I do all the record keeping before I leave home. I buy a sheet of stickers and after writing the information I put the sticker on the box. I put a check mark in blue ink in the table with each round fired. This forces me to rest between shots and it keeps the barrel cool. I get a rhythm going and this helps me concentrate. This is very Zen. Having a set procedure like this is a good way to avoid mistakes and stay safe.

The table includes a space to indicate which target I am shooting at. It does no good to shoot a magnificent group and forget what the hell it was! I watch the loads punch the paper using my made-in-China 20 power binoculars, which I rest on sandbags. As soon as I retrieve the target I label the groups to make a permanent record of that session, including the date, and I save the targets out in the garage in a stack. The label for each group on the target states the charge and bullet used.

While at the range I wear wax earplugs under a set of over-the-ear muffs. Double protection. I sight in at the top of the black at 100 yards, and this allows me to hit at 300 by holding a bit high of center of mass. I never shoot at anything beyond 400 yards, but if I think the target is over 350 I hold where the hair meets the sky. To tell you the truth, I am not really comfortable shooting beyond 250 yards. The top-of-the-black approach works well with any modern caliber. I never use digital electronics. I just don't approve of the younger shooters who fidget with dials on their scopes and try to hit stuff at 600 yards. This is not sporting or ethical.

I select the best load and crank them out, maybe 100 or 150 rounds. When my batch of loads is done, I chamber every round as a test. If a round won't chamber you don't want to find that out on the trail! I lightly oil the loaded rounds using a rag sprayed down with WD40. I put the oiled rounds in a zip lock with a label tucked away inside. The zip lock, which I leave cracked open, goes into a half gallon milk carton that also is labeled.

My philosophy is, keep it simple and go shoot. Even my worst performing loads group tighter than I can hold in the field. So this is how I have done it since 1963!

 

[Canhunter35]

The top-of-the-black approach works well with any modern caliber. I never use digital electronics. I just don't approve of the younger shooters who fidget with dials on their scopes and try to hit stuff at 600 yards. This is not sporting or ethical.

Check out the rules regarding ethic discussions pertaining to long range hunting on the forum