Reloading Cost/Benefit Analysis: 9mm, 45 ACP, .308, .223

[NVGdude]

Buying new brass is only worth the expenditure for hard to find brass like .45 Colt, 7.5 Swiss etc.

Common brass like .45 acp or .40 S&W is basically free at any outdoor range, folks who don't reload are almost always willing to give you their brass if you ask nicely. I have bought once fired before for when I wanted 1000 pieces of matched brass to simply load up and put away. John at brassmanbrass.com is a good source.

For low pressure straight walled cartridges like .45 acp you can load them forever. Most folks loose them long before they wear out. I have .45 acp brass that is over 60 years old.

[JustinR]

60 years huh? That's pretty impressive.

I stuck with new brass simply because I only started reloading last month, and I'm wanting to eliminate as many variables as I can in the process. I have no idea what I'm getting into in buying once-fired brass (in terms of quality), and thus I haven't explored that road. The range I shoot at in Garland allows you to pick up your own brass, but they claim ownership to any left behind, otherwise I would have been volunteering to clean up their range.

The .308 dies I bought were Hornady, and the Get Reloaded! rebate has already been sent in.

At 400 rounds per hour on a progressive, that would easily make reloading 45 worth the effort.

[evan price]

I have .45 acp brass headstamped 1934 that is still going strong.

As far as loading cost benefit goes, that's an individual thing, based on how much do you shoot and what time do you have to put forth into reloading versus the extra cost of just buying 300 rounds from Wal*Mart every six months?

Evan Price's Cost Per Thousand:

9mm: $66
.38 Spl: $73
.357 Mag: $76
.40 S&W: $87
.45 acp: $87
.44 Spl: $87
.44 Mag: $96
.223: $148
.308: $215

I shoot a good bit and because I reload, I don't feel guilty about taking 500 rounds of 3 pistol calibers to the range and spending 4 hours there, anymore.

Pistol powder is Titegroup bought in 8# kegs in group buys from Powder Valley, Graf's, Wideners, whoever gives us the best deal. Primers have been Wolf lately at $18 a thousand bought in 10K lots from the same group buys. Bullets are hardcast lead for pistols or I can load a Rainier plated hollow-point for self-defense ammo duplication at extra cost.
Military-type for rifles (55-gr Remington JSP for the .223, 147-gr M80 for the .308) with H335 powder bought in 8# kegs in the group buy. I also load some other rifle calibers with Varget and nice retail bullets (.223 with a 40-gr Nosler, .308 with Hornady 165-gr SST, 6.5x55 with Hornady 129 SP, 8mm Mauser with 185-gr Remington PSP etc) and these cost more.

[Combat Controller]

I am averaging $110 per 1000 right now with LSWC 200 gr in .45 ACP, and with all the talking I do to Fast Rope when we reload together I still crank out 300 rounds an hour. In the rifles and exotic ammo it gets an even wider gap in the price/performance ratio. Trust me, most used brass is worth it, even if you get a 20% fail rate.

Heck I have never ever used new brass for .45 and some of my headstamps are almost gone from being reloaded so many times. If you are feeling hinky about used brass, the low pressure straight walled stuff is always fine...

[Whirlibird]

I did a test to destruction test on .45 brass some years ago.
I gave up after 22 firings, the cases still hadn't reached max length (with hot loads), the headstamps were gone (W-W) and I was filing burrs off the rims to get them into the shell holder.

So .45 would break down like this:

Using 5.0gr of Bullseye at $18.00 a lb (last I bought) that comes out to .013 cents a pop. Assuming I make a mess occasionally, lets just say $.02 apiece.

CCI primers were $115 for 5K, (again last I bought) that comes out to $.023 a piece. For argument we'll just say $.03 a piece.

Bullets, if I cast my own don't cost anything but for others, Missouri Bullet has the best prices with a flat rate shipping of $9.85 for 2000 up to 240gr. The 200gr LSWC's in either hardness run $34.00 for 500. So to save money, let's get 2000 for $136 and add shipping $9.85 to equal $145.85 total.
That breaks down to $.0739 a piece, but let's just say $.08 a piece for arguments sake.

Cases I've scrounged from every range, indoor or outdoor, police ranges, my own brass piles from blasting and who knows where so we won't figure in a cost there.

That totals $.02 + $.03 + $.08 = $.13 a pop.

For 9mm, we'll use the same powder and primer for arguments sake but the bullets only cost $113.85 for 2K, making their cost only $.0569 or $.06 if we round up.
That'd make the 9mm run $.11 a pop.

.40 splits the difference.

So 1000 rounds of .45 would run, $130. Versus the $320+ for the Remington ball. And I won't wear my barrel out with the lead loads. Something to consider.

As far as the cost of my time, that's time I'm not watching the politico's on TV so that's a good thing, it keeps my blood pressure down. It's healthy. And it'll feed me.
Or to put it simply, What's time to a hog?