Cost saving?
Selecting load?
Accuracy?
or all the above.
l re;pad .38/.357, .41 Long Colt, 30/06, 7mm Remington Mag, 8X57mm, 30/30, 7.62A39 Russian. .45 Colt Government

l am a reloading instructor.

There r definite cost svaving, u get a much better selection of bullets, & l can make cartridged that r 20x more accurate than factory rounds.

The down side to reloading - u need to pay attention to detail, it is not much fun, & u need a rock solid work bench that does not move to do it right.

Right now, the ammo shelves in our local stores r empty. You can not find ammo at any price. l have enough material to keep shooting the next 5-7 years. That is important to me.

Hope this helps

All of the above but very time consuming & tedious.

All of the above BUT:

If u buy quality components the savings r not amazing but still very good. l can buy 100 Hornady SSTs for the price of 50 Nosler Partitions but the Partitions usually perform better. l can buy cheap brass but Norma & Nosler Custom r more consistent.

Selecting the load is great because l can load from 150 to 180 grain bullets into my 30 calibers depending on what performance l want.

Accuracy is linked directly to selecting loads. l can fine tune the powder charge to match the bullet-barrel-powder harmonics best. Some bullet weights or designs do not always work well with individual guns; so l can experiment with the best combination.

Accuracy & loadings r somewhat controlled by the Cartridge Overall Length (C.O.L.). If the COL is wrong then the accuracy suffers.
I've seen factory loads have COL vary as much as .200 between longest & shortest. When l reload l know precisely how much powder & what length I've loaded.

I've shot factory 165s in my 30-06 & got almost 2 inch groups; l shot my loads & l can cover 5 shots with a quarter with change left.

Yes & no. l reload for certain calibers for all the listed reasons, especially for my 220 swift. It will shoot 1/4 moa with 50 grain moly coated v max bullets & l shoot it often. l found a sweet load for my 45/70. You load a 405 grain cast bullets over trailboss powder to a velocity of around 1000 fps, & u have perhaps the most fun load ever shot out of a 45/70. It is quiet, almost no recoil, & impossible to shoot & not smile. On the other hand l have other calibers l do not reload for. If it is a rifle l do not shoot all that much, l probably wo not reload for it unless l want a load that is not available commercially.

yes, l reload all my ammo except shotgun shells. These days it is mostly pistol cartridges. l can reload pistol ammo for .380, 9mm, 38 spec, 357 mag,45 acp, & 45 long colt. For rifle ammo l have dies for 30 carbine, 7.62x54 R, 30-06, 6mm remington, 250-3000 savage & 308 winchester.
When l shot combat pistol competition, it was not unusual for me to fire 500 to 1000 rounds per week, & reloading was the only way l could afford that much ammo. l still have every set of reloading dies l have ever bought, & l keep them just in case l might pick up another rifle or pistol in that caliber again. Currently l am only reloading for 38 spec, 45 acp, & 45 long colt

my family does. l supply a lot of the brass , and they load it up !
you can make the ammo .. as hot .. as you want .. so that is why they prefer to load it themselves. it does save money.

l reload about 15 different cartridges. l reload 45 Colt, 45-70, & 45-90. l use my own cast bullets & black powder for those. The cost of similar ammo would probably 4 times my cost. Of course that is not counting labor. Another thing is that most if not all factory 30-06 ammo creates too much port pressure in a M-1 Garand. It cycles harder & will lead to a bent operating rod. Military surplus is usually fine. So l reload 30-06 to get proper port pressure. l reload for all 3 reasons though l do not worry about accuracy as much with pistol ammo.

l reload everything except 9mm & 12 gauge shotgun shells because it cost more to reload than to buy a case of it, plus the time involved it is not worth it.

l cast my own paper patch bullets & reload my 1874 45-120 Sharps rifle. l also load all the ammo for my .223, .243, 30-30 & 35 Remington rifles & pistols.

l get better accuracy due to experimenting with different loads. It is probably less expensive to load ur own if u do not figure out the time spent, l do it because its relaxing, challenging & l can get a 1/2 minute of angle out of all my bull barrel target rifles.

As usual, l have to come in here & play devil is advocate.

About a week ago l visited the sporting goods department at my local Walmart store to hunt for some after Christmas bargains. l could not find any clearance items, but l did take a look at the ammo case. l already have enough ammo (and reloading supplies) to last me for the rest of my life. But then again.can we ever really have ''enough''?

l found some bulk pack boxes of ammo. l purchased some boxes of 100 rounds of Remington 38 Special +P with 125 gr. SJHP bullets. l paid $28.97 a box plus tax. We will call that roughly $31.00 a box, out the door.

Ok, so l just looked at the MidwayUSA.com website. MidwayUSA usually has the best prices on components. Assuming u buy in what l would call ''normal'' packaging for bullets & brass, the prices r as follows:

Pack of 100 Remington 125 gr. SJHP bullets at $14.79
Pack of 100 Remington 38 Special unfired cases at $18.49

Doing the simple math, that comes to a grand total of $33.28 for ONLY the bullets & brass. Add to this 100 primers & a sufficient amount of powder for 38 Spcl. +P loads. Let is also add in the high cost of shipping today to my MidwayUSA order & u can start to see that reloading is not economically sensible.

Another tale of woe here. Back in 1977, when l was just a teenager, l recall paying $3.25 a box for 12 ga. Winchester AA target loads (1 1/8 oz shot, 3 dram). In October of 2008 (31 years later) my local Kmart had a sale on their Remington promo loads. The 12 ga. loads featured only 1 oz of shot, but that also means less recoil & a better ''challenge'' on the clay target fields. The price? A whopping $3.68 a box. This means that my cost for shotshells as risen a whopping 43 cents in the past 31 years.

Now, add in the time it takes to ACCURATELY & SAFELY load ur own ammunition, & u can see where we r going in terms of economics.

l still like to ''roll my own'' when it comes to hunting cartridges though. l find that l can get better accuracy & know exactly what l am getting in terms of bullet performace downrange when it comes to shooting calibers like my 22-250 or 300 Wby Mag.

About the only way u r going to save any kind of money is if u happen upon a really good deal at a yard sale or flea market & someone is selling grandpappy is loading stuff at the prices he paid for it back in 1975.

Bottom line. Folks like to come in here & brag about how much they r saving by loading their own ammunition. Ok, now run the numbers like l just did (above) & tell me about that cost savings.

For me, this is just more evidence of why people got conned into paying $450,000 for homes that r only worth $200,000. This is not even junior high school algebra. This is grade school math.

And to geeze a bit more here. If l had gone to sleep like Rip Van Winkle back in 1977 & woke up today, l would find that Al Franken, the comedian, is a US Senator & NASA scientists have forgotten how to build a space ship to go to the moon.

No. l usually just buy it re-manufactured.
Except for shotgun shells that is.

do you mean reloading like reloading people does it or reloading as in taking existing ammo, and change it performance with new bullets or changes in powder?

Because l only modify my ammo. None of my ammo has boxer primers or practical to reload with.