So I did the math on reloading shotgun shells

[jzdank]

And I was floored. Maybe the place I was looking had inflated prices, but I was quite surprised.

My little buddy is getting old enough to start tagging along and becoming my little hunting buddy. I have always wanted to reload my own shotgun shells, but before I started buying stuff, I figured I would do some math.
14 bucks for 100 hull's
5 bucks per lb of lead shot
31 bucks for 1000 primers
22 bucks per pound of powder
12 bucks per 250 wads.

Doing 1oz loads with 30 grains of powder (I'm not an expert, but trying to over estimate), the cost of a box comes out to 15.75 per box, 12.25 without having to buy the hulls.

Am I missing something here, or are the numbers in the right ballpark, and commercially produced shotgun ammunition is cheaper?

 

[BoomstickBuff]

When I was reloading, I was able to keep my costs at roughly $6 per box. I can tell you that some of your prices are way too high - for example, I bought once-fired hulls for $5/100 all the time and could easily reload them 4+ times. However, I have found a number of options to get decent quality target loads (e.g. Federal) for $6/box or less. Soooo...I sold my press and components and now shoot factory shells. There was a time where you could save a fair bit by reloading shotshells, but my opinion is that day has passed.

 

[swmp9jrm]

For 12ga, about the only way you save money by reloading is if you buy components in larger quantities. I buy 5,000 or 10,000 wads at a time, 5,000 primers, and 8 pound kegs of powder. Most expensive part of the process is the shot. No cost for the hulls as I have tubs full of them and they can be reloaded multiple times. I can reload 7/8 oz trap loads for less than $4 a box and 1 1/8 oz loads for less than $4.50 a box. Used to be able to get Gun Club on sale at Dick's for about $5 a box, but now the best I've seen is about $5.75 a box. I go through a lot of shells shooting trap, so it makes sense for me to reload, and I long ago paid for the equipment. If you're only reloading for hunting it's probably a losing proposition.

 

[TJ Kackowski]

In today's economy, the true value of 12 ga. reloading is being able to customize the load to your wants and needs. You want a light load to use as a training load, or a Frankenload to use for gaming ... no problem. Reloading can also be beneficial if you're loading for gauges other than 12 ga.

The biggest benefit I found was in the time I spent with my kids when they helped with the reloading ... so, you've got that to consider in your cost per round.

 

[amboy49]

And I was floored. Maybe the place I was looking had inflated prices, but I was quite surprised.

My little buddy is getting old enough to start tagging along and becoming my little hunting buddy. I have always wanted to reload my own shotgun shells, but before I started buying stuff, I figured I would do some math.
14 bucks for 100 hull's
5 bucks per lb of lead shot
31 bucks for 1000 primers
22 bucks per pound of powder
12 bucks per 250 wads.

Doing 1oz loads with 30 grains of powder (I'm not an expert, but trying to over estimate), the cost of a box comes out to 15.75 per box, 12.25 without having to buy the hulls.

Am I missing something here, or are the numbers in the right ballpark, and commercially produced shotgun ammunition is cheaper?

First, you didn't mention whether you already have a reloader. If not, you would have to add in the cost of one. You are a little off on your component cost(s).
Floatable hulls ar plentiful and can be had for the taking at most trap/skeet range(s). If you need a 100 to get you started I'll give them to you.
Lead shot is currently selling for $40 for a 25# bag. That's a $1.60 a pound not including tax.
Primer cost is about correct.
Powder cost is close as well and you'll need about 17-18 grains per shell.
Wads are about half of your stated cost.

The poster above was right about buying in volume. If you don't anticipate shooting a couple hundred rounds or more a month you're probably better off looking for shells on sale at Dicks or GM. You won't get premium Winchester or Remington shells - but Gun Club or Estates can be had in the $5 or slightly more range.

Lastly, all bets are off if you want to shoot 20, .28, or .410. Factory ammo, especially .28 and .410 is much more expensive.

Good luck with your continued research.

 

[Bfish]

I was looking in to reloading shotgun also... I decided just to buy them in bulk as it had no where near the savings of reloading pistol and rifle. I am still saving my hulls in case that changes one day. I recently saw 12 gage for $4.94 a box and bought a case, I went back to buy more and it was gone... I do wish I'd bought more!

 

[churchmouse]

In today's economy, the true value of 12 ga. reloading is being able to customize the load to your wants and needs. You want a light load to use as a training load, or a Frankenload to use for gaming ... no problem. Reloading can also be beneficial if you're loading for gauges other than 12 ga.

The biggest benefit I found was in the time I spent with my kids when they helped with the reloading ... so, you've got that to consider in your cost per round.

Time. That is the real expense. Having the time.

 

[SSGSAD]

And I was floored. Maybe the place I was looking had inflated prices, but I was quite surprised.

My little buddy is getting old enough to start tagging along and becoming my little hunting buddy. I have always wanted to reload my own shotgun shells, but before I started buying stuff, I figured I would do some math.
14 bucks for 100 hull's
5 bucks per lb of lead shot
31 bucks for 1000 primers
22 bucks per pound of powder
12 bucks per 250 wads.

Doing 1oz loads with 30 grains of powder (I'm not an expert, but trying to over estimate), the cost of a box comes out to 15.75 per box, 12.25 without having to buy the hulls.

Am I missing something here, or are the numbers in the right ballpark, and commercially produced shotgun ammunition is cheaper?

I agree with amboy49,

First, contact me, and I will GIVE you 100 12 ga., shells .....

Second, I haven't bought ANY shotshell items, in quite some time.....

But wads, are about half of what you have listed.....

Powder, unless you are going to load MAGNUM, about half the powder.... 16 to 20 grains, depending on the other componets.....

good luck .....

 

[kennedy759]

I shoot 16 ga, bought a bunch of remington game loads $9 box for practice and to get hulls, I now can make reloads for about $6. also when I bought my press used, the seller gave me 3 boxes of federal ammo, so thats another 75 free hulls. local gun club sells shot for $37, and winchester primers for $28. so you can get your costs down by shopping around a little,plus gives you an excuse to visit different gun shops.

 

[gun_nut]

Last time I stocked up on them, I got 1000 AA hulls for .02 cents apiece.

 

[Leo]

I used to reload 20 -30 boxes, every month. I have a nice 12 gauge progressive press that I have not taken out of the box since 2010. When Remington Gun Clubs or Federal top guns were $4.00 per box and you could reload for less than $2.10 a box, it was worth it. I am not loosing the time to save 75 cents.

I can only summerize my experience with the others. I have a lot of hulls, so my cost is only wads, primers, shot and if you are lucky enough to find powder, (and paying inflated prices) takes most the price savings out of it. The desire to shoot your favorite custom spec shells is all that is left for 12 gauge and twenty gauge. The 16, 28 gauge and .410 bore still give you savings, as you never see them on sale for $5.50 a box.

I have a Ken Ruckers spring/hydraulic system on my competition shotgun, so a 100 or 200 bird program with full regulation 3 dram shells do not beat me up, so I don't need soft recoil custom reloads.

 

[Sniper 79]

I always see guys dumping tons of hulls in the dumpster at my club. All are once fired factory stuff in 20 and 12. I hated to see them go to waste all the time so like you I ran some numbers and came up with the same thing.

Factory ammo is still cheap enough especially when buying a case at a time on sale. Like others have said unless you are shooting a mega ton or have a need for a custom load forget about it.

Shot guns are not my first choice in firearms and only get shot once every few years give or take. So for me it don't make sense. As a hand loader for pistol and rifle it still sucks to see a 55gal drum of hulls get dumped into the dumpster.

Do those hulls have any value? They are mainly Hearters, Federal, Remington, stuff.

 

[bigretic]

For 12ga, about the only way you save money by reloading is if you buy components in larger quantities. I buy 5,000 or 10,000 wads at a time, 5,000 primers, and 8 pound kegs of powder. Most expensive part of the process is the shot. No cost for the hulls as I have tubs full of them and they can be reloaded multiple times. I can reload 7/8 oz trap loads for less than $4 a box and 1 1/8 oz loads for less than $4.50 a box. Used to be able to get Gun Club on sale at Dick's for about $5 a box, but now the best I've seen is about $5.75 a box. I go through a lot of shells shooting trap, so it makes sense for me to reload, and I long ago paid for the equipment. If you're only reloading for hunting it's probably a losing proposition.

ditto.

I was looking in to reloading shotgun also... I decided just to buy them in bulk as it had no where near the savings of reloading pistol and rifle. I am still saving my hulls in case that changes one day. I recently saw 12 gage for $4.94 a box and bought a case, I went back to buy more and it was gone... I do wish I'd bought more!

I buy off the shelf at $5.99 or less generally rather than spend the time reloading.

Time. That is the real expense. Having the time.

Yup.

 

[RipkinC]

Shotshell loading for target IMHO is not worth it, once you factor in time your usually loosing money over a cheep winchester or federal bulk pack. If your a competitor it can be different, just like metallic loading you can taylor loads to the gun. The biggest kicker these days is the cost of shot. It makes everything else look cheep.
Now where shotshell loading definitely saves you is in hunting and self defense loads, especially if you cast your own slug and buckshot. But most only buy maybe 20 slugs for a season and thats assuming half go to sight in/practice so busting out a machine, spending an hour to load etc is not worth the $10-15 savings for most.
What I have always said to these questions is its fun loading, but do not expect to save like you do in metallic loading (most are looking at making target shot ammo) the equipment does not retain value as much (recommend buying used) and the hulls take up a ton of space comparatively. So unless your running the clays shoting circuit a bulk 100ct pack from a big box store will usually work.

 

[Twangbanger]

When I first started shooting registered trap in 1989, it was worthwhile to reload. Shot was the most expensive component, and rarely more than $25 for a 25 pound bag through the mid-90s. I bought a $600 Ponsness Warren reloader in 1995, and added another couple used ones the next two years in different gauges. Winchester AAs and Remington STPs were still $5 a box, but if you bought components in quantity, you could almost cut that in half by reloading. I would buy factory shells at the Grand American each August, and in a week of shooting, I'd have enough fresh hulls to last the following year, since I could easily reload them 8 or 10 times. Eventually, I had a row of 55-gallon plastic trash cans in my garage full of hulls to reload from. If you didn't want to load, you could save your empties & there was a good secondary market in selling them to other shooters for $0.05 a hull to recoup some of your costs.

Then, things started to change. It's almost like the ammo companies didn't want you to reload anymore, and decided to get serious about hindering you. They started cheapening their hulls, so they wouldn't last as many reloadings. (Listen to clay shooters talking about "old" AAs vs. "new" AAs, for example). China started using tremendous amounts of metals (lead for car batteries, brass, etc.), and your $25 bags of shot nearly doubled in price in a few years. The cost of the good factory target shells started going up. Then, the low cost shells and imports began to pour in...Estates, Rios, Nobel Sport, Challengers, etc. Remember the "Wal Mart Federals," 100 round bulk packs of what were basically Estate shells with hard shot for $14.97? The large ammo companies took a role in introducing these loads. Pretty soon, trapshooters realized that for shooting anything less than long-yardage handicap at a state shoot or higher, the $14.97 Wally World shells were good enough.

By 2001 or 2002, the change was well underway, and by 2003, it seemed like the only "loading" I was doing, was loading the flats of factory shells into my vehicle! The economics weren't there anymore. The only people who were doing really well price-wise on reloads were using reclaimed shot (or melting lead and dropping their own), and going together with friends to buy massive lots of components. My PWs went up for sale while the market for them still existed, and it was back to my old MEC and Hornady machine for what little loading I did.

I won't say never reload shotshells. It's nice to not have to buy 3 dram store loads for target shooting. However - the economics are different than metallic ammo. The projectile weight is massive on a per-shot basis, plus you have to buy wads. Absolutely do not pour a ton of money into an expensive loader like a Spolar, P/W, Dillon, or similar. The lowest-priced, used progressive MEC you can find with all its parts intact will do just fine.

 

[kennedy759]

just hit the lottery, scored 1000 once fired 16 ga hulls for .07 each, hopefully get at least 3 reloads each

 

[pdg45acp]

And I was floored. Maybe the place I was looking had inflated prices, but I was quite surprised.

My little buddy is getting old enough to start tagging along and becoming my little hunting buddy. I have always wanted to reload my own shotgun shells, but before I started buying stuff, I figured I would do some math.
14 bucks for 100 hull's - free if you pick them up where you shoot skeet, trap or sporting clays.
5 bucks per lb of lead shot - $45 for 25lb of new shot ($1.80 per pound) or $30 for 25lb of reclaimed shot ($1.20 per pound)
31 bucks for 1000 primers
22 bucks per pound of powder
12 bucks per 250 wads.

Doing 1oz loads with 30 grains of powder (I'm not an expert, but trying to over estimate), the cost of a box comes out to 15.75 per box, 12.25 without having to buy the hulls.

Am I missing something here, or are the numbers in the right ballpark, and commercially produced shotgun ammunition is cheaper?

It's still too expensive to reload shotgun though.

 

[BE Mike]

I recently loaded up a few hundred. I did a price breakdown. It came out to $5.25 per box. I consider mine as about equal to Winchester AA, which go for about $9.50/box. I'd say you are paying way too much for components. Certainly you are paying more than I.

 

[triggerhappy]

5 bucks per lb of lead shot!
you need to find a better supplier for your shot, I've been paying around $1.70 per lb

 

[98cirrus]

For me reloading is both cheaper and FUN. There was a day when components were inexpensive and you could reload a box of shells for a couple bucks. Not so any more, but over those years i got to liking the reloading process. We shoot alot of 27 yard "Suzy Cues" and "Protections" at my range, with a few quarters in the kitty for winner take all. The shoot offs are back another 10-15 paces. Gotta have good ammo to win those quarters! My premium reloads would cost 8-9$ a box as factory loads and with bulk buying and careful shopping i keep my cost around 4.75$ a box.
The fun: My reloader sets up close to a tv, and i reload mostly in the winter, in the man room. Reloading puts me in a good mood and the reloader never complains. The pile of shells keeps building and building, it's enjoyable. My M E C reloader must be 20 years old and with a little love just keeps on chugging. It turns out pretty uniform loads that pattern well. As a kid i used to set up my dad's MEC reloader, back when they had wood fiber wads. Nice memories around the reloader.
I find it trickier to make "super clean" reloads that will continuously cycle well in the semi automatic I use for sporting clays. (The problem is residue.)I GAVE UP TRYING. I shop hard and shoot store bought ammo in the semi. A couple months after Obama got in office i went up to On Target in Kalamazoo and bought 24 cases of sporting clays ammo. The 20ga stuff was 3.99 and the 12g hotter 1 1/8 oc. load for the Benelli was 4.87 per box. Wish i had bought more 12 GA. along with all the .22 ammo they had on hand at the time. OH WELL! If i went to an over-
under for the sporting clays, I would switch over and shoot reloads in it too.