Isn't this sad...30-30 ammo

I pictured this at the local Walmart the other day. We live in a rural area where deer season is almost celebrated like Christmas. Let's see: Four boxes of .350 Remington Magnum, which nobody's ever heard of, and two other calibers of ammo which don't go to a rifle anyone owns. Fortunately for me, I handload in several different calibers, so no ammo shortage here. I have about 500 rounds of 30-06 using different weight bullets.

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Yeah but even the materials for hand loading are becoming extremely scarce and expensive now. It's crazy. Any time I see a pre-purchase backorder sale for decent ammo offered by Brownwells/OpticsPlanet/etc, I jump on it. It takes a little longer to arrive, but at least it's not costing 5x the market rate from a year ago.

I'm seeing that. Two months ago, the price for small pistol primers was about $3-$4 per hundred or $30-$40 per box of 1,000. Those are the ones used in 9mm ammo. None of the reloading supply places around here has them anymore and they're bringing up to $350 per thousand now. I did manage to score a decent stash of primers at some garage sales last summer, so I'm good.

Same thing with small rifle, large rifle, and large pistol magnum primers. They seem to be made of unobtanium now. I still have access to a wide variety of powders, thanks to a local gun shop that over-bought a couple years ago, but you have to take what you can get. No more Alliant 2400 or Unique for magnum handloads, but plenty of other brands and types. It's just time-consuming working up loads every time you change powder or bullet weight.

Plenty of Hodgdon Titegroup too, which is good for most any pistol calibers. It takes smaller charges but is wicked to work with, as a one/tenth of a grain increase can cause a massive pressure spike, and turn your pistol into a hand grenade.

Bullets are scarce too: Anything in a .355 diameter (9mm), especially the jacketed ones. There are still plenty of cast lead/tin bullets around made by ACME or other companies, and their Hy-Tek polymer-coated bullets are pretty good if you keep them below 1200 fps.

And then there are the two 5-gallon buckets of wheel weights behind the house. I have bullet molds for 9mm, 38 Special, .44 magnum, 30-06, British .303, and several muzzle-loading rifles and pistols, which use only pure lead. Plenty of Pyrodex powder and percussion caps for the muzzle-loaders.

As for commercial ammo, I spent the last ten years buying up what I could find at garage sales. Probably have 10,000 rounds of 7.62x39mm for the AK, and a bunch of other calibers I don't even have the gun for. Probably have too much .22 LR too.

No such thing as too much .22LR.
The only time there's such a thing as too much ammo, is when you're swimming or on fire.

LOL true statement!
 
It's not the time so much as I don't know how it was stored.

The eye test usually works...is the brass tarnished?
Yeah, little bit.
And a bottle of solvent had leaked into the bottom of the tub, too. No telling what that may have done.
What kind of solvent?

I still remember the bucket that my uncle bought, full of British .303 ammo. Its original use has been holding used truck engine oil. Nobody bothered to wash it out. In a word, yuck.
 
It's not the time so much as I don't know how it was stored.

The eye test usually works...is the brass tarnished?
Yeah, little bit.
And a bottle of solvent had leaked into the bottom of the tub, too. No telling what that may have done.
What kind of solvent?

I still remember the bucket that my uncle bought, full of British .303 ammo. Its original use has been holding used truck engine oil. Nobody bothered to wash it out. In a word, yuck.
Hoppe's 9 I think.
 
It's not the time so much as I don't know how it was stored.

The eye test usually works...is the brass tarnished?
Yeah, little bit.
And a bottle of solvent had leaked into the bottom of the tub, too. No telling what that may have done.
What kind of solvent?

I still remember the bucket that my uncle bought, full of British .303 ammo. Its original use has been holding used truck engine oil. Nobody bothered to wash it out. In a word, yuck.
Hoppe's 9 I think.

Love the smell of that stuff. I use it for shaving lotion.

:laughing0301:
 

What about spare magazines? You do have spare magazines, don't you?
He does.

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Nothing to do with Biden and everything to do with scared dumb-asses buying up everything. "Biden gonna take my guns so I gotta buy more guns". Dumbasses. I pretty much had to quit shooting and hold on to what I have because panic buying has made the cost prohibitive.
Don't forget that a lot of people who lived in dangerous neighborhoods who desperately wished they had a gun to defend themselves and their families who couldn't previously afford to buy a gun got a windfall $1200 check, plus unemployment benefits that were several hundred dollars more per month than their regular pay.

You can get a pretty good quality gun for $1200.

That Mossburg 500 shotgun at $400 is still a good deal. I got my two of those a couple of decades ago at about $300. In 12 gauge and with two barrels which change out quick; one at @27 inch for hunting, skeet,~longer shooting and the other at @18 inch which is better for indoors~home defense.
 

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