I've been looking at getting back into reloading (mostly pistol) cartridges. At one point, I had quite a setup, involving an RCBS Rockchucker, but sold it during college. I currently have only a Lee Handloader, which I'm not terribly fond of using.
Lately, I've gotten into competition shooting (IDPA for now), and am starting to shoot more, now that I have some free time. I'm currently shooting a lot of Brown Bear 9mm ammunition, imported from Russia. I can get it for around $0.187/round, shipped, which I believe is the cheapest ammunition available at the moment.
I realize there's plenty of steelcase ammunition detractors out there - despite their ample arguments and protestations (easy to find online), all the Russian steelcase works wonderfully for me. It's accurate and reliable. But that doesn't keep me from remembering a time not long ago (2 years?) when Winchester Whitebox was under $10 for 100 rounds.
So I'm trying to put together the numbers to see if it's economically viable to reload 9mm today. Here's my breakdown of a per-round cost, exclusive of equipment and time, based on prices today:
$0.079/rnd Bullet - Berry's bullets 115 grain plated; $79.08/k shipped
$0.029/rnd Primer - Available from local gun forums; $29/k
$0.013/rnd Powder - based on a load of 4.6gr W231, at $160/8 lbs shipped
$0.008/rnd Brass - Once-fired, $30/k, 75% recovery until 90% depleted
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$0.129/rnd Total
Compared to the $0.187/round cost of Brown Bear ammunition, I save $0.058/round by handloading. 31% off.
I've done some shopping as far as the type of reloading setup I'd like to assemble, and I'm looking at setups costing around either $300 or $500.
To break-even on these equipment investments, at a savings of $0.058/round, I'd need to produce:
$300 reloading setup - 5172 rounds to breakeven
$500 reloading setup - 8620 rounds to breakeven
These aren't huge roundcounts for me, but they're still up there, now that I'm working and don't live by the national forest. At this point, my limits as far as useful shooting are about 200 rounds per trip to the indoor range, every other week. That's right about 5200 rounds per year - I'd be able to pay off $300 of equipment in a year.
I actually entered into this analysis with the belief that I wouldn't be able to make back my investment without an astronomical upfront purchase of supplies, but the first 6000 rounds' upfront materials costs look like:
$474 - Bullets
$174 - Primer
$160 - Powder (8 lbs jug)
$180 - Once-fired brass
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$988 Total for first 6k rounds. ($1288 with $300 of reloading equipment.)
This slightly distorts the per-round cost analysis, as that 8 lbs keg of powder at 4.6gr/load is good for a bit more than 12k rounds.
$1288 for 6000 handloaded rounds, with equipment
$1122 for 6000 Brown Bear factory loaded rounds
These numbers do actually show that, contrary to my hypothesis, the reloading upfront costs don't actually vary much from outright purchasing the loaded ammunition.
I probably will find the time to put together a setup some time this year, then.
There is another dimension I haven't quite explored - time. With a turret press setup, I can get about 200 rounds per hour produced, based on my previous experience. To load those 6000 rounds, I'd need 30 hours of labor. If I analyzed this strictly along the dimension of economics in relation to my hourly consulting/contracting rate, reloading is an insanely stupid proposition. In moderation, reloading is an enjoyable activity for me, though, so I feel this is probably acceptable.
I want to take some time later to research primary movers of ammunition costs. If preloaded ammunition can somehow head back down to the $10/100 rounds zone, the economics and hassle balance change completely. Given how much volatility there's been in the last five years with respect to the political landscape and the voracious commodities markets (particularly wrt metals), I want to find out how much we can attribute ammunition price swings to these various factors, with an eye for maybe:
Waiting for a return to lower preloaded ammunition prices
Looking to hedge ammunition costs with commodities plays on metals (ETFs, mainly)
Doing further analysis to determine cost trajectories of components v. loaded cartridges