New to loading ammo....

Hello all. Well, me and the fiancé about to move into our first house in about a month. When we move I want to start a new hobby, loading my own ammo. I figured all I am going to load for now is 9mm. I have two main questions and hopefully so of you can help me.

1st question: I am trying to figure out the basic equipment I need to get started. I have decided that since I am new to this and I don’t have a whole pile of money to spend on equipment, I think I want to start out with simple hand loading devices:

http://www.midwayusa.com/Product/665540/lee-breech-lock-hand-press

http://www.midwayusa.com/Product/319794/rcbs-universal-hand-priming-tool

I understand I will need dies. This was the set I was looking at….

http://www.midwayusa.com/Product/885350/lee-deluxe-carbide-4-die-set-9mm-luger

Is that die set all I will need?

Now as far as powder is concerned, I have no idea what a good powder to use for 9mm is, so any good suggestions?

Other than the bullets, shells, and primers, what else do I need for a good loading set?

Question 2: Realistically, how much money do you really save by loading your own ammo?

I really need some good advice on this because I am really interested in doing this not only as a hobby, but to save a few bucks. At the same time, I have never loaded my own ammo before and I don’t want to load anything wrong and blow myself up at the range. Also any suggestions on any good loading books/reference manuals would be appreciated also.

Thanks for any and all information and help.

The first question to answer is......... About how many rounds do you plan to shoot each month? Be honest.....

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2nd - Forget the "myth" of saving money by loading your own ammo

It might sound great to the lil woman....but it aint true

msredneck wrote:2nd - Forget the "myth" of saving money by loading your own ammo

It might sound great to the lil woman....but it aint true

Because you start with 9mm and figure you might as well load 38, 308, 44, 45, 270, 30/06, 40 &so on. You wont save money till you stop reloading and I dont reload that much or have I been reloading that long.

I started witb the lee classic turret press. Not that much more expensive.

yeah your not gonna save any money especially with 9mm. IF you were loading .257 weatherby mag you might save some money since the factory ammo is 60 a box. You can save your brass and use any 25 caliber ammo and load it for less than 20 a box, but 9 is already so cheap you won't save anymoney until around 10k rounds once you count buying the press and all. you also need a scale. For my first press I bought the RCBS supreme master reloading kit it has everything you need. Scale, press, powder dump, trays, and manual. You will only need dies.

I got the Lee Anniversary Press Kit for my first venture into reloading.
http://www.midwayusa.com/Product/423081/lee-challenger-breech-lock-single-stage-press-anniversary-kit
It comes with just about everything you need except the dies. I would also highly recommend a bullet puller...
http://www.midwayusa.com/Product/215517/frankford-arsenal-impact-bullet-puller
You will be needing it. Plus you may want to look into getting a tumbler, although it is not that necessary. I started out reloading 9mm with Clays Universal but I'm now using Unique. You can save money after you recoup the expenditure on the equipment. Especially if you go in with the group buys that we have in the forum.

P.S. You may want to invest in this so that you can double check your powder loads before you seat the bullets and make sure that you don't double charge a case or one is not too full or has too little in it. http://www.midwayusa.com/Product/122368/frankford-arsenal-universal-reloading-tray-50-round-plastic-blue

msredneck wrote:Forget the "myth" of saving money by loading your own ammo

I've got 500 rounds of 45-60 cartridges loaded up here at the house...would cost me better than $1500 if I bought them from Buffalo Arms. Cost me around $75 to reload them using my cast bullets. Brass was cut down from 45-70 and it was paid for years ago so I don't figure the cost of it in. So I'm one of those that save money reloading.

I am rather new to re-loading.. but some thoughts.

Forget a hand-held press. If your shooting 9mm your NOT shooting 5 or 10 rounds a year.. your shooting 100+ per session. You will only be very frustrated trying to crank out 100 rounds that way. Get a progressive, any brand.

Of all the calibers to "save money" on 9mm is probably the hardest. Cost new is the lowest of all calibers save a .22. Will you save money eventually?, sure. Can you try some varience to loads that you otherwise could not?, sure! But for the most part, 9mm has a fairly small tolerance for variance. Now all that said I don't know your intentions for shooting, if you hope to shoot 1k rounds a month... yeah you will start saving money sooner.

Scales: I have both... I only use the balance beam.
Bullet puller: not an option, buy one
Heavy work bench, nice and tidy ( to start with) area .. yes
Good Lighting

I hope this helps. Keep asking questions... we like looking smarter than we are!

PS: on the post about not saving money: Hes not entirely wrong, but it might not be obvious why: once your re-loading, the ammo SEEMS cheap.. so you feel more comfortable shooting more...So shot for shot it IS cheaper... but us reloaders cant stop shooting so we can load more!

I only plan to shoot a few hundred rounds every now and then. I don’t really plan on going to the range every week and shooting 1000 rounds. More like going to the range maybe once every two months and shooting a few hundred rounds. I am also just trying to find a “therapeutic hobby” to occupy my time.

I had just heard that it was cheeper to load your own ammo, which I why I wanted to ask before I put forth all the money to buy all of the equipment and foind out I am only saving about .02 cents per round.

Typically I load for about half price on any given caliber. The more specialty loads like ballistic tip and match grade stuff I load for well under half price. Of course if you figure in the cost of your setup and reloading costs more than buying ammo at first but it pays for itself in the long run. Also the more you buy in bulk the cheaper it is. For bullets go with precision delta. Minimum order is 2000 but I haven't found anyone that can beat their price for jacketed bullets.

Kevin346 wrote:I am also just trying to find a “therapeutic hobby” to occupy my time.

Reloading will fit that bill then...course casting your own bullets is another relaxing hobby.

I would suggest getting a good reloading handbook and reading it cover to cover before you buy anything. It will answer most of your questions. I like the Lyman book. You would probably best served by a single stage press until you get the process down.

I've been doing this for a couple of years and am no where close to having all of the answers. This forum may be your single best resource. If you've got a problem there's usually somebody here with a solution.

Its a great hobby....You can spend countless hours piddling away your life.

Just get some gear that's not gonna frustrate you.

I would not recommend a hand loader...its gonna irritate you. Get a quality "kit" from Lee or RCBS...with these you can load a 100- 150 rds an hour or so

Get a good reloading book...my favorite is the Lyman

I'd also recommend the ABC's of reloading.

Choose a Tame caliber....in other words...something like 9mm or 38 special....not 357 Mag

Go slow and EZ...

And again you don't save money...it just allows you to shoot more...which is a good thing

I'm with everybody else, I'd stay away from a hand loader. The easiest thing to do is to see if there is someone in your area and work with them if the opportunity presents itself.

I have both of the books that msredneck recommended. I'd get both.

Personally I think that .45 ACP and .38 are the easiest to start off loading. Neither of those are a very high pressure round. Plenty of folks start off with a 9mm. I certainly do not think that it's a deal breaker, but, I would stay away from dense powders for a while. I'd look for a powder that will fill more than half of the case so that if it overcharges you're more likely to see it. Unique or Power Pistol are both fairly "fluffy" powders and work fine in 9mm.

It's pretty rare to meet someone that saves money reloading in the short term. I haven't saved any money yet, but, I've got enough .45 acp to build that when I finally get around to shooting it will have cost me .12 per round to build and factory ammo will likely be over .60 per round. The trick is to buy in bulk or make your own and keep the cost down as much as possible. The problem with that is, we shoot our profits. The realistic answer to your question is; loading for 9mm you probably won't see any short term savings.

If you're around the coast you're more than welcome to look me and you can make some 9mm with my equipment.

MS45 wrote:If you're around the coast you're more than welcome to look me and you can make some 9mm with my equipment.

Yeah, I live in Biloxi right now and December 1st me and my fiance is moving to a house in Ocean Springs.

Look on msgo

There's a link for plans on building a nice reloading bench

You are gonna need to build one....its a gotta have eventually

Since you are not married yet...Go ahead and claim a whole room in the house for your gun and ammo loading room

Caleb C's advice is very good. Read a manual from cover to cover to get a "feel' for what you are about to do.

My advice: Lee makes products to help make loading inexpensive. From their case trimmers to their priming tools. They don't cost a arm and a leg and they do a good job.

As stated in a couple responses above -- find a mentor close to you. WATCH and ask questions .... BEFORE you purchase the first piece of equipment.

When I started more than 30+ years ago, I only knew one other person who reloaded and they lived about 80 miles away. I purchased "Stuff" I thought I would need -- waisted a lot of money over the years on equipment that was not necessary or was not the best product for the task.

Reloading will save you money PROVIDED you already shoot a lot rounds. Reloading for me just allows me to shoot a lot more than I would if I had to purchase them loaded; 500 S&W commercial rounds will run you around $2.50 - $3.00 each - can load them with my own cast bollits for about .08 per round not counting the cost of the brass which I use over and over again. However, looking at 9mm it may be a different story since you can pick-up Win White Box at decent prices sometimes.....

Again, I would take MS45 up on his offer!!