Posted on 05/20/2008 5:50:16 AM PDT by 300magnum
TOMBSTONE, Ariz (Reuters) - Gunslinger Bob Krueger blasts away at his outlaw rivals at a tourist show in this storied Old West town, although rising ammo costs may force him to choose his shots.
Krueger and his gnarly band of pistoleros are among millions of shooters, hunters and even lawmen across the United States feeling the pinch as sky-high metals prices and demand from wars abroad are driving up the price of bullets.
Ammo prices for many popular guns have more than tripled in the last three years, driven in large part by surging demand for metals in rapidly industrializing China.
As the Asian giant becomes wealthier, millions of tons of copper, lead and zinc, which are also used to make bullets and brass shell-casings, are being snapped up.
Shooters, gun dealers and sheriffs say the impact has been further aggravated by competition for limited ammo stocks with the U.S. military, currently fighting wars on two fronts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
"Everybody is feeling it," said Krueger, a Stetson wearing cowboy whose show blasts through hundreds of rounds of blank ammo each week at Six Gun City in Tombstone.
"If things get bad enough, we may all just get one bullet each," he said, to laughter from his grizzled buddies.
HUNTING FOR AMMO
Dealers complain that the cost of rifle ammunition has doubled and even tripled in the past two years, with similar increases for some hand gun ammunition.
Lynn Kartchner, a gun shop owner in nearby Douglas, Arizona, says he now pays $250 for a case of 1,000 rounds of assault rifle ammunition, up from $80 two years ago, while a box of popular 9 mm shells has jumped to $17 from $10.
"Price rises have been accompanied by scarcity for certain kinds of ammo," Kartchner told Reuters in his shop, which is packed with rifles, pistols and shooting paraphernalia.
"There isn't as much variety, and a lot of people snap up whatever they can get their hands on," he added.
Increased costs and competition for ammo is also being born by police forces across the United States, among them the sheriff's department in Cochise County on the Arizona-Mexico border, which faces incursions from armed smugglers and even bandits from south of the line.
Last year the department faced a four-month delay acquiring rifle cartridges and had to dip into ammo reserves, rousing the concern of Sheriff Larry Dever.
"We do face people in this environment down here who are heavily armed, sometimes with higher capacity armaments than we carry," Dever said.
"The last thing we want do is find ourselves in a situation where we are not training sufficiently so that (deputies) can maintain those very important proficiencies," he added.
HOARDING, RELOADING
Demand for metals is tipped to stay strong in China for the next decade.
Cowboy shows and lawmen aside, high ammo prices are being shouldered by millions of target shooters and hunters across the United States, many of them working people on a limited budget.
"If you have three of four children, and they all go out on a hunting trip, the cost of ammo can be a bit of a burden," said Luis Hernandez, a keen deer, bird and varmint hunter from Douglas.
To keep costs low, many hobby shooters are now scouring gun shows, gun shops and the Internet in search of cheap ammunition, which some then buy in bulk and hoard against further price rises.
Others either shoot less, switch to smaller caliber ammunition such as .22 which is cheaper, or are increasingly turning to reloading their old shell cases.
"The main saving is in the brass casing, which is the most expensive part," said Hernandez, who reckons on saving up to $20 on a box of some premium rifle cartridges by reloading.
Other shooters and dealers are holding out hope that ammunition manufacturers will develop cheaper alternatives.
"High cost drives innovation," said Kartchner. "There has been some interest in plastic or aluminum cartridge cases in the past, so I'm hopeful they will come up with something. We'll just have to see."
(Reporting by Tim Gaynor; Additional reporting by Ed Stoddard; Editing by Eddie Evans)
I’m starting reloading. The lack of cheap surplus in some calibers is motivating me. You still have to buy bullets (or materials to cast bullets), though, so it’s not a cure-all.
I reload.
Free wheelweights to cast bullets, powder and primers in bulk, and once-fired brass from various outlets.
.38 spl costs about $0.10 per round; 9mm about $0.08 per round; and .223 about $0.20 per round. I don’t know yet what 12ga costs to reload as I have just bought the equipment to reload shotshells, but I’m guessing it’ll be about $0.35 per shell.
I haven’t bought any powder or primers recently, have they gone up in price also?
IMHO, if you are paying more than a dollar per cartridge, it’s definitely time to start reloading. There are some cheap import ammo deals still available such as Wolf with steel cases, but the next Democratic Congress will end all that. I am afraid they will drive ammo prices through the roof intentionally...just make shooting unaffordable.
We hear from the mills that alloy steel prices are up 42% since April.
Yes.
Yes. Old wheel weights make EXCELLENT bullet casting stock.
They use something in the lead mix for wheel weights (I think someone told me it is antimony maybe?) which makes the slugs a bit harder than than conventional lead compounds.
Weak dollar.
Ouch, sure glad I stocked up last time.
“They use something in the lead mix for wheel weights (I think someone told me it is antimony maybe?) which makes the slugs a bit harder than than conventional lead compounds.”
Antimony and arsenic. Wheel weights can also be heat treated to make them VERY hard, but then brittleness becomes a factor.
Doesn’t it unnerve anyone that governments, state, local, federal, foreign, are buying ammo as fast as it can be made?
Sounds like 1977 again in so many ways. Shotgun shells jumped by 100% during the late 70’s.
Yeah, I’d ruled that out because of the initial cost to get set up but it’s looking better all the time.
I figure it means they’re shooting more.
My T-C smokepole instructions iirc said specifically to _not_ use wheel weights, however, for casting muzzle-loader round balls or slugs, only pure lead.
They said alloys like antimony make for hard, oversized projectiles that raise bore pressures significantly. Maybe not a factor for cartridge firearms but for old “black powder” arms it should be pointed out because it seems to be a common technique for those that roll their own ammo.
What a remarkable balanced article.
I live in the county that elected Sheriff Dever.
Ammo availability has been terrible since I moved back here in ‘05.
You are correct. I would be VERY CAREFUL about casting muzzle-loader ammo from wheel weights.
Or getting ready to shoot A LOT more.
Maybe Chancellor-elect Obama can come up with a Federal subsidy program to help them out. ;^)
That’s more like it.
Ahhh... happiness is a large pile of brass. ;-)
time for a congressional investigation into Big Ammo.
Doesn’t it unnerve anyone that governments, state, local, federal, foreign, are buying ammo as fast as it can be made?
ping
This is why I cast my own bullets and reload with them. Now if I could only make my own primers.
That too.
Exactly.
Wheelweights are mostly lead with about 2% tin and up to 4% antimony, which makes the resulting alloy harder.
Actually, I test the ingots obtained from melting ww’s. The hardest (most antimony) are reserved for the .223’s (the high velocity/pressure requires a harder bullet). The softest alloy is used for the .38 revolver rounds.
I really want to get into casting and I'm ready to invest in the tools, but the biggest obstacle for me is obtaining the wheel weights. It seems all the tire stores around here have arrangements to have them recycled. Any suggestions from the FR banglist crowd?
Unless you are re-loading A LOT of ammunition, I’d suggest a small, independent auto repair place. They will have fewer wheel weights to give you, but they are less likely to have a bulk recycling deal, and can PROBABLY supply all but the most voracious re-loader with all the lead (and antimony and tin) he/she can use.
And if you DO need more lead, you can always scope out a couple of the smaller shops.
Primers were up to $27 a carton at the gun show last weekend. That’s up from about $22 at the LAST gun show we went to about 6 months ago.
Sorry, should have ended with “... a couple OTHER smaller shops as well”.
Been making my own for a long time, and making strategic purchases when the opportunity arises. I won’t say how much I’ve got, but it’s probably pretty close to the total rounds fired during the Revolutionary War.
I suspect that there is going to be an international effort to restrict the market for 7.62x39mm M43 ammo, in a back door effort to neutralize a lot of the world’s AK-47s.
The idea is that since the AKs are everywhere, everyone wants ammo for them. So if they can somehow restrict production, it will drive the price out of range for most owners. In a lot of places, ammo will just become unobtainable, and this will subdue some of the 4th world troublemaking.
It's a shame that gun buyers must consider the cost of ammo when looking at different calibers, much the same as car buyers must consider fuel mileage. Although 9mm FMJ's are still (barely) under $20 per 100, all other serious loads (.380, .38, .357, .40, .45, etc) are over $20, even over $30 per 100.
WWB .45 still $30/box
Rem .223 55gn $.43/rnd
at WallyWord
And that is about as good or better than can be gotten in bulk over the net, without the hassle of shipments and the s/h cost.
Was in there yesterday and there was a line at the counter.
Which reminds me...time to change the tag line...
Somehow I get the feeling all it’s going to do is make the market more lucrative for the Chinese.
The days of easily obtainable wheel weights are pretty well over. I’ve been going to a scrap metal outfit and paying for alloy, but that price is going up too and sometimes if they are busy they won’t be bothered with someone wanting relatively small amounts of it. I’ve also used range scrap that we dig out of dirt mined from the burms at my local range. I’ve also used reclaimed shot from the trap range, which is excellent alloy but expensive. One simply has to hunt for the stuff. On-line outfits like Midway sell alloy, and the quality is very good but again the cost is up. I think the basic answer to your question is that it’s something one simply has to hunt for these days. I recently lucked into 150 lbs of free linotype, which for bulletcasters is almost gold.
I just paid 22.50 for a box of 50 .223 Black Hill Seconds.
My retired neighbor heads out to the club with shovel, screen, and wheelbarrow to sift through the pistol range backstop. A couple weeks ago he told me he'd sold 2,000 pounds of lead to a scrap dealer this year.
7.62 X 54R ammo is still reasonable.
Some of the Eastern European and Russian ammo is caustic, so you have to really clean after shooting. Anyone have other thoughts on the subject?
How might I get an estimate of how many rounds of ammunition are produced/used in the U.S. every year?
I’m crafting an argument against “guns are for killing people” by showing that 99.99+% of all ammunition in the U.S. is used for recreational purposes - skeet shooting, target shooting, hunting, etc.
I have actually mined a 5 gallon bucket’s worth from the berm at my club to try as a sample. Seperating the spent bullets from sticky Georgia red clay is going to be a real chore. I also hear that jacketed bullets tend to soften the alloy, so I reckon I’d need to add some tin.
I’m not sure I did the math right (I hate word problems!), however, here goes...
At current new prices of .43/round for .223, compared to the reload costs of .20/round and assuming that the reloading equipment would cost ~$500 of an investment...
The recovery of initial expenses woudl require re-loading 2500 rounds befoe any savings are realized. Which does not factor in the time required to gather materials (esp quality brass!) and actually perform the reloading process.
I suppose that very long term, it would eventually work out and those that have been doing this for years and years already realize nice savings.
The last time I was at the scrap yard I asked about lead, they told me scrap lead has not risen that much through all of this.
Hazardous chemicals there. Could be done, but if it gets to that point a return to flintlock might be in order.
Article understates the price increases. 14 mos ago I could buy 9mm quality ball ammo for less than $10 a box.
I’m saving the brass, but not reloading yet. What presses are people using?
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