Jim,
I took note in Jason’s recent message regarding Lee reloading tools, and I must say I agree wholeheartedly. I have a Lee challenger press, and strongly recommend it.
In fact, I recommend the Lee Anniversary Reloading Kit with “Modern Reloading” Manual (available from MidwayUSA: for $89.99 plus shipping). It comes with everything except dies, primers, powder, brass, and bullets. Oh, a set of calipers is a handy thing to have too.
The case is the most expensive part of the cartridge to make, requiring multiple steps in shaping the brass into the final cartridge case. Reloading can significantly cut costs for the casual shooter, as well as allowing the more advanced shooter to develop and refine more accurate loads.
There is, however, one point that Jason made that I disagree with: that military surplus ammo is unreliable junk. Not so! The Swiss GP11 is fantastic (great if you have a K31 rifle), Polish 7.62x54r Light Ball is excellent fodder for the Mosin-Nagant (it is corrosive, but the Mosin is a cinch to clean), South Africa made some great .308, and Greece makes excellent .30-06 M2 Ball ammo (available from the CMP). Milsurp ammo has been stored in unknown conditions for unknown lengths of time, but with few exceptions, it’s perfectly suitable for a fun afternoon out at the range.
That, and there’s a fair amount of boxer-primed, reloadable military surplus ammunition — I myself have nearly two thousand pieces of .30-06 brass that I got from Korean-made military surplus (KA and PS head stamps, the former being corrosively primed, the latter being non-corrosive). Buying the ammo in the first place was cheap, and now I have a goodly supply of brass. For those concerned with the safety of military surplus ammo, a kinetic bullet puller is inexpensive, and one can remove the bullets, dump out the old powder (makes good fertilizer for plants), remove the primer if desired (be extremely careful when de-priming live primers — it might make more sense to chamber the primer-only cartridge in a gun, then fire it [while being careful of lead emissions, of course], and then de-prime the spent primer). All one needs to do then is re-prime the cases, charge the case with a suitable amount of powder, and re-seat the bullet. No need to buy more brass and bullets. I’ve done this with some of the unreliable and occasionally unsafe Indian .308, and rendered it quite consistent and accurate. Cheers! – Pete
JWR Replies: I agree that the quality of military surplus ammo varies widely. There have been some with erratic pressure. There is also a lot of corrosively primed ammo still on the market, most notably WWII vintage .303 British and a considerable amount imported from the former Soviet Bloc in various calibers. But some, such as the Swiss GP11 that you mentioned is outstanding. And I wish that I had bought several hundred thousand rounds of West German .308 ball when it was on the market back in the early 1908s. That stuff very accurate.
JWR,
I think I’ve written you about this before, but when it comes to Lee, I feel the need to caution others often. I have been a reloader for almost 20 years (limited only by how old I am), and I started using lee reloading equipment. When I was a teenager, the price point was great. However, as I’ve gotten older and been able to afford equipment from other manufacturers, I rarely use anything made by lee.
Lee does make some good products, their bullet molds, (the ones that use “tumble lube”) and their lube sizing dies (that go with the molds) are versatile and low cost. The other product I highly recommend is the Lee factory crimp die. As for the rest of their products, I’ve found them to be strangely engineered (they dump the primers into the bottom of the press) and I’ve also found them to be of poor quality. If you are interested in reloading ammunition for yourself, I highly recommend buying tools from another manufacturer (RCBS is my favorite) as your funds allow. Having equipment is better than not, but having good equipment makes reloading much easier, safer, and produces higher quality reloads. – AVL