Whilst I have been shooting for some 40 years, mainly in the military, it was only when I took up competitive pistol shooting in civilian life that the reality of paying for ammunition became apparent. So, financial reality dictated that reloading would become part of my shooting pastime. The recent shortage of ammunition has brought the necessity of reloading to many shooters who in the past considered it a chore, and not worthy of the expense or the time required.
Having enjoyed many TAG articles, finding a topic which I could embrace and write about, which could put something back into our little community, was somewhat of a challenge. No one seemed to be addressing reloading, so here we are. My ulterior motive is to plant subliminal messages every couple of weeks into the brain of a certain lady firearms journo, which might get her started into reloading. Well, it’s worth a try.
What I DON’T plan to do is reproduce the myriad of information which is available in the many excellent publications on reloading, but rather to present a series of articles which deal with reloading issues which are either not addressed in the manuals, or which seem to have scant coverage. Largely this will be based on the mistakes I have made along the way, and the lessons I have learnt from them.
I am hopeful that this will stimulate discussion on reloading within the TAG community. I am by no means an expert, and fully expect to learn something along the way as well.
Whilst my focus will be on large volume ammunition production for hand guns, a lot of the discussion will be relevant to loading ammunition for rifles as well. For those of you with experience in reloading for rifles, please jump in if I say something that you disagree with, as this should be a learning experience for us all.
In my next article I will discuss the basics of reloading, what is involved and what the final product should look like. I hope you enjoy the articles. I look forward to your feedback.
Featured image of the Hornady Lock N Load Auto-Progressive Reloading Press courtesy of Hornady, via amazon.com.
