Shooting a .45 Long Colt will put one back into the reloading business in a flash! Having brass and my own cast bullets, my costs are less than a dime a round. I have built a .243 reload that gives me MOA out of my favorite deer rifle. They are about fifty cents a round. I have a .257 Roberts and a .32 Remington that I shoot for less than a dollar a round. Buy your power and primers locally and apply the Haz Mat charges to the costs of the local components. As for the bullets, look on Auction Arms.

Midway USA is a good place to start looking for componets.  I bought thousands of componets back in the late 70's and in the 80's, talk about sticker shock today.......ouch!

I guess the question to ask is What kind of bulk bullets are you looking for?  If you are looking for bulk 30 cal plinking bullets, the pulled 30 cal FMJ slugs are available from some of the military surplus ammo dealers and on AA.  Bulk bullets have some discount to them, but not nearly as much as 10 years ago.  They are still using a lot of them in Afganistan and the raw materials are a lot more expensive than they were.

Try loading 12 gauge shotgun shells. The price of lead shot as soared. It used to be cheaper to reload. Now it runs me 5.17 a box roughly 5.30 w/tax. I just bought six cases of Remington Game Clubs for 5.40 a box, 54.00 a case of ten boxes. I just picked up a 28 ga. That is where reloading comes in. The 28 ammo runs 10-14 bucks a box and I can load it for under 4.25.    trapper

Which reminds me. I have ben looking for some 28 ga hulls for sale. There are quite a few but they all seem to be high brass. Can I load high brass 28 at low brass specs? I noticed in the empties barrel at the club that the Estates we sell at the club are high brass but nobody reloads the Estates...   trap

I don't trap shoot anymore so why reload for 12 ga. when you can purchase a box for $5.00. Now if you need to shoot 410, 28 or 10 Ga. thats a different matter. I sold my Mec awhile back because I have not used it in over 10 years. I reloaded all components I had before I sold it and now have over 1000 rounds of 12 ga. reloads. Probably more than I will ever use since I shoot a 20 and 16 gauge also.

The only way you will get the best accuracy and performance from rifles and most handguns is to fine tune the loads by reloading.

I too bought lots of bulk components back 10 to 20 years ago and still am using them up. Some items I need I just keep watching auctions here and specials from other top mail order places.

If you don't need them right now keeping an eye on auctions here at Gunauction aka Auction Arms you will find good deals. 

Hagrid, cut one of those 28 estates in half and see if it matches up to anything in the Lymans shotshell reloading book. I use that as my "bible" If you guys are reloading 12 to 1 1/8 oz yep it's spendy, I am reloading my 12 to 1 0z. and 7/8 oz and getting much better patterns and have not noticed any diff in shooting (except lower recoil.)Also, remember my problem with the 28 gauge re;oading? well the other day I had to get more shot, So, I got 8 shot again (The other was 7 1/2)  and guess what! I had to adjust that wad again! A-5

I wouldn't think you would have to adjust the wad again. The shot is thrown by volume even though is says by weight. The shot bar fills up regardless of the shot size. If it is 3/4 as in the 28, The hole will fill the same whether it is 5's or 8's and weigh the same.    trapper

That's what one would think, but it is what it is. You will probably find more issues with the 28 gauge as I have, just like crimping, all of a sudden your going along, no problems and boom you through a crimp for no reason. I have never had that happen with 12 or 20 gauge. A-5

Reloading for `cost effective` [cheap] ammo for rifles day has long past. Reloading for `precision` rifle ammo has some of the premium grade factory ammo nipping at it`s heels but you can still make ammo better than you can buy. Cheap Handgun ammo can still be reloaded and for volume shooters it`s still the way to go. And for most shooters thier limitations will not allow them to tell the difference between reloads and the best you can buy, for practice purposes. Reloading shotshells take an extreme amount of effort, component selection, and equiptment to equal factory loads and will rarely beat them. To Handloaders, it is a hobby all of it`s own to create their own ammo, and cost has little to do with their motives. They take it as an insult to even suggest shooting factory ammo thru their firearms. axolotl