Seems that everyone on here wants full power loads at American Eagle prices. Well from my shot 50 year ammo experience you pay for what you get. Semms 10mm comes in 3 power levels and price levels. Very lite below 1000 fps 50-70 cents per round. Medium power 1000fps to 1200fps for 80 to 1.20 per round and full power 1200 to 1500/1600 and cost of 1.20 to upwards of 2.00 depends on bullet you get. American Eagle low end and Buffalo Bore/Double Tap on the high end. Now my question is simple range ammo easy choice,carry ammo easy choice. But why does everyone expect to get full power for cheap prices. Those days are gone thans to the crazy days going on. Next question if ou are on the receiving end of one of these does one think it will matter if it costs .60 or 1.60. I think not. I think one should get what makes them happy not bitch at others who choose different and we all need to be on the same side or we are going to wake up and have no options to even get ammo much less choose which kind to get. Maybe I am the dumb one. Yes i bought 22 ammo for 39 cents a box now they are 17.00 to 20.00 dollars per box. Cheap ammo is GONE !!!! Opinions lets hear it.
I guess my question is why shouldn't we.
The difference in component cost between a 180 grain at 950 fps and a 180 grain at 1300 fps is about $0.005. Same primer, same bullet, same case, just an extra grain or two of powder. Even if it is an extra 4 grains of powder, that is only $0.01 with high end powder.
Now, all that said, I understand that the basic rule of thumb for a quick and dirty calculation of break even if component cost X4. Based on that simple rule and the cost of quality components, we should expect to pay about $1.20 a shot for 10mm.
However, ammunition can be volume produced, and QC is relatively low cost, meaning you can produce 1,000 rounds an hour per employee pretty easy. Lets assume you pay your employee (or yourself if you don't have employee's) $50,000/year to run the Dillon 1050. And that you get no volume discounts on any components.
By my math that still works out to only $435/1000 in hard costs + labor to produce the ammo. Even with a 10% margin for overheads you can make out pretty good direct to the public staying in the "cheap" price range.
But, if you have a distributor and a retailer in the mix that both expect to make a 30% margin, you end up at Buffalo Bore prices pretty fast.
Which is why I either roll my own or support the guys that sell direct to the public.
New to 10mm?
Premium defensive or bonded bullets hollow points are more expensive than FMJ types due to the extra steps and processes to form the HP. Although the metal prices have risen, it is mostly the cost of shipping of products in or out that has driven the cost upwards over the last few years...Not to mention Haz-Mat fees! :o PITA :'(
Intercooler:
Yes new to 10mm. Since the day it was first sold to the public. Just because I just found this site and you may be the resident genius on 10mm I respect that. Is your knowledge of the 10 more than mine maybe. This is not a place to compare private parts but t oask questions and to try to get answers and opinions. If you have input feel free if you have a smart ass remark I have no time to waste on that subject. I apprecite people who have knowledge and share it no mattr how dumb the question. If you have knowledge and act like it makes you somebody rest assured I do not care who you are,what you know or anything else. I am just a 10mm fan expressing an opinion.Right or wrong it is just that an opinion.Does that clear up the new to 10mm for you.
Intercooler I am going to apologize to you as I tend to go off on gun issues. I have had guns for 50 plus years and evert caliber from 22 to 500 Nitro Express. Yes I know a lot but I do not flaunt it. I usually ask a question to see if anybody really does know the answer I already have. You would be amazed at the experts in both guns and ammo. You sir do have knowledge but poor understanding of who ask questions on a forum. 1.Peole who really do not know and need help and people who really do know and want to see how many know it alls are on the forum. Sorry for my rant. your info is helpful but learn your people.
I don't know anything. Fill me in.
RRman, I have been around Intercooler on this and some other forums, and I never knew him to be a smart aleck. I have hit him with some pretty silly questions too.
Don't jump the gun, my friend. It's good to see fellow 10mm enthusiasts such as yourself here.
Welcome and enjoy..
I didn't ask to be smart at all. When I saw the low post count and rant my thought was maybe you were new to the 10mm ammos. I have been pretty pro-active and reactive about the 10mm ammo out there. Some are priced way higher than they should be and for what you are getting. Some were priced decent and then went wild and I didn't hold my tongue telling it! Everyone chooses their own stuff and I'm all for that. My biggest thing since I have started figuring it out is getting to the bottom of that!
by all means don't hold back, spill all that knowledge, me know nothing :D
It is tuff to get to truly know someone via these forums, but I also accept that not everyone will share my views or sentiments on a given subject. Even if someone is making a seemingly personal attack, I try not to let that get in the way of whats important.
I don't pretend to know everything and I don't ???...However, I don't mind sharing what I know! ;D I sometimes pose some what if questions, to generate the thought process in an effort for others to join in and share as well!
I actually have posed some slightly controversial questions, to see what others bring to the table and knowledge base. This has fired up some good data and facts concerning sticky subjects! :-\
We can all be friends here, I consider this one of the more friendly sites, I have had the pleasure of being on!
Seems kinda like buying a motor. You pay for the horsepower even though the parts cost the same
My reason for apologizing was I jumped on IC know he was looking at my post count. I sure do not know all as I do not and never will handload. I do not trust myself with self built ammo. So I am stuck with the price of the factory ammo and it seems the 10mm is the only 3 level ammo. Buy that I mean you get slow and cheap,medium and reasonable or full power and full price. And i even have level 4. Subsonic 10mm in the 925-950 fps range. I laughed at myself when Ibought it but have since kinda got a love hate relationship with it. I hate it cause you can not hardly find it anywhere and now it is as high as the full power loads but I lnoe it as you are basically shooting a 45ACP,easy to handle for anybody and the factory Winchester rounds I have are loaded with the Black Talon style bullet and are quite good for home protection as it will not go thru 3 houses just mine.
this ammo was built for LE only in the late 80's early 90's. It is the FBI Lite factory stuff and is very reliable but un replaceable. Probably should save it for collectors items as all I have are as new as the day they shipped. Still I love to shoot the full power Buffalo Bore loads. Expensive yes,but loaded like DT and Underwood to the max. One might go a little higher but I sure would hate to shoot and be standing there with the grip in my hand and the slide and barrel stuck to the rest of me. That is another love point on the light 10. I nkow if you want a lite 10 get a 40. The day I get a 40 is the day I will sell my handguns. I am a 10mm fan, casual affair with the 45ACP when loaded up and used to be a 22lr fan till it got to 18.00 per box. I will sell every 22lr I have before I buy 22lr for that much per box. I think my 1st box of 22 ammo was 29 cents in 1960. Guess I should have invested my retirement funds in 22 ammo. Looks like a big return there even it it did take 50 years. And guys to anybody I insulted sorry. Nothing I hate worse than being treated the new guy or being asked to use the search. If I wanted to search I would hunt billfolds at Walmart.
What kind of findings have you found in the various ammos tested? Good or bad
RRMan03 writes,
QuoteI sure do not know all as I do not and never will handload. I do not trust myself with self built ammo.
Anybody can learn to handload, doing it right and safely. You develop your own quality control, and assemble ammo with bullets of your choosing, loaded to perform in your own equipment. You don't have to have those fancy, complicated progressive presses either. To this day I still use my single stage RCBS press to assemble truly great ammo for everything I own except those little 22's. There are many great reloader manuals to guide you thru recipes and any and all steps involved. No you don't have to load to the highest levels of performance and that is where rolling your own ammo can pay big dividends! When I started handloading, there was no internet or great forums to discuss ideas or compare notes with others who where sharing in the passion of handloading. I will say handloading is as addictive as owning great 10mm guns!
Yes handloading does take time, but you don't have to crank out 10,000 rounds in a day either. Those that do need that kind of volume for competition use progressive machines. They usually set the dies and stuff for a particular bullet and powder charge and lock that down to make runs. The automation is where I see problems occur and the cost of those setups get expensive. Heck even manufactures make re-callable mistakes.
I guess what I'm trying to say is don't sell yourself short when it comes to the hobby of handloading!
^^^ i agree, reloading is at least half the fun of owning firearms
More than half if you start casting your own bullets!
ya i wanna start casting bullets... is there a thread on here on how to do this? you wanna start one? ;D
You can't learn a lot from this site! http://www.lasc.us/Fryxell_Book_Contents.htm (http://www.lasc.us/Fryxell_Book_Contents.htm)
Personally I only shoot factory loadings and have found I really like the Buffalo Bore 155 X and the 220 HC. Both do exactly what I ask them to do. The lower power loads do not get the penetration of the above in the same test. I do not test for actual speed but for actual results on the same test just different ammo. I do occasionally try a different medium to shoot into just to see how the bullet would react if I had to use it in that situation. All my tests are for defensive or offensive situations with different mediums as my test. I just got to shoot my first Underwood ammo today.It was 180 FMJ advertised at 1300 and I will say for the money this is the best 10mm ammo made. Your getting full power loads for low power prices. Hope to find some more and stock up. At their price I see no one putting out any better power wise at a better price.
I need to do more with Buffalo Bore. As for Buffalo Bore the 155's rated at 1500 FPS only did 1263 FPS in real life. That irks me on the advertising end. The 220's rated at 1200 FPS did 1100 FPS as well. Kevin has been saying he would release an all Copper which would hit his advertised. I know for a fact his other heavy ammos do from testing. Buffalo Bore is very expensive and their 180's use a Montana Gold. Supposedly it was loaded with a Gold Dot 180 at some point and a switcheroo was done without telling the customers. If I didn't have other options I would use it for sure but feel you can get equal or better for less dollars. Next time I find some 155's I plan on getting some for Chrony readings, tear-down and Chopinbloc to do his gel testing with them.
Buffalo Bore is too damn expensive.
Quote from: The_Shadow on February 27 2013 08:27:07 PM MST
You can't learn a lot from this site! http://www.lasc.us/Fryxell_Book_Contents.htm (http://www.lasc.us/Fryxell_Book_Contents.htm)
perfect, thanks shadow...
what brand size/type of mold do you use for your 10mm?
In 10mm, I have several, the RCBS 200 & 175 grain Turncated Cone 2 cavity, which have a tiny bit of SWC design to it, this cuts clean holes in targets.
I also have the Lyman 175 TCBB 4 cavity and an obsolete 156 grain Devastator HP single cavity based off the 175 gr mold.
They all shoot well sized at 0.4015" from my guns.
But I also cast 309", 356", 358", 431" & 452" sized bullets also. Some are gas checked types.
Many people are jumping in on group buys for the 10mm bullet mold over at CastBullets.com http://castboolits.gunloads.com/forumdisplay.php?8-Cast-Boolits (http://castboolits.gunloads.com/forumdisplay.php?8-Cast-Boolits)
Good luck getting going, metals are more expensive these days. But in years gone by wheel weights were a plenty, but thanks to government intervention, many are zinc these days.
Quote from: sqlbullet on February 28 2013 07:45:49 AM MST
Quote from: 4949shooter on February 28 2013 04:31:46 AM MST
Buffalo Bore is too damn expensive.
This ^^
YUP...
Time to looking into reloading...
Loads tailored EXACTLY to your needs. ;)
CW
Quote from: sqlbullet on February 28 2013 07:45:49 AM MST
Quote from: 4949shooter on February 28 2013 04:31:46 AM MST
Buffalo Bore is too damn expensive.
This ^^
It makes you wonder what their sales would be like if they lowered their prices to reasonable levels.
I am not sure there prices are really that "unreasonable".
Montana Gold's pricing is offline right now, so I can't get pricing on their products. I am gonna assume a volume buyer like Buffalo Bore can get them for around $0.12 each, or $120/K
Figuring their load at 10 grains of Longshot we have the following basic component costs per thousand:
Primers: $35
Case: $147
Bullet: $120
Powder: $23.8
Labor: $15
Figuring a 10% overhead and 40% margin for the mfg, 30% for the distributor and 40% for the retailer, you land at $1502.65 per thousand, which is about where they are priced.
We are just really lucky to have guys like Underwood who cut all the middle men out and sell direct to us for a 15% margin after overhead and labor.
I'm not saying it's unreasonable as far as cost of manufacturing goes. I'm saying it's unreasonable as far as my wallet is concerned.
There is quality ammo out there that is more affordable to penny pinchers like myself. And it isn't like just buying a box or two, either. I would have to buy 100 rounds just to test it in my gun for function, then I would have to buy more on top of that for carry.
If I was still single and had money I wouldn't mind acquiring a stache of Buffalo Bore.
Awww pony up and help out Tim Sundles :P
Quote from: RRMan03 on February 24 2013 08:31:44 PM MSTMaybe I am the dumb one.
Maybe we're both dumb as I agree with everything you said. ;D By the same token we aren't all born with a silver spoon in our mouth (I wasn't and am not suggesting you were) and sometimes it's hard to come to grips with the cost of almost anything worth buying anymore and we can sometimes find ourselves in a perpetual state of sticker shock.
But like you point out, there is intelligence in understanding that cost isn't all about the sum cost of: parts, packaging, manufacturing, labor....and so on. Higher prices are charged for some stuff that doesn't cost a manufacturer more money (or not near more than the prices they set suggest). These of course include: more power, higher performance, cutting edge technology, market monopoly, general rareness, and so on.
Of course virtually all of us know this, it simply isn't all that easy to grasp when it feels like we're always financially struggling to get what we want. So reality is what it is, and sometimes it just sucks.
Don't forget about Liability Insurance cost, shipping of materials inbound and out to customers...Taxes, Haz-Mat fees! :o
Yep. And of course the only reason some plinking ammo is the low cost it is is because some big manufacturers produce all their own components on top of all else already mentioned.
Quote from: Intercooler on March 01 2013 04:36:52 PM MST
Awww pony up and help out Tim Sundles :P
Lol....Tim doesn't need my help. :P
You have that right! Wasn't his 10mm lineup bigger at one time? What round would be worth purchasing for gel and teardown?