I will be picking up a Bushmaster 20" A3 next week. I have been very curious if it would be cheaper to buy military surplus ammo or rely upon reloads to keep it fed.

Thank you!

If you can pick up range brass, then buy your powder & bullets from Hi-Tech Ammo, you can load for about half the price of buying lake City surplus. At least that's been my experience. My reloads are also a bit more accurate than surplus.

Rick

What would be a good powder and bullet combination to start out with? I would mainly be interested with 55gr fmj and the barrel is a 1:9.

I use LC brass, Winchester small rifle primers, 25.5gr of WC846 with a pulldown 55gr FMJ bullet. This load shoots just about MOA out of a 20" Bushmaster using a Tasco 3X9 scope.

As always, start out low and work up while developing your load. That said, several shooters I know are using this very same load with good success. YMMV.

Rick

quote:

Originally posted by krazykarl:
What would be a good powder and bullet combination to start out with? I would mainly be interested with 55gr fmj and the barrel is a 1:9.

Golden west 55gr fmjbt.$35.00/1000 tele:626-454-4585 ask for david

powder Wcc 844 or Wcc846. The 844 is much cleaner burning. roger

I bought wolf ammo from the sportsmansguide real cheap for plinking.I use barnes 53gr X bullets for my hunting load with 2015 powder.I own a RRA AR-15.I love this gun!

quote:

Originally posted by krazykarl:
What would be a good powder and bullet combination to start out with? I would mainly be interested with 55gr fmj and the barrel is a 1:9.

KK, My son uses 20grs. RE7 with the 55 REM. FMJ, 33 bucks per 1000 if I remmeber right from Midway, he uses wsr primer and once fired brass also from Midway. RE7 will give you the most shots out of a pound of powder and besides it's one of the best powders for the 223 and AR15. Jay

Thanks for all the advice thus far. I am really starting to lean towards reloading epecially with documented evidence of Federal ammo causing some catastrophic failures in rifles.

http://ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=3&f=16&t=238962

Back when I had my AR-15 I could get 100 rounds of military for about $50.00 so scarfed up a few thousand rounds. These shot well and the military round can be duplicated with winchester W-748 powder. I have about 4000 once shot .233 cases and Have reloaded some that shoot real well. But go to some gun shows and look around and find some good .223 in 500-100 bulk for a good price. Tell me about the catstropic failures of Federal ammo. What rifles,how many, what caliber etc?

quote:

Originally posted by Blob1:
Back when I had my AR-15 I could get 100 rounds of military for about $50.00 so scarfed up a few thousand rounds. These shot well and the military round can be duplicated with winchester W-748 powder. I have about 4000 once shot .233 cases and Have reloaded some that shoot real well. But go to some gun shows and look around and find some good .223 in 500-100 bulk for a good price. Tell me about the catstropic failures of Federal ammo. What rifles,how many, what caliber etc?

The incident is linked in my prior post.....

quote:

Originally posted by Blob1:
Back when I had my AR-15 I could get 100 rounds of military for about $50.00 so scarfed up a few thousand rounds. These shot well and the military round can be duplicated with winchester W-748 powder. I have about 4000 once shot .233 cases and Have reloaded some that shoot real well. But go to some gun shows and look around and find some good .223 in 500-100 bulk for a good price. Tell me about the catstropic failures of Federal ammo. What rifles,how many, what caliber etc?

With the components I bought for my son last xmas the total came to 110 bucks for 1000rnds.,(3lbs RE7, 1000 Rem. FMJ, 1000 wsr primers) thats since we already had the once fired brass from the year before. Do you think you should reload? Jay

I reload for .223 just because I have a psychological aversion to buying OEM ammo. Half the cost of a box of ammo is the case; the other half is probably transportation from the factory to the store at today's fuel prices. It pains me to lose a single one of the 5000+ cases I have because that's one less I can reload. I have figured that my costs to reload are on par with buying Wolf ammo but I still do it, regardless of the time required. I also don't like the smell of Wolf; I prefer the sweet scent of Accurate Arms 2200 Data Powder instead. My brass is certainly not lacquered like Wolf is and so will never cause a case to stick in my chamber. Wolf ammo also seems to me to be very dirty.

I have seen now on two occasions since November 2004 brass that is plastic from about 10mm above the rim with the base being brass, of course. This mystery ammo is headstamped PCA 04. I have seen it in both a desert tan and a navy gray plastic. Does anybody know who makes/sells this ammo? It's got to be cheaper than all-brass and by definition it is not reloadable.

Lastly, I reload five or six calibers because I like knowing what's in the case to be giving me what prints on the target. Knowing allows me to change the powder charge, the bullet, the primer, the seating depth, et cetera to improve the grouping next time out. Reloading also eats up those long hours of darkness after 5:00 pm during our Nevada winters; it's a good way to pass time instead of vegging out in front of the TV or on-line with ARF.

OK, Reload it is. Now for my second question, components to buy?

1. Brass (once fired, new winchester commercial, new winchester military, new federal, new remington, imi, ?????)
2. Primers (brand name?)
3. Powder (I know some have already mentioned their choices)
4. Bullets (mil-spec pulled or commercial?)

quote:

Originally posted by Blob1:
Back when I had my AR-15 I could get 100 rounds of military for about $50.00 so scarfed up a few thousand rounds.

That's 50 cents a round. That's some expensive shooting for mil. surp. roger

Yeah it certianly would be at 50 cents but meant to write 1000 rounds latest Lake city for $50.00. Bought some for $30.00. Had 15 20 round clips still in the original foil wraps $8.00 a piece. A friend rock and rolled his AR and it turned out the military rounds with out any priblem. Went through several thousand rounds without one problem. Cleaned it well,kept the blow back tube clean and used the military teflon based oil in it.

Once-fired brass will have to have the crimp in the primer pocket reamed out after you resize it. I do it with a chamfer tool I bought at Sears, p/n 67165. I chuck it into a drill chuck that I mounted on a pencil sharpener base and spin the crimp out in a blink. Then I scrape the primer residue with the handy RCBS brush tool, again chucked into the drill chuck. I trim to length with a Lee trimming tool and chamfer the wire off with the RCBS chamferring tool. Case trimming takes the most time because I have to chuck the case into the little thing that holds it while you turn it to trim it. I can trim a case in about 24 seconds (I've timed it). Chamferring and decrimping don't take as much time because the tool is mounted in the drill chuck and the cases are handled by hand one after the other to the tool, not the tool to the case. I can trim 100 cases in less than 45 minutes because I made a special tool that allows me to tighten and release the nut on the case holder and trim the case without ever having to put the tool down. I just welded the case cutter to a cut-off 5/8" open-end wrench and it works like gangbusters.

KK, My son uses 20grs. RE7 with the 55 REM. FMJ, 33 bucks per 1000 if I remember right from Midway, he uses wsr primer and once fired brass also from Midway. And the crimp has been removed by them. RE7 will give you the most shots out of a pound of powder and besides it's one of the best powders for the 223 and AR15. Jay[/QUOTE]

By all means try some Sierra Match Kings in 69gr flavor with Varget and see how well you and your new rifle shoot.

You may be surprised as the AR-15 will give most varmint rifles a run for their money.

I've always used the white box Winchester 55gr fmj ammo, yes there were some lots that were "hot" but I've not had any problems. Some friends bought the American Ammunition ("A-MERC" head stamp) at very reasonable rates and it seems to be good stuff.

By all means reload. Make sure you follow the published data for AR type rifles, and stay below the published max loads for a bit. I have had good luck with 25 gr AA 2200 with a 50gr pill.

The two calibers I don't reload blasting ammo for are the .223 & 9mm, sometimes .308 too. You can buy surplus for almost the same preice as handloading w/o the effort.