a friend of mine just started reloading and a little disapointed in the no of rounds he loaded .223 rem with h322 powder..... anyone do any .223s that don't use so much powder?? thanks jjb

Imagine if you were loading for a 460 Weatherby how fast a pound of powder would go.

In answer to your question and with no idea what kind of a 223 you are shooting I will risk starting a whole new round of "why not to" comments and tell you to do a search for Seafire's Blue Dot loads. Search on this forum for the loads.
Doubt these will work in an AR15 type platform, but I may well be wrong with that assumption.

They are low powder volume, NOT low pressure loads so work within the parameters as presented

7000 grains to the pound.
25gr to the .223 load.
280 loads to the pound.

canister powder is $20.00 a pound.
.07 per round.
$1.40 per box.

Sounds reasonable to me.

7mm STW. 100 grains per round. 70 loads per pound.

Louis mentioned the bluedot loads. I not sure I would recommend them for a new reloader. A little extra powder to be safe sounds like good insurance to me.

quote:

Originally posted by Antelope Sniper:
canister powder is $20.00 a pound.

Hey where you been getting 20$ a pound powder lately?. If bought off the shelf here its more like 26-28$

gibrass.com has wcc844 (H335) for about $16/lb or $125/8# including the Hazmat fee. That is if you don't mind pulldown powder. I don't.

Blue Dot loads...

or the other powder I use, since some guys complain about no factory pressure testing data..

SR 4759... 15 grains is a real popular load I use...

another surprising thing I discovered... standard 55 grain SP and FMJ bullets will penetrate and perform better at MVs of about 2400 to 2600 fps...

discovered this, when I found that at the lower MVs, such as used with Blue Dot and SR 4759 loads, those bullets will easily penetrate 3/8 inch steel plate... when the same bullets are shot at regular factory load velocities of over 3100 fps... they will bounce off of steel plate..

just another little tip I have learned.. these MVs work just fine on shooting little sage rats, which are about the size of a 12 oz soda can, to the size of a 20 0z pop bottle in size..

the 223, with the 2400 to 2600 MV will smack them all day long at distances of 200 yds or more.. I limit my shots to about 250 yds with these loads, only because of trying to guess the then needed elevation beyond that unless the scope I am using has mil dots on it, or a target turret..

Let's expand on what Antelope Sniper said, if you are plinking (Not full accuracy reloading):

.07 for powder
.10 for new LC brass (Nachez)
.09 for bullet (Midsouth varmint nightmare = $45/500)
.03 for primer ($30/1000 with hazmat bought in bulk)

That's $.29 per round. That is $145 per 500. Wolf is $120 per 500 at Nachez or Sportsman's Guide shipped. New PMC is $285/1000 plus shipping. Unless you just need the brass and can take that amount out for the brass for the second loading, it might make more sense to buy the Wolf and not worry about where the cases go. Or at lease the PMC has the brass you can keep for the same price as reloading.

Just a thought.

Quick answer: go to one of the ads for bulk surplus in Shotgun News. WCC-844 is what the military specs for 223 55 and 62gr ammunition. I buy it with a friend, and we got 8lb jugs for about $90 apiece by buying four jugs in one shipping container.

Blue Dot... $71.00 for 5 lbs at Sportsmans...

12.5 grains per round: about 575 rounds per pound...

14 grains of powder for round: 500 rounds per pound of power...

10 grains of powder per round: 700 rounds per lb of powder...

11 grains of powder per round: 640 rounds per pound of powder...

these are just some of the loads I use, depending on bullet weight and MV I am desiring...

combine this with bulk varmint nightmare bullets at like $45 per 500...

and then Wolf primers at $15.00 a box of 1000, and then factor whatever your haz mat fee was...


as for brass, I have about 6 to 7,000 pieces of range brass picked up at our local range...

then I also neck size the brass, knock back the shoulder with a body die when needed every 4th to 7th round depending on the load.. 10 or 11 grain loads of Blue Dot usually don't even require having the neck needing resized but every 3rd or 4th shot... I just clean out the neck with a bore brush, deprime with a universal deprimer... and anneal the brass every 4th shot...

this is all for a bolt action... but on a test, I reloaded a batch of Remington Range brass I picked up, with the above procedure...

the batch had 10 cases to it... and then I did the same regimen as above... and loaded those cases 100 times... thats right folks, 100 times...what go me started is on Lapua's web sited they claimed reloading brass over 300 times!

had 3 casualties on that test... all operator error at the relaod bench...

no head separation and no neck splits...

this is for bolt action, but it is cheaper than shooting rimfire magnums, that's for darn sure..

ya want economy, there ya go...

plus it will increase barrel life 400 to 500%

and that stuff is plenty good for small sage rats out to 200-250 yds....