I am Teaching a New Reloader

[Ken in Iowa]

A young man from our church heard that I reload and even cast my own bullets. One thing led to another and I have him making his own ammo now. 223 to start, 308 next.

God has a hand in it. I have many of the tools that he needs already that I was going to sell.

Two memorable moments from teaching process;
1- The sparkling once-fired brass emerging from the tumbler.
2- And of course the first completed cartridge made with his own hands.

Hoestly, the best part for me is passing on the knowledge that I have accumulated over the past 50 years.

[OS OK]

We can be old handloaders forever but, until we teach another...we have not come full circle.

Good on you...charlie

[Plate plinker]

I too have a newbie starting up. One of are summer hires and to boot he is an engineering student.

I predict great things for him.

[ranch23]

I helped a young man from Church, or maybe he helped me?

[Der Gebirgsjager]

Good job, gentlemen. I'll bet that you all have other good traits that will rub off on these youngsters as well. Most successful men had a mentor at some point in their lives.

[HeavyMetal]

Helping get a shooter into reloading is very rewarding, I've done it Three times in my life, and sometimes you save someone from a major accident.

My "first" student lived just around the corner from me and had the small handicap of having several children and one income, now the family was very supportive, he had to boys that loved to shoot, and they had purchased over the years an eclectic set of tools for him.

we met cause my kid went to school with his, the around the corner thing, and when they mentioned to my kid the dads ammo just didn't seem to get it done, mine was all over it with an invite to come visit his dad and get it sorted out and fast!

Gotta love kids!

A day was set and Carl came by the garage to have a talk, took him about 3.5 minutes to realize he'd hit the jackpot experience wise!

My first suggestion was for him to go get his gear and show me what he was doing, and this is where the fun started!

In just a few minutes he was back with his meager amount of supplies, clanking around in the front seat next to him in his pick up: a Glass Mayo Jar full of Unique and Two glass Baby food jars with both Magnum and standard primers in them!

I couldn't believe that someone would actually do that! A quick demo was set up with a primed case and a folded sheet of tin foil at a range of Four foot the Mag primer shredded both layers of tin foil and ripped several large holes in it!

Once Carl saw this he realized that he had been at great risk and a few old primer packs rescued from the trash I keep forgetting to empty got his primer storage fixed for good, last time I saw him he still had one of this old Federal primer packs in a small frame on his work bench as a reminder of what not to do!

Once that was all sorted out we got on to his reloading technique, he had a Ruger Super Blackhawk in 44 mag but couldn't get it to shoot with cast, his boys had bought him a Lee Six cavity mold for a 250 grain boolit but someone had forgotten to tell them they'd need gas checks to make them work right!

I fired up my old Lyman pot and we made a bunch of boolits right then and there, a little advise on pre heating on top of the pot and he was suddenly raining great looking casting and in short order we had a few hundred for him to try out.

A quick trip through an old Lyman 45 with gas checks attached to them had Carl a some real nice looking boolits to load.

I had my number one Dillon 550 set up to do Magnum loads at that time so getting him some working reloads was pretty quick, he was working with a Lee C press and the difference between it and the Dillon was like magic ( this was July the next Xmas his wife got him a Dillon).

In these days an indoor range was in the next city over and open until about 9PM I took Carl and the Super blackhawk over to try the improved loads.

Carl was still a little skeptical about lead boolit reloads, since his had the usual issues with Keyholing and large groups from no gas checks, but Carl was a good shot and it didn't take a full cylinder for him to change his mind about casting boolits!

All in all it was a good day, I helped a fellow shooter, shot down a bunch of stupid myths and kept him from hurting himself, this took place in the early 80's and I still don't regret having done it!

These days a lot more information is available to beginners via the internet and some of the old BS myths are still out there so leading a helping hand when a receptive person is listening can be very rewarding.

It's not that new reloaders are unreceptive it's that the internet makes everyone an expert in less than a New York Minute, LOL!

I stopped offering assistance years ago, unless actually asked, because until the shooter having a problem realize's it's him and not the gun, you can't tell him anything that he doesn't already know!

Good that we are helping new shooter learn from the old school just be careful how you approach the staring gate, LOL!

HM

[Ken in Iowa]

I helped a young man from Church, or maybe he helped me?

I am wondering the same thing.

[tdoyka]

good for you!!!!

i have helped my old man, my oldest boy and 3 friends. i have another guy who wants to reload but he doesn't have time(he owns his own business). he has everything needed to reload but the time to do it.

i'll say it again, good for you!!!!

[Ken in Iowa]

My student came in thinking he wanted a Dillon. Since his interest was in accurate long range rifle shooting, I slowed him down quickly. "Let's start with the basics" which included case sorting and full length resizing on the Rockchucker that was to become his.

The first and second days were all about case prep. Die adjustment, primer pocket and flash hole uniforming, case length and chamfering.

We used different tools or methods to do things. Priming on the press (with and without the auto feeder) contrasted with my pet RCBS hand tool was an eye opener.

We were using Reloader 15 powder. My Redding 3BR measure metered it well. He detected that occasional crunch of cutting a powder kernel. We weighed every charge for a while. My usual procedure is to ceremoniously check the powder level in a tray of cases before moving it next to the press for seating. He was all about that!

[ozarkhillbilly49]

i have been helping a young man out some. he has a model 700 police in .338 lapua. he is getting into long range rifle. i am a fan of the bonanza/forester coax press for precision loads. i am shooting a savage model 12 vlp in .243. i shoot fairly regularly at 500 yrds. he has just stretched the lapua out to 800. he is holding his own against older more experienced shooters. it makes me feel good to pass along some of what i have learned. i didn't shoot the last trip to the range. but as the day ended a fellow shooter paid me a great compliment! he said i wish you hadn't taught that little devil catcher so well!!!

[Der Gebirgsjager]

High praise, that!

[reddog81]

Good for you. There aren't too many casters or even that many reloaders in central Iowa.

[jhalcott]

I love the look a new reloader has when their first round is fired. Ive had several newbies at the rangefiring ammo theyloaded.

[Half Dog]

I would consider yourself lucky. I try to give components away to get friends started but no luck so far in getting them going.

[Teddy (punchie)]

sounds good, love watching young people learn.

[Thumbcocker]

Good job.

[Wild Bill 7]

Good job, it is very pleasing to teach someone to load. I have also had a hand in teaching two young men how to reload. Safety is the first priority, no distractions and if they are start over. Also helped a friend who reloaded rifle get into pistol reloading. He accuses me of making him spend way more money than he thought. HaHa!!! He loves it though.

[lightman]

Good Job! Its a good feeling to pass something on to another generation.

[Bzcraig]

Excellent!! I have a nephew wanting to learn as soon as time allows. He is an Army Captain, single dad of 3 and working on his masters and one of those guys who excels at everything he does! He is a great man.

[Down South]

Great job!!!!
I've only been able to help one guy learn anything about reloading and that was for his 9mm. It seems that few are interested in learning these days.
I've been loading my own for over 40 yrs now. I had two kids, both daughters. They never took interest. And I had four grandsons, all grown now. They never took interest.

[Strtspdlx]

see everyone is so helpful. trying to find a mentor or active reloader in nj is seeming very difficult. of course I haven't had the time id like to have lately because of the new house and my job and financial constraints as well as time and and and. I would say I'm self taught but that is a lie. ive had a few people offer help via email or phone and recently ive made a "pen pal" out of one of the members here that I go to when I have a question. but my thoughts are so all over the place its hard for me to stay on one subject very long. hopefully one day ill have the knowledge to be able to pass it on to someone younger or less knowledgeable then myself.

[lightman]

Just about all of us started out with time and budget constraints. To this day, I still do my case prep and hand priming in the living room. Back in the day I did that so as to spend time with the family. Both of my Sons are avid hunters but only one of them shoots in competition or reloads. I've yet to get him into casting but he has been helpful on a couple of nice lead scores!

[Caster1977]

I retired just over a year ago and the first thing my high school friends did was to take me to Cabela's over in Missouri. I'd been reloading for over 40 years and my three buds have matching 22-250's they wanted to reload for after buying their first boxs of ammo. I convinced them that for rifle, they should stay with a single stage press rather than beginning with a progressive, so a new Rock Chucker was acquired along with appropriate dies, powder, primers, bullets, reloading manuals, etc. only one bought all that was needed and the others were invited share. So far, it has worked out well but they insist I walk them through it every time a reloading session kicks off. I don't mind. It's only an eight mile drive and the coffee is pretty good!

[Down South]

I convinced them that for rifle, they should stay with a single stage press rather than beginning with a progressive, so a new Rock Chucker was acquired
That's what I started out with, a Rock Chucker. I have a number of presses now including two Dillon RL550B's. But you know what, I still use my Rock Chucker for my hunting rifles.
I will use the Dillon's for 5.56/223 but I mostly use them for handgun ammo.

[GlockGuy]

Good on ya!