Lets talk storage!

[jdgabbard]

Ok, if any of you are anything like me, then you prefer that when you sit down at the reloading bench you have your components stocked up and ready to load. And I know that I hate it when I decide I need to load up some ammo, I sit down at the bench only to figure out that I'm out of boolits. Which necessitates firing up the pot instead of loading up ammo.

The obvious solution to this would be to have a good supply of boolits already cast up. And that in most cases is not an issue. However, storing and keeping track of how many you have and of what alloy, ect, is another issue altogether!

So I sat down yesterday and did some brain storming. I thought to myself, what do they come in when you buy them? BOXES! Then I thought to myself how I could cheaply come up with some boxes to neatly story boolits in, write the info on the box and stack them away for later use. So I sat down with a calculator, a piece of paper, a pencil and my computer. Withing about 30 minutes I came up with a PDF file that I could print off on a thin cardboard type paper. Note: I used the cardboard paper folders. The ones that fold in half and have the two little slots to hold papers in. I used these because I have a box of about 200. And they yield two boxes a piece.

The box I came up with is much like a shoe box. Once the pattern is cut out and taped, glued, or stapled together (use your discretion. I stapled the bottom portion and taped the lid with office tape) You have a nice little box that stacks 100 boolits of 9mm or 38 cal boolits 50 on top of 50 with a cardboard divider between the two levels. The lid simply slips on the the top. Afterwards I can wrap the boxes up with a piece of copy paper in a christmas gift type fashion and write the information on top of it. (When wrapping with copy paper with this size of box cutting about a 1/4 inch off of the left and right sides and cutting the sheet horizontally yields two sheets to wrap with. Perfectly sized.)

So I will attach a copy of the pdf to this post, for any of you that would like to give it a try. Be advised, as it is unclear in the pattern, that the square that says "inside piece" should be cut out and be by itself. It is the divider that goes inside of the box.

Pistol Bullet Box - 9mm & 38 Spl.pdf

So now that I've given you my solution to this problem, and given you my recipe as well. Lets hear some of the other stuff that you guys have done to store these things without buying lots of already made up boxes.

[osage]

Your solution is neater then mine. I have my boolits in misc. containers, coffee cans metal and plastic, plastic tubes that sugar free 2qt drink mix comes in and akro bins. I just started using clear plastic shoe boxes to store brass in. Its working out fine. So I thought once that is done I'd move on to boolits

[357maximum]

WOW, you really thought this out.


I use styrofoam vaucu-tainer packages for my rifle boolits and my need to be accurate pistol boolits. These containers get thrown out by just about every hospital and clinic. The little vacumed vial that sucky your blood out when affixed to a needle comes in them. My wife is a nurse and she brings home about 10 a week. They come in three sizes and all sizes hold exactly 100 boolits. the three sizes are dependant on whether it is for pedes, adults or big adults I guess. The big ones have a home for 100 45-50 caliber boolits, the middle size (most common) will do 100 35-40 cal right nicely, and the pedes sized ones work good for short 30's and short 35's.

I use cool whip containers and butter dishes for everything else. i do not want no dust on me boolits so I like the plastic containers and the vacutainers stack nicely and keep out dust....it is the system that works for me.

[randyrat]

I like it a lot! Mine are all stored in whatever container i could scrounge from the kitchen. None of them fit on my shelves. I hate my storage containers.
If i can muster enough patients to make containers like yours life would be better.

[INDENT] I made a corrigated board chair(cardboard) in collage and got an B with it. I would have had an A, but i had to cut the arms off it to fit it in my Volkswagon (Beetle) so i could bring to school. I used it for a few years until someone spilled beer all over it. Wish i remembered some of that, i'm terrible at designing things like boxes ect..

[uncle joe]

I had the same problem. My dad had all his boolits lined up neatly in a very short cardboard box standing on their bottoms 1 layer deep. Looked neat but would not work for multiple style boolits.
I bought two index card boxes at wallyworld $1.25 each. I put lubed boolits in one and right out of the water boolits in the other stacked on top of each other.

[Green Frog]

The bulk of my important bullets are cast for Schuetzen and are shot in the order cast. I line them up on the cloth pad to cool when the come out of my mould, then hand inspect each round and put it (in order) in a plastic liner from commercial pistol cartridge boxes. The full plastic liners are then either returned to their original cardboard sleeves which can be marked with appropriate data, or placed in wooden cigar boxes that hold the 300 or so "matched" rounds I like to take to a match. For my BPCS bullets, I do the cardboard sleeve thing mentioned above until those rounds are loaded at home or at the range.

Green Frog

[Shiloh]

My brass is in 5 qt. ice cream buckets. 9mm and .38 in empty yellow plastic Kitty Litter jugs because there is a lot. Heavy duty.

Once fired range pick-up brass goes in separate boxes until there is enough to clean, mild acid bath, and process. Boolits are in coffee cans and empty plastic industrial soap cake containers with lids from work.

Shiloh

[Tonto]

I store cast and sized/lubed bullets in the frozen food containers sized in pint, pint and a half, quart and gallon sizes found on the home canning section of most stores. They are somewhat clear, take a sharpie marker for the contents and stack nice. And I have way too many now as ballast for the reloading bench. A recent move reminded me how heavy the inventory and ingot stash are. These containers hold from a couple of hundred to a thousand or so depending on caliber and weight. Dirt and dust is the enemy.

[opentop]

I buy small zip lock bags from the craft section at walmart. I then place them in 30 cal, or 50 cal ammo cans.

I store all my empty brass in coffee cans.

[jnovotny]

I store all my brass and boolits in the plastic coffee cans. They stack well and a 1gal. Can holds about 2000 158 gr 357 boolits. You can even get different sizes of cans, they all work well in the reloading room and the casting room.

[Cloudpeak]

Wow, I didn't realize we ate so many peanuts until I looked around my shop

I store my bullets in 3# Planter's peanuts cans with lids. I write on them with Sharpies info on bullet size and style, sized only, sized & lubed and date cast. The cans stack well and are a bit sturdier than cardboard boxes.

I've got around 5,000 9mm's and 2,000 45 SWC's stored and am fixin' to cast some more because it's 8 below and there isn't much else to do.

Cloudpeak

[mooman76]

I did store mine in empty powder containers but soon had more bullets than containers and switched to coffee cans. Lately I have switched to tose sort of new disposable plastic containers that you can microwave and freeze in. They are strong enough and I can see though them to see the bullets. I can write on top with a majic marker the bullet size and weight and if they get too messed up or broken they are cheap enough I can just throw them away and get more. They also come in a good variety of sizes.

[cohutt]

I keep most in quart or gallon zip locks labeled by date cast; these are stored in the clear plastic split lid storage bins from wally world.




My 440g Ohaus 45-70s fit nicely into MTM 45acp cartridge cases:

[copdills]

I use coffee cans myself

[wheelgunner]

I use new boxes from Uline ( http://www.uline.com/ ) I order them by the 100 (the 4X4X4 boxes I lke are only .16 ea), they hold 4-500 depending on the size. I fill em up just like the cast boolits you buy in the store and place them on a shelf where I can easily determine the quantity on hand and what size I might need to cast next. I save the empties and refill em next time I cast. I have about 70 boxes filled up on the shelf. They also have a miriad of different style boxes at Uline, I'm sure they'll have what you're looking for. BTW, if I order before 2pm, I have them the next day UPS from PA to MA!

I have no connection to Uline, just very happy with their product and service!

[beagle]

I use the 100 round .22 packs salvaged from the range for bullet storage. Label with bullet number and sized diameter. They stack easy, they're free and keep your bullets dust free./beagle

[MT Gianni]

I keep unsized bullets in baggies with their date cast and alloy in cardboard boxes per caliber. Sized and lubed are also stored in quart zip lock baggies where temp does not exceed 70 degrees.

[jdgabbard]

Yeah, I use the plastic Folger's Coffee Cans for Brass storage too. I will say that one of the big cans can hold about 7-800 38spl brass, or about a 1000 9mm. And their stackable. Which makes them perfect for my setup.

Yeah, on these boxes once I cut them out and fold them up, and fill 'em up, I just wrap them up in paper and put their info including alloy, date, and lube on the paper wrapper. I did it this way as to let me reuse the boxes whenever I use up the boolits. This way you don't have to fold up 30,000 boxes in your boolit casting career.

NOTE: I also started working up a design for a box for loaded boolits. Similar to what you would have seen a hundred years ago. However, I thought to myself that you can actually purchase ammo boxes a fairly reasonable price from places like Midway. But if anybody is interested in something like this just gimme a PM. May be a day or two before I get back to you though.

[opentop]

Hey jdgabbard

I'd like to see some pictures of your boxes made up and packed.

[jdgabbard]

Hey jdgabbard

I'd like to see some pictures of your boxes made up and packed.

Here you go. Not a great picture. But should give you an Idea.

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