*sigh*

Why do I feel another time-consuming, expensive hobby coming my way soon?

Resistance is futile.

I needed a new hobby to replace homebrewing beer and reloading fits the bill. I like to shoot and I cannot justify the cost of ammo, so the initial outlay of cash will end being insignificant. Reloading is a good "winter hobby" since I can do it in my basement and then go to the range. During the summer I'm too busy with the Porsche , so this is great for me.

Tab Tanner came over today to get ke started reloading. After a few minor setbacks (i didn't have the shell holders for the Lyman hand primer), we were off and we made 25 cartridges. After Tab and my BIL left, I made some more, I'm up to 150 cartridges made today. I used Winchester brass, Winchester primers, H4198 powder (20.2gr) with Hornady VMax 55gr bullets. This is going to be fun!!

You will love the quality of the ammo that you make. Just a word however is to pay attention to the weapon that you intend to shoot your handloads through. I am a big 30.06 US Military nut. From experience you need a good set of load data tables. This is critical for rifles such as the M14/m1a and the Garand. Hot loads are not much liked by these types of rifles and you can bend oprods. Ask me how I know. BUt it is no big deal as long as you understand the key to USGI loads for these types of weapons. Also, a good tip is to think in terms of pressure or CUP. I found this helpful in truely understanding that it is pressure that plays a big role in how a cartridge is built.

Experiment with small batches of ammo, don't go crazy on just one load until you have sampled a few. TAKE TONS OF NOTES ON CARTRIDGE PERFORMANCE, that is what is nice about reloading, you control, you customized the round to the firearm (most noticable in rifles than in handguns IMHO).

And when you get all of that stuff down and are SAFE and comfortable with your process you can experiment with OGIVE length variations per chamber per rifle and witness the effects, small variations in powder loads (this can get real anal) and the results on the target. Oh, have fun now and remember you can spend alot of money on stuff.

Take Joe's advice and use the 550 on round at a time.

Wow! I just shot my 1st reloads! All fired well and no FTF's or FTE's. My father gave me his Smith &Wesson Model 645 .45ACP Semi-Auto that he bought new in 1985 and only put 20 rounds through it. When I called him to tell him my 1st .45ACP loads did well, he said "Merry Christmas, the gun is yours", very cool!

I used Hornady 185gr HP/XTP bullets with 7.7gr of Unique powder using Speer brass and CCI magnum small pistol primers (required by Speer) and should be at 1030fps. shot well, handled nice and was pretty accurate at 25yds. I'm very happy with my 1st reloading experience!