[Jeff Higgins]

I thought about picking this up. I'm a fairly serious handgun and rifle reloader and bullet caster, and have been for over 40 years. Seems it would make sense to pick up shotshell reloading as well.

Well, I'm sorry to report, it just didn't make sense for me. I don't shoot enough shotgun, never having gotten into any of the clay bird games (although I've had just a yee-haw time on the occasions I have shot some). I really only shotgun to hunt. I don't go through but a few boxes of shells every year in total, and they vary from our mandated non-toxic for waterfowl and some upland on our West side, 3" mag #6's for eastside pheasant, 2 3/4" 7 1/2's for grouse, etc. I would be changing setups constantly to load a box or two of each.

That, and I don't see the really "fun" part for us hopeless tinkerers and experimenters - shotgun reloading follows set "recipes", which removes the experimentation and fooling around inherent in metallic cartridge reloading. To met, that's the main reason I reload. I would reload even if it were more expensive than buying commercial.

But, yeah, I can absolutely see it for you high-volume trap and skeet shooters. The thousands of rounds per year that you guys chew through would soon put you in the poorhouse without reloading. For a duffer like me, though, the ROI just isn't there.