I did get to enjoy doing some reloading this past weekend, I had 100 new 460 magnum cases, twenty 454's and ten 45LC. That kept me busy for a little while. When I was done I got bored and started browsing gun stuff, now I have 250 12.7 x 42's on back-order with Starline. This whole beer virus and ammo panic sure has made it hard to enjoy going to the range so I have something to reload later and I am running out of space to store the assembled ammo but I am hesitant to use something that may not be replaceable.

We lost 4 pre-planned vacations. My wife lost her job and her business. Going to the range and making loud bangs and sending boolits into the berm ARE MY ENJOYMENT.

I don't get the boredom problem.

Got a dog, then bought a motorcicle. Had to get out of the house and see different places.

I live smack dab in the middle of a National Forest. Take my Jeep out almost every day with my morning coffee, trails are endless.

Take a different gun or two with me and pop off maybe a dozen rounds. Sometimes only 1 or two from concealed.. just to keep them company.

To the OP: Ye ol' "12.7 × 42".. ? Hmmmm.....

Hodgdons? Nope: nothing. Oh, yeah: the 50 B.

You don't like those big bangers, do you? When the "45LC" (sic?) appears to be your "plinker load", well...

Cheers!

P.S. Did you corner the market on Lil' Gun prior to...?

I got 2 lbs of LilGun, 1000 primers (LPM), dies, about 200 rounds and some 50AE bullets just before the world went to ****. The AR is ok, not near the kick of my TC Encore in 460 Magnum. I did get a brass catcher for the AR so I don't have to chase spent brass at the range. Before I hurt my back chopping up a tree I would go to the range at least once a week, I cut back for about a year while I healed up.

The 45LC and 454's were loaded as a carry round, 250 grain FTX's that I cut a cannulur in at the same height of the 250 grain Extreme's I use for plinking. The 45's are loaded at 9.5 grains of Tightgroup, I have yet to have one fail on me out of several hundred rounds. The 454's (28.5 grain H110) were a problem until I got a roll crimp die and added the extra step, solved the getting a bullet stuck in the barrel problem. I have a chest carry holster for my 460V and added a gun belt with 25 loops for ammo, I have gotten a few likes from guys at the range when I show up wearing it, the red tips are a nice touch.

I do my reloading on a RCBS Summit press, and check each powder charge as I go from the powder measurer to the press with the case in one hand and a bullet in the other.

I’ve never been more disenchanted with guns before. My gun club range was closed for 2 years for renovations so the amount of shooting I’ve done in that time was minimal. Now it’s opened again and you hate to go and waste reloading components and lead. I am well off but for how long? I don’t see anything getting better this year

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-Matt

I understand and am truly sorry for you.

Our local range (GHR&P Club) is open 24/7, 365 days per year (is that redundant?): referring to indoors, of course... Except for a couple isolated days it has been open during renovations (Adding a restroom, water heater, new steel backdrop with rubber sheet curtains, wallboard ceiling, new woodstove & heaters, etc).. Totally (re-)built the upper (rifle) range shelter, new concrete walkways, woodshed, etc.

Outdoors, rifle up to 300 yards from the new shelter, hmmmm... Probably from dawn to dusk, but I have never heard of somebody shooting outdoor at night?

No hourly charge, no range officer, no counter, no sales (well, targets are 10 for a $): the year you turn 62 dues get cut in half, from $100 (+ a $5 key charge) to $50... Per YEAR. With a Purple Heart your dues are -0-.

Easily 95% of the times I've gone in the last 4 years we have had the indoor range (or indoors to outdoors, or outdoors pistol targets @ 25 & 50 yards) to ourselves.

Without it I would have gone totally crazy!

Keep hangin' in there, Dieseltech56!

Surprise, surprise I got an email from UPS, there is a package ready for pickup at Starline. Now all I need is for Extreme to make some 50 cal bullets'.

I got an email from UPS "Your package is delivered"... but it ain't anywhere.

You bought the stuff you shoot, its not wasting ammo??

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NRA Cert. Inst. IDPA CSO

I built a router sled to make cedar ‘pies’ for stools, end tables and coffee tables a while back. Squared up 22 pies so far. The pix is before I got my router installed on it. Planning on using hairpin legs on them.

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...are GREAT hedges against depression. Happiness is a warm press and a range trip. I've had tons of serious hobbies, but this is the one that has lasted for me. Right now I need another hobby like a kick in the head.

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"He was kinda funny lookin'"

I started playing frizbee golf. Lots of fun.

I decided this morning that I would “reactivate” one of my old High Standard 22 autopistols in as “conventional” configuration as possible since I don’t have my 9mm reloading tools “online” at this point. My next few trips to the range will involve primarily the HS and a K22 and a bunch of Federal Auto Match bulk ammo.

Meanwhile in the loading room I’ll load a bunch of WC & SWC ammo for 38 Spl before I break the Dillon down and change it to load 9mm. I’ve got the components in deep quantities so I can load the ammo I have been buying but which is now in short supply, I’ve just got to get off my adze and do it!

Froggie

I got home to find a box of brass. The weekend is saved, I have 250 12.7 x 42 cases to prep then the next weekend I can drop powder and seat bullets. I guess it's ok to put off finding another hobby for a couple weeks, that's the nice thing about a single stage press, it takes up a lot of time.

You can’t kid us, we know you couldn’t wait to start your stamp collection.

I did start a coin collection a few decades ago during a med cruise, my wife decided to give it to her grandfather during the next deployment (just a bunch of funny looking coins).

I have the same issue. Honestly, shooting and reloading are really my only hobbies.

Not to get all emotional here, but this is just a depressing time. The weather is trash, no one knows when reloading supplies will be available again, no one know what will be made illegal here in the next few years, there's an odd guilt of shooting my dwindling reloading supplies when I do get out...in other words, it sucks. The same thing hit me back in 2013, I stopped shooting almost 100% from Jan '13 through late '14.

I'm not sure what outdoor hobby I'm going to pick up come this spring.

There are a lot of cool hobbies out there. At the beginning of the pandemic I was into, in addition to shooting, fly fishing, biking (mountain and gravel), hiking, camping, beer (it counts!), and ultimate frisbee (can you tell I live in CO?). Since the pandemic I've picked up spinning/casting rod fishing, ice fishing, and waterfowl hunting.

While I miss having the option to shoot, I miss shooting a lot less than I expected to. I'll still hit the range from time to time, and when ammo comes back I expect I'll get more into clay games, but I sold a great number of my guns during the pandemic and really don't regret that at all.

For me the panic was just one more straw, I've long lamented the increasing slide of mainstream gun culture into politics and conspiracy theories, and it shows no signs of slowing on that front. When I go fishing and talk to fellow fisherpeople I get to discuss catches, techniques, what beer we prefer, and why we're the smartest for driving 20 year old Toyota trucks, when I go to the range I get to hear about how NY billionaires are totally going to pay activists to drive a hundred miles to their rural community and burn it down, any day now. I know which conversation I enjoy and it's really better for my mood to not just wallow in those circles anymore.

Pellet guns, dry fire, photography, volunteer in your community.

That sir sounds like a fine time!! Sounds like a perfect day to me. I cant even go hiking with the dogs anymore since moving to maryland, well at least the area we moved to, it FLAT.

We used to take the dogs to the woods every single Sunday. We went in pouring rain, we went in blinding snowstorms and we went in boiling heat. It did not matter. We would climb the hills for hours and hours, find a scenic vista and relax and enjoy the view and solitude. Here though everything is flat, any trail is well defined and marked and usually paved so all the yuppie soccer moms dont get their shoes muddy. They also have ytash cans conveniently located for the latte cups. This just sucks. I long for true wilderness wanderings again.

Fortunately for both of us though we are still employed fulltime and our live seem to have been little impacted by all of this except for the ammo shortage.