Does reloading cause brain damage?

Reloading causes brain damage in the sense that we think we are saving money. We are really just shooting more. Yes it's much cheaper than shooting factory loads but I have not saved much in the bank at a decent rate or in a fund with the money I would have spent shooting.
 
I don't believe people who say, "I've been casting for 50 years and shooting in an indoor range and they can't find any lead in my blood." I just don't believe those posts. They could give someone a false sense of safety. We need to be careful. I get my blood tested. There's some lead there but it is at a reasonable level. I just try to be careful. Working in industry all my life I've learned to take care of myself no matter what others say and do. I won't use a tumbler because of the dust generated. I wear a mask because of the Covid. Why take chances? Getting sick or crippled sucks. I'm 66 and still ride a bike and go to the gym. Being sick isn't macho.
 
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rwsmith said:
....of containers with lids so I won't have use the good china. But I never have one when I need it. I mean you can wash the china. It's not like it's going to hurt it.




OK, the question was, does reloading cause brain damage?

It does when your wife catches you using her good china.


I heard dryer sheets were good to put in the tumbler with the brass. I had a LOT of brass to tumble. I told my wife to get more dryer sheets next time she goes to the store because the box was empty.

Now I have brain damage.:confused:
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HOHOHO.
I resemble that remark. Imagine my delight when I discovered that the post of one of my wife's earrings would fit into the cavity of my sierra hollow point bullet to dislodge the walnut from my having tumbled the bullets in the walnut media! "Dear, have you seen this earring?" she says. "What earring?",I answer. I am going to hell.
 
I have a "Reloading causes brain damage" near miss. I was sizing bullets in a old Lyman 450 and the lube was so stiff it would not flow (it was cold in that room in January!) So I grabbed my wife's blow dryer and directed the hot air stream towards the base of the sizer, worked great!

But I managed to smear alox all over he hair dryer! She started looking for her dryer before I got home from work the next day. She met me at the door (with dripping wet hair and fire in her eyes) I simply hander her the bag with a brand new top of the line blow dryer. That is how I avoided a trip to the ER for a emergancy rectal dryerectemy! (it seems my brain is located near there and that blow dryer would definitely cause brain damage!)

Ivan
 
max503 said:
I don't believe people who say, "I've been casting for 50 years and shooting in an indoor range and they can't find any lead in my blood." I just don't believe those posts. They could give someone a false sense of safety. We need to be careful. I get my blood tested. There's some lead there but it is at a reasonable level. I just try to be careful. Working in industry all my life I've learned to take care of myself no matter what others say and do. I won't use a tumbler because of the dust generated. I wear a mask because of the Covid. Why take chances? Getting sick or crippled sucks. I'm 66 and still ride a bike and go to the gym. Being sick isn't macho.
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Well, you can believe what you will...or NOT. If you say I'm lying, that's on you.

In my early years I didn't know any better. Now I DO, so I take better care. I also wear the mask, ride my bike and go shooting as time permits.

My doctor's blood tests didn't lie. I worked in industry for 40+ years as well and followed the safety practices mandated to me by the info of the day. I may get mesothelioma in the end, but it wasn't because I refused to follow the precautions that were required by my employer.

Anywhoot, I resent the fact that you are accusing me of lying. Maybe you should stop shooting all together and stay in the house and watch TV.

My data was provided to calm people's fears, not to provide a false sense of security. My recommendation to you at your advanced age is to go into seclusion because the covid is probably out to get you.
 
GypsmJim said:
Well, you can believe what you will...or NOT. If you say I'm lying, that's on you.

In my early years I didn't know any better. Now I DO, so I take better care. I also wear the mask, ride my bike and go shooting as time permits.

My doctor's blood tests didn't lie. I worked in industry for 40+ years as well and followed the safety practices mandated to me by the info of the day. I may get mesothelioma in the end, but it wasn't because I refused to follow the precautions that were required by my employer.

Anywhoot, I resent the fact that you are accusing me of lying. Maybe you should stop shooting all together and stay in the house and watch TV.

My data was provided to calm people's fears, not to provide a false sense of security. My recommendation to you at your advanced age is to go into seclusion because the covid is probably out to get you.
Click to expand...

I feel it's irresponsible to promote a cavalier attitude towards the health hazards of lead.

The average blood lead level for an adult is 3 mcg/dL. https://www.health.ny.gov/publications/2584.pdf

Who interprets your lead level tests? Right now the acceptable level for a child is 5 mcg/dL. Only a few years ago it was 10. If you are an older male I could see a doctor telling you that you have no problem with lead even though you have a fairly high level. For one thing, they don't use chelation therapy until you are up around 45 mcg/dL for a child or 80 for an adult. A doctor could tell you you're fine only because they don't want to send you for treatment, or perhaps your insurance wouldn't pay for it.

My point is a doctor could tell you that you don't have a problem, only because they don't recommend chelation treatment at this time. That doesn't mean the lead in your blood isn't affecting your health. My doctor told me there is NO acceptable blood lead level, but I think she is being very cautious.
 
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rwsmith said:
....of containers with lids so I won't have use the good china. But I never have one when I need it. I mean you can wash the china. It's not like it's going to hurt it.

OK, the question was, does reloading cause brain damage?

It does when your wife catches you using her good china.

I heard dryer sheets were good to put in the tumbler with the brass. I had a LOT of brass to tumble. I told my wife to get more dryer sheets next time she goes to the store because the box was empty.

Now I have brain damage.:confused:
Click to expand...
The dain brammage is caused by the rolling pin she applied to the side of your noggin - not the reloading itself.
 
max503 said:
I feel it's irresponsible to promote a cavalier attitude towards the health hazards of lead.

The average blood lead level for an adult is 3 mcg/dL. https://www.health.ny.gov/publications/2584.pdf

Who interprets your lead level tests? Right now the acceptable level for a child is 5 mcg/dL. Only a few years ago it was 10. If you are an older male I could see a doctor telling you that you have no problem with lead even though you have a fairly high level. For one thing, they don't use chelation therapy until you are up around 45 mcg/dL for a child or 80 for an adult. A doctor could tell you you're fine only because they don't want to send you for treatment, or perhaps your insurance wouldn't pay for it.

My point is a doctor could tell you that you don't have a problem, only because they don't recommend chelation treatment at this time. That doesn't mean the lead in your blood isn't affecting your health. My doctor told me there is NO acceptable blood lead level, but I think she is being very cautious.
Click to expand...

Boy, such an aggressive response seems to imply an unstated problem.

My cavalier attitude is directed at the topic at hand, i.e., "reloading" causing brain damage. I think most educated people understand the hazards of lead and take appropriate precautions. But to imply that reloading or shooting is hazardous is a stretch.

A blood test less than 10 mcg/dl is considered a background level. A person is assumed to have lead exposure exhibits a reading over 10.

I started shooting at about age 13. I started casting boolits at age 26. At that time some old codgers at my club warned me that it was a bad practice. At that time in my career I was semi-involved in environmental health testing of employees in factories owned by my company. We wired them up twice a year for a week and monitored their ingestion of the air in their workplace. With that background, and for my own benefit I obtained a reprint of a government study of lead exposure when melting lead and casting boolits. That data convinced me to set up a casting facility in my basement.

At age 66 my blood level was 5. My doctor said that the reading showed showed no discernible lead exposure. That confirmed the data presented by NY in the previous link. I guess the doctor didn't lie to me either.
 
Lots of thread drift, but,

I'm one of those guys that have been casting my own, shooting them at indoor ranges for a few decades and my annual blood tests show normal ranges (and I even worked downtown LA for 20 years, not in an office). One of the most "warned about" subject connected to shooting/reloading is lead poisoning. Waaaay to much false info and "Chicken Little" posts on forums today. Some posters would have you decked out in a full Haz-Mat suit complete with Hepa filtered breathing apparatus, elbow length leather gauntlets, full length leather aprons, and only cast in a controlled environment (like a paint booth with one hundred thousand air exchanges per hour). My employer provided annual physicals including blood testing for lead. My lungs are in pretty good shape for a 74 year old even though I have used a wobbler to clean my brass, dry for 25+ years, and my last blood test, just 4 months ago showed lower/normal lead/heavy metals levels. (as long as I have been visiting forums and reading reloading/shooting info. I have only read of one person with high (dangerous?) blood/lead level; a man in Alaska that cast and sold bullets in a shed for 30 years). But I too am concerned with what newer casters see/read, and some are probably scared away from casting because of the scare tactics/"warnings" they may read on a forum. Actually I don't care what "precautions" anyone may take for their "safety" and I normally don't rant about Chicken Little posters. My only brain damage shows up in replying to old wives' tales and fearful "warnings"...

Just K.I.S.S, and use common sense (a scarce commodity today)...
 
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That's true but it's ok........

mtgianni said:
Reloading causes brain damage in the sense that we think we are saving money. We are really just shooting more. Yes it's much cheaper than shooting factory loads but I have not saved much in the bank at a decent rate or in a fund with the money I would have spent shooting.
Click to expand...

If I didn't reload I could only afford a range trip a couple times a year. With today's prices maybe once a year.

So not only do I get out once or twice a month, I can shoot all I want to.
 
It's a proven "fact"...
In Men ... the leading cause of brain damage ... are Wives .

Reloading has nothing to do with anything ...
Gary
 
gwpercle said:
It's a proven "fact"...
In Men ... the leading cause of brain damage ... are Wives .

Reloading has nothing to do with anything ...
Gary
Click to expand...

Reminds me of a friend I had. He and his wife argued often, him being one of the "hard guys" in school and her being half Asian half Irish. I once visited him after an argument he had with his wife, in the hospital. He had turned his back on her during an argument and the last thing he could remember was "Don't turn your back on me you ***!". She "tapped" him on the head with the hard edge of a Los Angeles phone book. Now that was brain (and scalp, hair and skull) damage...
 
gwpercle said:
It's a proven "fact"...
In Men ... the leading cause of brain damage ... are Wives .

Reloading has nothing to do with anything ...
Gary
Click to expand...
Actually if you want to get right down to it, males are born brain damaged.

From what I have read it is proven scientific fact that testosterone destroys connections between the two halves of the brain as males develop in the womb.

This is why men are generally so much better at separating logical though from emotional thought. We think with one half of our brain at a time - the left half is more focused on logic and the right half is more focused on feelings and emotion. This ability to separate the logical from the emotional is what they call "compartmentalizing" and most men are very good at it.

Females are born with a lot more of those connections between the two halves of the brain intact. That is why they generally think about both the logical and the emotional aspects of things at the same time. They are using both halves of the brain all of the time. This makes compartmentalizing more difficult for women.

So in a sense, we are born brain damaged in that some of the right-to-left brain connections we started out with were destroyed prior to birth by the testosterone in our systems.

The good news is that when we do something stupid we have an excuse - we were born brain damaged ;) :D

So maybe that answers the chicken or the egg question and it really is a case of the brain damaged being attracted to reloading, rather than the reloading causing the brain damage.
 
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