30.06 for M1 Garand? Easy to Reload?

[10thmountain]

I have admittedly been a purchaser or Ammo my whole life. Never reloaded. I have a ton of brass in 30.06 / .308.
Most of it is surplus brass with some modern rounds mixed in.
I am starting to kick around the idea of reloading.
So some questions :

1. What equipment do you need?
2. Can this be KISS easy? Keep it simple stupid
3. How many times can you reload brass?
4. What is the break even point on reloading? How do the economics work? ( what is the cost per round reloading vs buying new)
Any info would be most helpful.
Thank you!

 

[gyppo]

The break even point depends on the value of your time.
if you find used equipment , a wild guess Is you can get started for $300 Maybe less.
a loaded 308 or 30-06 ball round is going to cost you 55 cents approximately.
.15 bullet, .10 primer .30 powder assuming you load about 50 grains of Varget at $40 a pound.
These are all inflated prices. If you are paying $1 per round. That is $45 per hunderd In savings. In 700 rounds you break even. The quality of your rounds will be better than factory and you can tune them for your rifle.
Reloading is a hobby, hobbies rarely save us money.

 

[palmettomoon]

Don't do it for "economy," do it for precision and control.

 

[coach482]

Consider the equipment costs separate from the components. If you buy quality named brand used equipment you can easily sell if you decide later it's not for you.

PS. I hate reloading, but love shooting, so reloading allows me to shoot way more for less.

 

[Plumminfool]

Reloading is a sickness, at least for me. No money saved but my reloads shoot much better than factory loads.

 

[10thmountain]

Don't do it for "economy," do it for precision and control.

Agreed . I’d like to tame the 30.06 load as well. I do think it would be better for accuracy sake.

It would be great to reload 250 rounds then head to the CMP range .

What kind of equipment do you recommend? What’s the simple set up?

 

[palmettomoon]

Agreed . I’d like to tame the 30.06 load as well. I do think it would be better for accuracy sake.

It would be great to reload 250 rounds then head to the CMP range .

What kind of equipment do you recommend? What’s the simple set up?

RCBS Rock Chucker Supreme Reloading Kit will get you started. It's what I started with in '91. I still use it today for rifle cartridges. Augmented with some volume processing tools of course.

Use 30.06 Small Base dies for autoloaders.

 

[CTS Tactical]

Second the RCBS Rock Chucker Supreme. I have Dillon for some pistol rounds but my rifle rounds are all done on the single stage Rock Chucker. Biggest problem with getting started with reloading right now is lack of availability of components, mainly primers at a reasonable price. Maybe some day they will get back to some semblance of normal. I doubt we will ever see $32 per thousand again though.

 

[MILSURP Collector]

If I can do it anyone can.

I also reload EXPENSIVE MILSURP rounds like 30-40 Krag and 7.7 Japanese. Just started .455 Webley and 5.7x28.

 

[Guthrie]

You probably wont save much at all but you'll be able to shoot a whole lot more.