Today we’re going to talk about a few of my favorite tips to stay organized and keep track while I’m reloading ammunition. So first, if you have a single stage press, the best way I recommend to stay organized is to have some hard plastic cases. The reason I like to use these is because I can label them or color coat them according to my reloading and have them labeled along with the stages. So you’d have your dirty brass, and then you could go to your clean brass, then you could go to the casing with the primer, and then finally in your final stage. This way, you can just kind of keep track where they’re going. It’s not a necessity, just how I prefer to do it, and it makes things a little simpler.
Another quick tip is actually very simple. So a lot of times when you buy ammunition, it will come in cardboard, a foam container or something plastic. I never toss the original containers. I like to keep them because when I’m done, I know how much comes in this automatically. They sit up straight, I can actually look at them and inspect them all really easily this way because I can look at the primers. To me, it’s just the best way to just keep track when you’re done and they just stay in there perfectly setup and it’s easy to inspect them.
For empty casings, I actually just put them in Ziploc bags because it’s an easy way to store them. But then I kind of know these are all my dirty casing, so I know if they’re in a bag and they’re out of the box, I know they’re dirty and not to be messed with. After, once I clean them out, I’m going to put them in an actual nice container so I know they’re ready for the actual reloading process. Something else I like to do is actually before I clean casing and throw them in the tumbler, I like to put them in a little sandwich bag. The reason is because I know that a full bag is pretty much the exact amount I want to use in the tumbler. So that way, I can kind of keep track and then once this is full, I can dump it in tumbler clean it out. Once they’re clean, I can put it in a nice hard plastic container and get it ready for the reloading process.
Probably my favorite tip, which is not an important tip and it’s not necessary, it’s just something that I’ve learned to do and some of my friends at also reload, do the same thing. It just helps you keep track. So what I do a brand new factory made casing is obviously blank, there’s nothing on the back. Once I reload it once, I then put a slash on it with a Sharpie marker, which doesn’t actually damage it or affect it at all. This tells me that this has been reloaded once and then every time I reload it, I put another dash on there. This just kind of lets me know the condition of the actual casing because they don’t last long. Two to three reloads is about what I like to do, depending on the actual quality of the casing. So once it’s shot, and I see the three lines on there, I usually just toss this casing out.
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Wow!!! Only 2 or 3 reloads per case? Man, you are wasting brass. Send it to me. I’ll get 5 or 6 more reloads out of it. I usually get, on average, 8 reloads per brass case. Of course it all depends on how heavy you are loading each case. Now for my bear loads in my 41 mag, yes, maybe 2 or 3 times, but for just regular target loads for plinking and practice, I can get 7 – up to 10 times reloading. Brass is the second most expensive thing you buy as a reloader and I don’t like wasting it. Rifles are a little different, but still I get on average about 5 reloads per case. So, bag up your 3 times spent cases and send them to me. I’ll be glad to load them them up.