Hand loading, legality?

Phractal

I was wondering, as I intend to get into target shooting soon, whats the deal with hand-loading? Is it legal here to 'roll your own' per se? I know people in other countries who load magnificent .22LR target ammo (using primed cases) and was hoping I could do so too- most believe that the best performance is gotten from custom loads for just the right velocity, etc. So, can I do it? Or is it Verboten? Do I need particular licences? Which components are regulated?

Tackleberrywho

Phractal wrote: »

I was wondering, as I intend to get into target shooting soon, whats the deal with hand-loading? Is it legal here to 'roll your own' per se? I know people in other countries who load magnificent .22LR target ammo (using primed cases) and was hoping I could do so too- most believe that the best performance is gotten from custom loads for just the right velocity, etc. So, can I do it? Or is it Verboten? Do I need particular licences? Which components are regulated?

you need to wait a year or so to see what happens, coz at the mo No Go

Sparks

Can't see it being of much use with .22lr though, even if it comes through - the factory loads are too accurate and too cheap.

IRLConor

Phractal wrote: »

I know people in other countries who load magnificent .22LR target ammo (using primed cases) and was hoping I could do so too

I'm curious about this. Pretty much every high-level .22lr shooter I know of uses factory ammunition. What kind of performance are people getting out of hand-loaded .22lr?

tac foley

Sir - there is no such animal as home-loaded .22 Long rifle ammunition. Somebody has been jerking your chain here. I have been shooting factory .22LR since I was six years old, and I'm now 64. And I have never heard of hand-loaded .22 rimfire ammunition.

Before you say, who the f........... I'd point out that I shoot many thousands of rounds in seven different calibres a year on three continents, do not live in RoI, and have been an avid handloader since the late-1960's. I'd hazard a guess that if it were possible to handload .22 rimfire ammunition to a higher standard that that made by Eley [Tenex], Lapua Gold, RWS R50 and so on, that the top shooters would be shooting it.

Sadly, they have to make do with this stuff...

The manufacture of rim-fire ammunition devolves entirely over extremely precise deposition of a liquified form of explosive priming compound being spun into the bottom of the case by a machine designed to do at a rate of about 100,000 per hour.

Please have a look at Youtube to see this process in action.

tac
Supporter of The Cape Meares Lighthouse Restoration Fund

T.H.308

Yeah unfortunately haunhloading is still not legalised :(here but on the brighter side if the tightly controlled Creedmoor pilot scheme goes well
the powers that be may find start listening to reason and legalise it;)

tac foley

T.H.308 wrote: »

Yeah unfortunately haunhloading is still not legalised :(here but on the brighter side if the tightly controlled Creedmoor pilot scheme goes well the powers that be may find start listening to reason and legalise it;)

On a personal level, I'd be far happier to see VERY legal-gun-owning Irishman able to do something that most of us take for granted without either being criminalised or held up as an 'elite and privileged' member of society.

My $0.02.

tac
Supporter of The Cape Meares Lighthouse Restoration Fund

T.H.308

tac foley wrote: »

On a personal level, I'd be far happier to see VERY legal-gun-owning Irishman able to do something that most of us take for granted without either being criminalised or held up as an 'elite and privileged' member of society.

My $0.02.

tac
Supporter of The Cape Meares Lighthouse Restoration Fund

I hear you and agreefully afterall in most countries in the world (with sensible goverments) licenced gun holders can handload to their hearths content and theres never a problem or issue.

Grizzly 45

tac foley wrote: »

Sir - there is no such animal as home-loaded .22 Long rifle ammunition. Somebody has been jerking your chain here. I have been shooting factory .22LR since I was six years old, and I'm now 64. And I have never heard of hand-loaded .22 rimfire ammunition.

As a historical aside.
I HAVE heard of it being done all right.But in such minute quantities and in 3rd world dictatorship hellholes where sourcing ammo for any rifle is a big problem,and mght be a life&death situation.It is done with the tips of "strike anywhere matches".Now no one get their panties in a twist about this info on a public board etc.[1] You cant get these anymore [and they are very specific type of match] here in the ROI,and they are NOT the army surplus,junk shop ones either. [2] it is such a PITA job,that I really doubt it has ever been done for a handful of .22 rimfire rounds ever .[4] Seeing the .22lr is THE most common round on the planet,why unless you are living in say N Korea or a jail,would you bother when you can buy a tested product over the counter?

thedragon

Its a big like robbing a bank, its OK until your caught. So the moral of the story ?

Grizzly 45

Dont get caught robbing banks??????;)

Tackleberrywho

Grizzly 45 wrote: »

Dont get caught robbing banks??????;)

Sometimes one would sense that certain posters are lobbing a proverbial hand grenade to start a row

Grizzly 45

Pose a stupid comparision....:rolleyes: To which the answer is the same in both cases.

Phractal

Notice I said primed cases, not already fired ones. There is literature from 70s somewhere on my hard drive about reloading .22WMR IIRC. And for someone like me, it is moreso for the fun of experimenting. A man I used to talk to in the US used to pull the heads from .22, mess with the powder loading, then reinstall the head. Having dissected .22LR as a young teenager with a pliers, I know whats in em . The 'super cross' ammo had green flake powder, wheras remington had grey ball. Both had green primer mix

Phractal

Sorry, phone formatting means double post . The main reason I would like to load my own is not just to experiment with loadings and various powders using a chrono, but also to test sabots, if they are legal. I was thinking a saboted .17 projectile in a .22LR and a hot powder load could really scream... And really ruin a rabbits day. Sometimes there is no need for a suppose. BTW, one of you referred to third world improvised ammo. Familiar with P.A. Luty? He wrote some amazing books on making your own...

juice1304

Phractal wrote: »

but also to test sabots, if they are legal.

well you won't be able to do that either.

tac foley

To whom it may concern - I've been reading this thread with growing dread. Please feel free to futz around with ammunition in the safety of your own home - in fact, do whatever you care to. I personally don't give a rat's fundament if you blow yourself up, and end up picking your nose with your elbow, wiping your ar*e by remote control or simply having a weekly visit from a nurse with the pointy tweezers used to get sharp metal fragments out of where your your eyeballs used to be, for the rest of your life.

Remember that whereas there are some pretty good rubber hands that do many things these days - picking your nose, wiping your a*se and so on, they have yet to perfect the working rubber eyeball.

Please, don't let's anybody on this forum give the antis anything more to b*tch about as far as we shooters are concerned by discussing illegal reloading.

Right NOW, reloading in the RoI is forbidden by law, whether you like the law or not, and all this talking about wink-wink-nudge-nudge style reloading is not doing any of you any good.

It will happen or it won't. At least you can still buy ammunition.

Here in mainland UK we lost a lot more than the right to reload - we lost an entire range of sports, world-wide competition at any and all levels, businesses worth many millions of £££££, and our entire collections of ancient and modern a handguns that fire cartridges. Sure, we bitch about it from time to time, and vow to take it out on the politicians with our votes, but you will not see posts on UK fora about the illegal acquisition and use of handguns by otherwise law-abiding citizens.

There is simply too much to lose - even the little we have left - and way too many people whose sole purpose in getting up in the morning is to see that we DO lose it all.

Softly, gentlemen, please.

tac

Phractal

I do not intend to break the laws in any way- hence why I asked about legality. Also, safety would be my first concern since a very scary accident I had aged fifteen with a homemade firework that almost removed my trigger finger, and right hand. I was merely curious whether or not I could engage in the art of reloading here. Sadly, it seems to be a lost cause. Ah well sure, the factory stuff seems to 'do the job' for target and vermin shooting. I asked here cos I cannot read the legislation legalese stuff!