This is where I'm getting confused. The 1875 explosives act gave expressed exemption for storage for private uses. That meant that private ownership was not controlled up to a certain weight. Now I see that the DOJ have a printed guide to the actual explosives act in which the state on page 6 that a person may keep up 10lb of explosives for private use once written Garda permission is obtained.
This possession it seems is entirely separated from a registered premises, a magizine or a factory.

The order is quoted as "Order in council No 12" under the heading 'Keeping of explosives for private use and not for sale'

Maybe there is more detail in this 'Order in council no 12' document but I haven't seen it yet.. has anyone else seen it?

Zxthinger wrote: »

This is where I'm getting confused. The 1875 explosives act gave expressed exemption for storage for private uses. That meant that private ownership was not controlled up to a certain weight. Now I see that the DOJ have a printed guide to the actual explosives act in which the state on page 6 that a person may keep up 10lb of explosives for private use once written Garda permission is obtained.
This possession it seems is entirely separated from a registered premises, a magizine or a factory.

The order is quoted as "Order in council No 12" under the heading 'Keeping of explosives for private use and not for sale'

Maybe there is more detail in this 'Order in council no 12' document but I haven't seen it yet.. has anyone else seen it?

Correct on all points.HOWEVER there is national legislation that seems to work in conjunction or superceeds this 1875 explosive act.And this is what the Govt and national bodies work on.
THIS is what will catch you out.I made a point of trying to apply for a liscense for reloading a few years ago as a normal civvie to see how far I could get.When I got to the requirements of the building modifications and the fire alarm costs.Buying quality match ammo and importing it in bulk was a cheaper option!

And they don't care if you make or reload five deer rounds or 500k worth of ammo under the legislation.THIS is what we have to work under in law.This is legislation that makes sense if you are setting up an ammo factory,not reloading 100 rounds for deer season or a rifle match.
They do understand what we are about too,but it would take an Oireachtas act to change this primary legislation, Its compounded with difficulties now with EU and UN!legislation on explosive transport,and everyone in officaldom is going to be paranoid about doing this as the rules of ABC CYA will kick in on this big time.


Section 15-20 of Explosives Act and the Stores for Explosives Order
2007 - S.I. No. 804 of 2007 (Note this Order replaced Stores for
Explosives Order 1955 – S.I. No 42 of 1955) deal with licensing and
regulation of stores by the local authority. Any person may apply for a
licence with the local authority and the application fee is fixed by the local
authority within the limit set in the Act. The Application Form and Order
is available on DJE website www.justice.ie .
ii) The local authority shall not grant the licence unless satisfied that the fire
officer and a Garda have inspected the store and confirmed that it meets
their requirements. Prior to the granting of a licence, the applicant must
ensure that a risk assessment on possible fire and explosion hazards is
GD 6/2010
Guidance Notes for Public on Explosives Legislation
Last revision 14 July 2014
7 of 24
carried out and that the store is at all times operated under the supervision
of a competent person. I]No definition in law as to who or what qualifications[/IThe licence may be granted for a period of up to 5
years. Construction requirements for the store are also detailed in the
Order. Additional guidance on Fire Safety aspects of local authority stores
is available from Department of Environment, the local authority, or from
the DJE website. [A fire alarm that cost back then 3,500 eurs]

iii) In this Order, for the purposes of storage, explosives are divided into four
hazard types and the maximum quantity of explosives (of any hazard type)
permitted to be stored in a local authority store is 2,000Kgs. The explosive
limit is determined by the available separation distances. Comprehensive
tables showing the separation distances required to be kept between a store
and any other infrastructure for each hazard type and quantity of
explosives are contained in Schedule 4 to the S.I. There are some
exemptions from separation distances for the storage of small arms
ammunition provided for in the S.I, once certain conditions are met.
Controlled substances, (including ammonium nitrate, sodium chlorate,
nitrobenzene, potassium nitrate, sodium nitrate and emulsion matrix) up to
a maximum quantity of 50,000Kgs, may also be stored in a local authority
store subject to certain conditions.
c) Registered Premises
i) Sections 21-29 of Explosives Act 1875 (and Appendix F of Guide to
Act) deal with registration of premises for storage of explosives with the
local authority and the regulation of the premises. Any person can apply to
the local authority and if the fee1 is paid (equivalent to one shilling) and if
the general rules are observed, then the local authority registers the
premises to permit the storage (Application Form on DJELR website). The
registration must be renewed annually. There are two modes of storage,
each with different limits and sub-divided into three Groups:

 Mode A : A substantial building (constructed of brick, iron, stone or
concrete or an excavation in solid rock) or a securely constructed fireproof
safe detached from a dwelling at a safe distance from a street or public
place. General limit = 90.72 kg (200lbs) mixed explosives.
 Mode B: A substantial receptacle or safe inside a dwelling house or public
room. General limit = 22.68kg (50lbs) or double this if kept in a fireproof
safe.
1

THe most revelant form and part to us

d) Keeping of Explosives for private use and not for sale
Order in Council No 12 provides for a person to apply for a Garda Certificate 2
that he is a fit person, to keep for private use, up to 10 lbs of an authorised
explosive, for any industrial, agricultural, sporting or other special purposes, (as
specified on the certificate). The certificate is valid for up to one year from
date of issue.
2 This certificate is known in the Garda Siochana as a “C49” form.

Trouble is AGS will not issue and haven't issued C49s since 2006!

Fair play to ye grizz.
A lot of effort there.
I recently seen a TV show which covered gun powder manufacturers in Ireland. In this show a limerick man loaded a musket with black powder and discharged it for demonstration purposes. He was not a scientist but instead a rare breed know a a gun enthusiast.... he declared this if I remember correctly.
This all occoured recently and within Irish jurastiction too. So it would seem that some are allowed reload or at least have access to powder and percussion caps...?!?!

I seem to remember being told of a time when 30cal rifles were banned in all practical terms but there was still those who could obtain them. I have it from a fairly reliable source within the gun trade that he knew of several instances of this happening and the lucky holders of such firearms were apparently warned to not to divulge knowledge of their possession of such items as this would see the licence for such items being revoked forthwith.

Zxthinger wrote: »

Fair play to ye grizz.
A lot of effort there.
I recently seen a TV show which covered gun powder manufacturers in Ireland. In this show a limerick man loaded a musket with black powder and discharged it for demonstration purposes. He was not a scientist but instead a rare breed know a a gun enthusiast.... he declared this if I remember correctly.
This all occoured recently and within Irish jurastiction too. So it would seem that some are allowed reload or at least have access to powder and percussion caps...?!?!

I seem to remember being told of a time when 30cal rifles were banned in all practical terms but there was still those who could obtain them. I have it from a fairly reliable source within the gun trade that he knew of several instances of this happening and the lucky holders of such firearms were apparently warned to not to divulge knowledge of their possession of such items as this would see the licence for such items being revoked forthwith.

Demonstration using black powder firearms of the kind in use when Cromwell was in Ireland, and later, used to be a popular part of any re-enactment scenario of that period.

However, all this is now history, to coin a phrase, after one shooter of a musket of some kind inadvertently left the ramrod in the barrel, and the blank charge had sufficient oomph [a technical term, I'm told] to launch it many metres into the ether. In a safe direction, of course, but a terble worry for the organisers, nonetheless.

So the whole deal was deemed unsafe by the PTB, and live-firing of replicas of two or three-hundred-year old musketry or arquebuserie, using blank loads, is no longer permitted in the Republic. Perhaps the organisers wave a large flag bearing the words 'volley fire!!!' at the appropriate time - who knows?

Does this cover the midday gun at Spike Island? Do they wave a flag bearing the word 'BOOOOM!!'

Curious minds wish to know.

As I bleeve I pointed out at the time, gun store revenue for reloading supplies is more than equal to the amount spent on factory ammunition.

Why should that be?

Simple to explicate. The more you reload, the more you CAN shoot if you want to. Those who buy maybe one of two boxes of factory ammuntion a year continue to do so - obviously reloading is not for them. However, those of us with multiple calibres, or users of different loads for different purposes, WILL shoot more, and will spend our hard-earned money in our LGS on the consumables. It also means that the acquisition of ammunition is not a post-code lottery - how many posts here are shooters asking who has what and where is it?

I'm not going to discuss the laws here except to say that they are the laws, and have to be lived with, and obeyed or else. Over here in mainland UK we look at you in the Republic with great envy. Not only can you have a handgun that still looks like a handgun, but you can participate in any competition that employs a .22cal standard pistol, unlike us here, for whom that has been prohibited since 1997. You can also have semi-auto centre-fire rifles and carbines, again something that we cannot have, and that's since 1987.

If you are serious about reloading for target rifle shooting, then joining the appropriate section of target shooters based at the Midlands NSC may help you move forwards in your ambition. This has been covered in great detai over the years since 2011 by Cass.

Kandjen wrote: »

A

Surely, a body like the NARGC or some other body can mount some sort of repeal against antiquated laws in this area....?

They were offered it in 2008,but a certain individual or individuals in that body refused it for hunters.As "their members wouldn't be interested in that".Along with throwing IPSC and cowboy action shooting to the wolves.:mad:
So I doubt very much NARGC would be the first port of call on this.

Can I point out a mentality of Irish politicians and minority groups? It's also one of the reasons Ireland also lost sits fishing grounds to the EU.An FF politician was once asked about this and the reply was" Shure if you cant get us enough votes in the shooting crowd, what good are ye to us? We dumped the fishing lot as well as they couldn't get us enough votes together to get a man voted to the Dail." IOW are there more farmers than fishermen in Ireland?So who will vote for you?

The "Aul Vote" is their be all and end all, and we are too dispersed to be able to vote anyone in en bloc.No one is going to tamper with the levers of power in the Dail for the betterment of us.Its get power for power's sake and let the EU make the big boys decisions for Ireland. So no one is going to stick their heads around the corner for us on this and say "Lads the gun laws and reloading laws here are an almighty clusterfuk.Hers a bill to modernise and consolidate them out of 50 different acts in Irish law."

sorry to ressurect an old thread, but was there ever any development on this or anything that could be done? sounds like utter madness 😫

So, suppose there was a group like an Irish Ammunition Development Society - a non-profit that would work to develop training courses and safety advice for members with a view to developing the ability to optimise/ develop / reload rifle ammuniton - would there be interest in such group?

Why only rifle?, why not pistol and shotgun as well?.

In Ireland ........ 1st item on agenda ..... "The Split", 2nd item "who's gonna make the dosh from the spurious courses?" ..... and item 3 "another split among those hoping to make easy money from said courses...." etc etc

🤔

Fun fact! You can reload ammo in Ireland, and you don't have to be a member of anywhere or have any qualifications either.

You just have to fulfil ALL of the 2007 SI Storage of Explosives order.[Forget about that 1875 act which is basically playing a second fiddle to the aforementioned on this topic] that deals with making ammo in Ireland, and figuring out where and how you will get your powder and primers from either NI, the UK or EU into Ireland, which doesn't cost the Earth in specialised transport by road and ferry.

An Irish solution to an Irish problem in the DOJ's eyes. They are also only too happy to help us out too in any shape or form, but it has to be done by the book to the last dotted I and crossed T, and as Midlands was the only project done so far.

Every Govt dept involved was in utter CYA& ABC mode, as this was a 1st off and it, unfortunately, set the precedent for requirements to be followed by others wishing to reload ammo.

The SI is perfect and logical if you were going to open an ammo factory/explosives plant somewhere, and a lot harks back to what caused the explosion in the Kynoch ammo plant in Arklow in 1917 https://www.historyireland.com/arklows-explosive-history-kynoch-1895-1918/

However, it is utter overkill for the likes of us who want to reload a dozen specialised rounds for the deer season or customise a load for our rifles. But as they classify reloading as "manufacturing" ammo, the above SI applies.

So two choices; Go with the above SI, and if you have that sort of money, why not just open an ammo plant straight off?

OR

Get the legislation changed to allow home reloading. I'd give that option here a less than a snowball's chance in Hell.