Mr Mole wrote: » Agreed, hunters might have a need for reloading, but would they fire a level of ammunition that would make the need for reloading essential or economic? Maybe a club /shared system would be better than loads of reloaders throughout the country, ensuring safe storage, supervision and safety?
Mr Mole wrote: » Good valid points already lads. There appeared to be a perception out there that the powers that be had facilitated a trial in the sense that there is no reloading permitted under the existing laws. There is, if one has lawful possession of the components, and complies with the regulations on the safe storage of Explosives. Of course the trial is within the law. Yes there are risks, risks with trained people, and risks with untrained people. Risk assessment and proper training and regulation brings the risks to a minimum. There are some "online" and "postal" reloading courses that are downright unsuitable, in that there is no hands on supervision or training, so personally, I would not suggest them to anyone. Very true..However we have a tendency to go for "overkill" in some things regarding saftey.As Tac said the NRA course in reloading is perfectly acceptable to over 500 million gunowners in the USA,who I might add have ready access to 100% more dangerous things and explosives in the USA than we have,and how many "gunowners" have been found blowing up ATFE offices with pipebombs made from gunpowder in the US every week???My cousin did the German reloading course and liscense.How much of it was actually concerned with reloading a shell???? TWO hours!! The rest of a six day course was legalistic bumpf,on EU,UN standards andhow to transport ,store and handle HE,BP and nitro powder,and how to read ballistic data.. Transporting nitro powder can be sumed up as.Keep it in the original transport carton and container,dont smoke while handling,store in the transport container,use only the amount you require for the amount of shells to be reloaded.Dont keep it near naked flame,and mind excessive static elecky build up.More important when you were using old tin cans for powder.Nowadays it is stored in 1kg plastic cans like detergent bottles in looks.So if it does burn all it will do is cook off in a big expensive cloud of smoke. The big thing over there is the actual storage facility of your powder.Forget it if you are living in an apartment block!.However a 1kg container is no more and proably less volitile than a 20 litre jerry can full of petrol.Yet people store petrol and gas in the most stupid of ways. So guess which type of legislation will be introduced here.??:rolleyes: We all have to recognise that there ARE concerns, and its our job to satisfy them in the same manner we would do regarding our firearms. We have had some totally lethal suggestions from the PTB on how this powder should be stored.In locked steel boxes or safes,bolted to the floor!!:eek::eek: IOW a potential huge bomb that is unmoveable by the fire dept if your house is ever on fire. I wont even bolt my ammo storage box to the wall for that very reason.[Of which the Super and CPO were happy enough with as well.] Nothing like being advised and legislated by the unknowing. Agreed, hunters might have a need for reloading, but would they fire a level of ammunition that would make the need for reloading essential or economic? Maybe a club /shared system would be better than loads of reloaders throughout the country, ensuring safe storage, supervision and safety? So there is a nice central target to be hit with 10s or100s of kgs of powder and primers with all the cost of building powder magazines,alarms,HSE and Fire dept orders ,than possibly 100 of randomly dispersed loaders around the country with maybe a limit of a 1kg of powder per gun type that they reload,and the brass limit of their liscensed ammo permit??? TBH ,unless you are reloading for super accurate benchrest or have an obscure .Reloading wont be that much of a value for money or money saver in Ireland IMO. Maybe back awhile ago,when the EU and international transport wasnt as good here,and it was a Hobsons choice on ammo .But now with daily continental runs,the net and online sales,how easy is it to order up a few thousand rounds from a EU dealerand have it shipped? By the time you have bought the powder,heads,primers,shell casings,the tools etc,you are up into the hundreds,setting up all the equipment and complying no doubt with much new laws telling you what must be done,rather what can be done.. It will run into the thousands. How much ammo could you buy in bulk for that,of a specific loading and store in your firearms dealer,and draw out as you need it??? Personally I dont need super accurate ammo.I know some folks out there do.But for what I need in hunting,and the odd flake at a bit of paper,factory ammo does me just fine.
Yes there are risks, risks with trained people, and risks with untrained people. Risk assessment and proper training and regulation brings the risks to a minimum. There are some "online" and "postal" reloading courses that are downright unsuitable, in that there is no hands on supervision or training, so personally, I would not suggest them to anyone.
We all have to recognise that there ARE concerns, and its our job to satisfy them in the same manner we would do regarding our firearms.
Agreed, hunters might have a need for reloading, but would they fire a level of ammunition that would make the need for reloading essential or economic? Maybe a club /shared system would be better than loads of reloaders throughout the country, ensuring safe storage, supervision and safety?
Grizzly 45 wrote: » Mr Mole wrote: » ...regulations on the safe storage of Explosives. Of course the trial is within the law. Sigh......... Nitro-cellulose smokeless powders of whatever type and formulation [single or double-based] used in reloading are internationally classed as propellants - NOT explosives. Even the label reads 'propellant' in whatever language applies. 'Savutonta Ruutia' in Finnish [smokeless powder], Triebstoff [propellant] in German, and so on.... IF they were explosives then you would not see the shelves in gun-stores stacked with the stuff on open display. Black Powder - gunpowder - IS a Class 1 explosive and requires a licence in most countries. When the 1875 Explosives Act was introduced there was no such thing as nitro-cellulose propellant of any kind - there was ONLY black powder/gun-powder - this is the reason why it is not mentioned in the Act. I'll end my contribution to this thread by making a simple comment that I have been repeating to my fellow Irish shooters whenever the subject of reloading is mentioned - If you can be trusted by the authorities with one or more potentially lethal firearms, why can't you be trusted to make ammunition for it? tac
Mr Mole wrote: » ...regulations on the safe storage of Explosives. Of course the trial is within the law.
Vegeta wrote: » Is there anything we can do as a group to help this move forward?
johngalway wrote: » I'm going to drop my TD an email this evening, see what he has to say on the matter.
tac foley wrote: » Dear Mr Grizzly 45 - I'd guess that reading your post would probably put off 90% of the budding reloaders in Ireland
Let's just put a few things into perspective, and fully respecting your own personal POV that reloading is prolly not for you because of the small amounts of ammunition you would make not being cost-effective. I agree with you. Shooting maybe a hundred rounds a year is not going to make you a keen reloader.
But target rifle shooters and many keen varminters and sporting shootersfire off many times more than that. I'm no great shakes in MY chosen area - 300m military match-type stuff - but I get through at least 5-600 x .308, 2-300 x 7.5x55 Swiss per year, even a hundred or more 7x57 in my Boer War Mauser carbine. Add to that probably well over a thousand rounds of .357Mag in the revolver - as well as the black powder rifle and handgun shooting that seems to occupy my time. I haven't even mentioned the nine .22 rifles that I shoot - plinking and fun stuff.
I don't buy a hundred kilos of propellant at a time, nor does anybody I know. Like most of us, I buy it by the can - ONE can at a time. True I buy primers by the thousand, but even that is a small container
One for rifle, one for pistol and one for BP - I don't shoot the real BP, but a subsitute, BTW. It's cleaner, more economical and I get more shots per pound than with BP. AND I don't need a licence.
I started reloading back when Practical pstol was all the rage, and I would happily shoot around 800 or more rounds a WEEK. Try that without having reloading and you'll go bust pretty soon - unless, of course, you are one of the many Celtic Tigers we all hear about.
And just to make the point to all of you - I have been reloading safely since 1968 - at one time seven rifle and five handgun cartridges. Neither I nor anyone I know has ever had a mishap, and some of my pals are not the sharpest pencils in the box. I don't have a magazine or a purpose-built 'reloading shed' - I DO have an 8x6 shed in my backyard that I use for my steam trains as well as reloading, oh, and most of the backyard tools and a lawn-mower... Last time I looked I had all my fingers and both my eyes.
tac PS - apropos your comment about what you can buy in the US of A. In oregon you cannot buy fireworks - even sparklers - but if you are over 21 you CAN buy a case of dynamite [48 sticks]. But only one, mind.[/QUOTE
rrpc wrote: » If there's a willingness to facilitate the practice (and I can't interpret the Creedmore trial any other way) then there really seems to be no good reason to make a fuss at this point.
johngalway wrote: » I agree with Vegetas post. There was a line earlier that hunters may need some reloading, yeah, whatever. Because we don't shoot a million rounds a week doesn't lessen the importance of having an accurate round for our rifles. I share Veg's fear that it'll be limited to clubs. Sorry, but, if I had ever wanted to join a club I would have done so long ago, I don't and neither do I wish to be forced to join one to participate in reloading when the rest of the civilized world can do so individually. The worst possible outcome in a semi allowable solution is this Irish solution to an Irish problem, like Veg said that it comes in but in a castrated way. It also highlights the ongoing serious divisions in the shooting, and I use the term loosely, "community". I'm alright Jack, but screw you other guys. No thanks.
rrpc wrote: » As for your comment about divisions, quite frankly, you're the only one who seems to think there is one on this topic. Nobody would take the view you take or suggest as you seem to, that club members would want or even accept the solution you and Vegeta are alluding to. Now perhaps I'm 'out of the loop' and someone has already suggested this approach, but I'm saying here and now that such a solution would be way down the list as far as I'm concerned.
Vegeta wrote: » ......This politics stuff is not to my liking
rrpc wrote: » Not being a member of a club, you're jumping to a conclusion that's not sustainable in the real world. Most clubs would not be in a position to store components on the club premises. Even though the clubs SI has a little section devoted to the security of the premises, this is only in the case of clubs that store club firearms on the premises. The greater majority of clubs would not do this. As for your comment about divisions, quite frankly, you're the only one who seems to think there is one on this topic. Nobody would take the view you take or suggest as you seem to, that club members would want or even accept the solution you and Vegeta are alluding to. Now perhaps I'm 'out of the loop' and someone has already suggested this approach, but I'm saying here and now that such a solution would be way down the list as far as I'm concerned. Apart from the security aspect, it would be highly impractical when you consider the number of different calibres, powders, heads, primers etc. that would have to be stored and allocated. A complete nightmare in fact :rolleyes:
Vegeta wrote: » And some committee member who lives 2 minutes from the range answers back with "How about just allowing it on approved range premises then" And then a law was born
johngalway wrote: » So, you're saying should reloading for clubs be permitted in the future that clubs would not take it up as it would omit other shooters?
rrpc wrote: » bunny_shooter didn't get a licence for a mod, are you going to hand yours back? Why don't we work towards getting what's needed instead of trying to cut off our noses to spite our faces? Strangely enough, I wouldn't have a need to relaod, but I can see very clearly why others would and don't really see why they shouldn't, provided they can do it safely.
I don't know anybody who reloads shotgun cartridges, but then, most semi-profis get a substantial discount, those that actually PAY for ammunition, that is.
Well, I shoot in Canada, two states of the USA and over here, and I've never heard of such a thing as a club reloading magazine - where on earth has THAT idea come from?
I'd like to belabour the point that in all my years on this planet I have never heard of ANY gun store being broken into to steal either propellant or other ammunition components - criminals buy their ammunition by the ton on the black market and import it under the noses of the Gardai in Dun Laoghaire and Dublin and anyplace else they fancy. The likes of the 'Aud' don't even figure on the ilegal arms market...
SOME of you must get black powder, or else there would be no historical re-enactment. And of course, Pyrodex, Triple 7 or Clean-shot are propellants - and right now, you don't get propellants. Shame, that. BP shooting is great fun, especially out at the longer ranges with a good match rifle - 800, 900, 1000 and 1200 yards or so....
Not met any 'top name' shooters of any kind who pay for their own ammunition.
. Over here, if you want anything done, you have to do it yourself. Like the man said, if you want to fly like an eagle, don't dress like a turkey
f you can't afford to do it in the first place, don't bitch about not being able to afford it. Nobody ever said that IPSC-style shooting was made with paupers in mind. The same goes for F-TR, clay shooting or any other sport where there are dues to pay and expensive tools to play with.
johngalway wrote: » I'll take the non answer as a yes then
rrpc wrote: » Of your three solutions, I think the best is to wait for the trial to be carried out and for the new bill to be published. There'll be plenty of time to handle any issues at that stage.