Primer Notifications

trickg said:

Who is Papa Pete?

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That’s what I’d like to know. I’d kill (or at least very mildly maim) someone for 1k SRMP primers or NATO 5.56 primers. Well, at a vaguely reasonable price (less than $.10 say).

Gotta monitor Discord and jump the notifications like a hawk. I may put some of them up for trade for LRP and/or 22lr in the future, we'll see.

lazarus said:

That’s what I’d like to know. I’d kill (or at least very mildly maim) someone for 1k SRMP primers or NATO 5.56 primers. Well, at a vaguely reasonable price (less than $.10 say).

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I scored 1k at 15/100 after tax it was $160. Not doing that again but I should have enough primers and powder to last until things get better.

platekiller said:

I scored 1k at 15/100 after tax it was $160. Not doing that again but I should have enough primers and powder to last until things get better.

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I am well set on all the things (not a lot just overflowing though). But I’ve got I think precisely zero small rifle magnum. At least so far the powders I have seem to work okay in my calibers. But I’d like to test and wondering if, especially in cold temps, if things like CFE223 will ignite more consistently with a small rifle magnum primer for hotter 223/5.56 and 6.5 Grendel.

I haven’t heard CFE223 is particularly hard to ignite though. Same with win 748. Though they are both ball powders.

If I could score a 1000 brick of both large and small pistol, I could probably weather the rest of the shortage. I’ll keep on the hunt until I find something.

I've gotten 20k primers this year at or under 7cpp. I'm not saying it was easy, I'm just saying I watched Discord and moved ASAP when the notification went off. No bots involved. If you don't have a desk job that allows you that sort of flexibility, yeah, it's going to be tougher.

Let me also point out that what comes from MidwayUSA getting rid of the 5k packs is that the 1k packs last much longer there, and normal people can get them if they prioritize. Yes, the prices are horrible compared to pre-pandemic, but you're still saving a ton of money over factory ammo. What's more, it sets an actual price ceiling on the secondary market; if I can get primers semi-reliably at 10cpp from Larry, why would I want to spend 16cpp in the classifieds here?

I just have to figure that if I'm patient and keep my eyes open, I'll find some primers eventually. I thought the same thing about powder at one point - that I wasn't going to be able to find anything - but then one day I happened to be on Powder Valley right after new stock was posted, so I was able to pick some up - enough to get me through the shortage anyway.

Bullets so far have not been a problem - I've not once had an issue getting bullets, although not always the bullets I wanted. For example, at Xtreme what I wanted was 124 gr plated hollow points, but ended up getting 124 gr RN, but also some 115 gr HP. Another time looking for 200 gr RN for 45 ACP I had to settle for 200 gr flat points. The point is, I never came up on a situation where I couldn't find anything.

Cast lead bullets don't seem to be a big issue either. I'm the guy who buys a box of 500 that lasts a while though - right now my demands for the amount of shooting I do are fairly low.

Here is my hot take as to what's going on these days in terms of components:
1. The FMJ and coated bullet situations have more or less stabilized. About the only thing that seems genuinely annoying to get is 300 AAC coated subs. Blaster 223 and 9mm projectiles are not hard to find anymore.
2. Powder comes back frequently. If you're looking for something common, you'll find it soon enough. If you are married to Varget or 8208 XBR... maybe you're in for more of a wait.
3. Brass is more expensive, but is broadly available. Only tricky bit is finding really uncommon AR calibers like 6.5 Grendel.
4. Primers are still a problem, BUT the situation does not seem as bad as it did a couple months ago. Availability is getting to the point where if you're willing to pay 10cpp, you will eventually find something if you work at it.

If there was ever a message from these panics, it's that you need to put your money in primers, and, if you're a volume shooter, in a progressive press. Powder would be nice, but you can't really legally stock up on that in MD.

ETA: the reloading dies situation is pretty bad for certain items. Good luck finding a Lyman M-die in a popular caliber. Wound up going the NOE expander + Lee universal expander route.

erwos said:

Here is my hot take as to what's going on these days in terms of components:
1. The FMJ and coated bullet situations have more or less stabilized. About the only thing that seems genuinely annoying to get is 300 AAC coated subs. Blaster 223 and 9mm projectiles are not hard to find anymore.
2. Powder comes back frequently. If you're looking for something common, you'll find it soon enough. If you are married to Varget or 8208 XBR... maybe you're in for more of a wait.
3. Brass is more expensive, but is broadly available. Only tricky bit is finding really uncommon AR calibers like 6.5 Grendel.
4. Primers are still a problem, BUT the situation does not seem as bad as it did a couple months ago. Availability is getting to the point where if you're willing to pay 10cpp, you will eventually find something if you work at it.

If there was ever a message from these panics, it's that you need to put your money in primers, and, if you're a volume shooter, in a progressive press. Powder would be nice, but you can't really legally stock up on that in MD.

ETA: the reloading dies situation is pretty bad for certain items. Good luck finding a Lyman M-die in a popular caliber. Wound up going the NOE expander + Lee universal expander route.

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I mean you can. It takes contact the state fire marshals office and a permit. Don’t think it is a super cheap one, but I don’t think it is ridiculously expensive. You just need a thick wood box to store it in and they’ll give you a permit for up to 30#. Now that’s still not enough for some guys. In that case get a real powder magazine and they’ll give you a permit for more.

Sure 99% of guys don’t bother. But it is possible without too many hoops.

And 30# is a lot unless you load tens out thousands of rounds in a year and they are rifle rounds. I mean, with a stout load for 45acp you can get about 30,000 rounds or 60,000 of a light 38spc 158gr load out of that. That’s still >6,000 rounds of 223.

Won’t get several years of powder if you reload and shoot a LOT. But it isn’t so dire.

midway has cci lrp in stock

Out of stock

Midway lpp

I had a notify me for midway. While I was doing some looking around on their today and they had some for sale to anyone that happened on them. I received no notification, just constantly kept checking the site and got lucky. Happy owner of 1000 cci #300 large pistol primers.

DiJeCoBe said:

I had a notify me for midway. While I was doing some looking around on their today and they had some for sale to anyone that happened on them. I received no notification, just constantly kept checking the site and got lucky. Happy owner of 1000 cci #300 large pistol primers.

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I was doing the same thing and lucked out and and got a 1000 LRM primers.

I'm guessing part of the problem for us reloaders is that the primer manufacturers are likely supplying for factory ammo first - we get what's left over.

I keep hearing everywhere that the shortage is improving, and that ammo and components are getting easier to find, clearly this isn't the case with primers.

trickg said:

I'm guessing part of the problem for us reloaders is that the primer manufacturers are likely supplying for factory ammo first - we get what's left over.

I keep hearing everywhere that the shortage is improving, and that ammo and components are getting easier to find, clearly this isn't the case with primers.

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I don't know. It seems to be improving some. A few places have them in stock all the time, at ridiculous prices.

That wasn't the case 2-3 months ago. Midway was having plenty of drops from at least summer till now, but didn't have a whole lot for a few weeks in February through the end of March, but appears to be picking up again.

Remington JUST started making ammo and components again in the last like 2-4 weeks.

Speaking of, Midway had a primer drop this morning. Remington LPP and CCI #41 NATO 5.56 primers. I actually lucked in to the 1k of the #41 I've been trying really hard to get my hands on for months. Now, 11cpp after shipping, tax and hazmat. That hurts, but a hurts a hell of a lot less than none or $200+ for 1k.

Still puts me at total reloading costs for 5.56 of only about 32cpr. Now 2 years ago I could have reloaded blasting 55gr 5.56 for about 22-23cpr if I was careful about components, but 32cpr is not bad at all!

I am NOT going to stock a ton of #41 at 11cpp. But I now actually have all of the primers I need to hopefully get me through until the shortage is over and things are recovering well. Or even fully recovered. I don't anticipate on running out and reloading 1000 rounds of 5.56 or 6.5 grendel with that tomorrow. I haven't used it for reloading before, but I've got 100SRM and no other magnum small rifle magnum primers. So I'd like to try them out in 6.5 grendel, especially in my Howa, and also in 223/5.56. See how consistent they are. Once it gets cold again, see if there are any differences in load consistency/accuracy compared to my CCI standard small rifle primers.

And this gives me that chance to keep working on loads and if all my testing works out well, that would still likely give me 800-900 rounds I can load up from the remainder of the box.

I do NOT shoot that much on top of the primers I do have. I am fine for at least 2-3 years at my current rate, if not longer.

Now I just need to find some 32acp brass. Preferably range brass (because I am cheap as heck!), Not that I desperately need some as I've got probably 150 cases and a few hundred rounds of commercial ammo. But I tend to lose some of my 32acp on each range trip and I don't want to have to shoot commercial ammo just to free up cases for reloading. I am trying to get a feed issue resolved with my Cz50. My Yugo 70 runs fine with my reloads, but I HAVE to load it short because of a short throat. Commercial ammo which has a longer COAL, but a different ogive, works fine in both guns. But my shorter reloads will run in the model 70 fine, but the first 1-3 rounds out of a magazine in my Cz50 hang on the feed ramp sometimes. Last range session out of 48 rounds, I had 2 hang ups stripping the first round of the magazine and 2 hang ups on the 2nd rounds out of the magazine. Only 2 mags ran flawless.

Anyway, something I'll figure out I am sure (I wish .311/.312 71gr bullets weren't impossible to find so I could try different bullets to see if one would run better). It is mostly annoying because I really, really like shooting 32acp. And not getting a proper reload working...

I am trying to load the cartridges long next and if have to reload specifically for my model 70 and for my Cz50 and mark the ammo/boxes for each gun, so be it. I'd prefer not to have to though!

Also fingers cross Midway ships my order. They probably will. It was heart stopping as the pages hung a couple times moving on to the next one and I kept waiting for "your cart is empty" or whatever.

Well, I saw a Discord notification pop up last week, and actually managed to order 1000 SPPs from Midway. It was the first time in at least six months that I was actually able to get through the checkout process before they were sold out.

All their "normal" primers seem to be $74.99 per thousand, plus hazmat and shipping -- but better than the scalpers. And it looks like they're discontinued all their 5000-primer cases.

The shipment was delayed by a day because of some "hazardous materials irregularity," but UPS still shows it as due in today.

So judging by non-scalper prices, I think we all have to get used to ammunition and at least primers costing twice as much as before, at least for a while. But at least it does look like the supply is catching up.

Looks like the new normal is 10-13 cents per primer. Set to this price and limit to 1k, primers don't get immediately sold out and probably deters a good portion of the bots. I caught a glimpse of remington primers coming back in stock, so that's a sign that Remington is producing ammo/reloading supplies again.

Haven't seen LRP's being dropped as of late though.

guzma393 said:

Looks like the new normal is 10-13 cents per primer.

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Well, no... $75 divided by 1,000 = 7.5 cents a primer. Plus hazmat and shipping, of course...

guzma393 said:

Haven't seen LRP's being dropped as of late though.

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I suspect that might be because large primers (pistol and rifle) are less in demand, and they're ramping up smalls first...?

Mark K said:

Well, no... $75 divided by 1,000 = 7.5 cents a primer. Plus hazmat and shipping, of course...

Well yeah, I meant that primers are atleast available but you'll be shelling out 10-13 cpr depending on the primer type, limit to 1k, and hazmat and shipping fees. I always targeted for the 5k cases which Brownells and sometimes Natchez does but those drops are very hard to get at best.

I suspect that might be because large primers (pistol and rifle) are less in demand, and they're ramping up smalls first...?

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That may be the case. I haven't seen a lrp case drop in 3 months and I regret missing them.