Is Australia heading for an AMMO/Reloading shortage?

[wanneroo]

The first examples of new pricing (or maybe just gouging) are appearing here in Australia.
How about CCI 500 or Federal small pistol primers for AUD 170 per 1,000 or AUD 20 per 100?

https://www.horsleyparkgunshop.com.au/c ... tol-primer

Sounds about right.

If people want to shoot and they don't have supplies from previous years, that's what will have to be paid.

[Oldbloke]

Wow, last time I bought s&b primers
$45 per 1000. ( abt 3 years ago) Same small or large. Got 1000 of each. Probably die before I use them.

Just need more 308 bullets and about 1kg of AR2208 and I'm set for life.

[Bugman]

Managed to get some Trail Boss from a guy who has become so disillusioned from not being able to get this, get that etc for reloading.
Felt sorry for him, and offered to buy it but he just said just take it. It is obvious these reloading shortages etc are really taking some sort of toll.

[Oldbloke]

Managed to get some Trail Boss from a guy who has become so disillusioned from not being able to get this, get that etc for reloading.
Felt sorry for him, and offered to buy it but he just said just take it. It is obvious these reloading shortages etc are really taking some sort of toll.

When is that going to happen to me?

I'm here, I'm here, toss your powder and 308 bullets this way. Pretty please.

[dnedative]

The first examples of new pricing (or maybe just gouging) are appearing here in Australia.
How about CCI 500 or Federal small pistol primers for AUD 170 per 1,000 or AUD 20 per 100?

https://www.horsleyparkgunshop.com.au/c ... tol-primer

That's not new pricing, that's 100% gouging.
Spoke to a dealer who confirmed they are taking the piss big time, he was selling primers for $110/1000 - said he was not giving them away for free at that price either. Supplier price hadn't changed so they are literally screwing over people to the tune of $60-70.

[wanneroo]

Wow, last time I bought s&b primers
$45 per 1000. ( abt 3 years ago) Same small or large. Got 1000 of each. Probably die before I use them.

Just need more 308 bullets and about 1kg of AR2208 and I'm set for life.

Last time I bought S&B primers a few years ago before corona, depending on the sales and coupon codes I had, I got them for anywhere between $16 and $27 US$.

I haven't seen S&B primers since before corona.

Last time we had a crisis here in the USA from 2013-2014, the primer supply issue ended when truckloads of S&B primers were made available here in the USA at Cabelas. I'm hoping that happens again.

[dnedative]

We wont be seeing S&B primers here again for a long time; They were pretty cheap and as far as I could tell pretty good.
Was half hoping we would see some Tula primers but the Russians can shove those up their arse based on recent events.

Lack of pistol/shotgun powder here is the main problem, everyone who has some is generally looking to make it last as nothing is due here till 2023 and whatever that might be wont even make it to a shelf. If you could import 5000lb of Win 231 or Unique you would sell it within a day lol

[Oldbloke]

S&B are owned by a yank company now.

[dnedative]

S&B are owned by a yank company now.

Nah, still owned by CBC so the Brazillian government still has their fingers in the pie.

[Oldbloke]

Your right. Brazilian not US. I cocked up.

[wanneroo]

We wont be seeing S&B primers here again for a long time; They were pretty cheap and as far as I could tell pretty good.
Was half hoping we would see some Tula primers but the Russians can shove those up their arse based on recent events.

Lack of pistol/shotgun powder here is the main problem, everyone who has some is generally looking to make it last as nothing is due here till 2023 and whatever that might be wont even make it to a shelf. If you could import 5000lb of Win 231 or Unique you would sell it within a day lol

I did see some Unique on the shelf here the other day so it's in production.

Sounds like someone just needs to ramp up getting it all to Australia.

[rc42]

I've heard that there is only one ship able to carry propellant powders to Australia due to safety approval requirements and it delivers to Nioa in Brisbane, it was due to arrive around the end of 2021 but was turned around (or wasn't willing to wait in the queue for a couple of months) and is next due in 2023.

No guarantees that it will get through then either and ADI don't seem interested in manufacturing faster powders here as the market is too small for them.

On the plus side, by the time we actually get new supplies of powder and primers the global pricing should have settled down again.

[bladeracer]

No guarantees that it will get through then either and ADI don't seem interested in manufacturing faster powders here as the market is too small for them.

This statement makes no sense, you do know that ADI has a fairly wide range of pistol/shotgun powders?
They just screwed up their manufacturing so they can't produce any currently.

Apparently they replaced their old production line with the new one instead of building the new one first and making sure it was up and running before destroying the old line. The new line doesn't work but they no longer have the old line to produce these powders. They are hoping to have it sorted for 2023 though.

[rc42]

Their last news was that they were ceasing production and pausing all development of commercial fast powders "for the foreseeable future" and currently have no published plans to ever manufacture fast powders again.

They are aware of the shortages as sever organizations, including Shooters Union, have tried to push them to commit to producing these powders again but they won't. Their new plant is apparently working at full capacity meeting military contracts and producing commercial rifle powders which they sell in much larger volumes and make more profit from.

The economics are fairly simple, on one side the cost of development and production of relatively small batches of fast powders and their distribution across Australia and on the other side the volume they could sell and the profit it would return. Clearly they have done their sums and decided "stuff them" as a business decision.

[Oldbloke]

No guarantees that it will get through then either and ADI don't seem interested in manufacturing faster powders here as the market is too small for them.

This statement makes no sense, you do know that ADI has a fairly wide range of pistol/shotgun powders?
They just screwed up their manufacturing so they can't produce any currently.

Apparently they replaced their old production line with the new one instead of building the new one first and making sure it was up and running before destroying the old line. The new line doesn't work but they no longer have the old line to produce these powders. They are hoping to have it sorted for 2023 though.

Correct.
Pistol/shotgun powders.
If memory serves me correctly the new line was intended to change the recipe from double base to single, or was it the other way.

The build was contracted out. The line didn't work due to drying issues. Change happens very slowly in that industry.

Against sound advice, a political decision was made to demo the old line before the new line was operational. (doh)
2023 sounds about right.

Keep in mind the federal government owns the facility. ADI just manages it.

Rifle powders.
Regarding the shortage of rifle powders. They have had a "hiccup" with that line also and all production was stopped. Coincidently it was about the time covid hit our shores resulting in lots of tin hat stuff.
"Improvements" have now been made and if not already, full production is expected to begin soon. Some packaging will change. ADI has a news page if people are interested.

[duncan61]

I am fortunate that in my busy shooting days I bought a 4 kg container of 2208 for $220 in Geraldton as I can load .222 .243 and 100gn pills in 7mm Rem Mag with it.I still have 2 kg left.I have just checked and my local store has reloder 17 but they wish for $100 for a pound or .454 kg.If I did not have projectiles primers and brass to build 7mm Rem Mag target stuff it would almost break even to buy factory rounds

[bladeracer]

Their last news was that they were ceasing production and pausing all development of commercial fast powders "for the foreseeable future" and currently have no published plans to ever manufacture fast powders again.

They are aware of the shortages as sever organizations, including Shooters Union, have tried to push them to commit to producing these powders again but they won't. Their new plant is apparently working at full capacity meeting military contracts and producing commercial rifle powders which they sell in much larger volumes and make more profit from.

The economics are fairly simple, on one side the cost of development and production of relatively small batches of fast powders and their distribution across Australia and on the other side the volume they could sell and the profit it would return. Clearly they have done their sums and decided "stuff them" as a business decision.

I think you are making too many assumptions. They are well aware of the shortages as they can't produce the powders. They probably can't make a commitment until they know the plant works. The plant is producing rifle powders just fine, no issues at all.

[rc42]

ADI's own words from 16th Dec 2021:

"APS Propellants – As we’ve previously informed, we’ve had to make the incredibly difficult decision to pause active development projects and cease production of commercial reloading products under the Australian Pistol & Shotgun (APS) range for the foreseeable future."

They will never know if the plant works with no active development projects taking place, they have also said that the plant is running at "maximum capacity" ("24 hours a day, 5 days a week" which seems odd to shutdown at midnight on Friday and start up at midnight on Sunday).
They also state that they are struggling to keep up with "unprecedented demand" for rifle powders.

No assumptions needed to see their plant is running at its most profitable with just rifle powder production so they have no financial motivation to ever produce fast powders again. They have effectively said as much, unless they can only foresee a few months into the future but companies tend to have 5 year business plans to lay out their future investment, revenue and profit targets, this is likely the sort of timeframe they are referring to.

[dnedative]

The issue with ADI is that the new plant is unable as it stands to produce consistent product. For every good lot they make, they are scrapping two etc. If the plant worked properly, they would still be doing production runs and selling powder.

It was uneconomical to either continue production as-is, by the sounds of things they tried all the easy fixes and none worked and its even more uneconomical to redesign the plant to fix the issue when you will never recoup the costs. Things may change in the future, Hodgdon are their biggest customer so who knows what they might want in the future.

[wanneroo]

We are actually getting imports of ADI 5.56 over here in bulk.

Similar to last time prices here were elevated in 2013-2014. I guess they figure at that price point they can sell it and make a profit.

Sounds like they messed up their pistol powder line and considering demand they should probably figure out what they are doing because there is a demand worldwide overall for pistol powder.

[Tubs]

Is it just me or is there a shortage of primers?

[bladeracer]

Is it just me or is there a shortage of primers?

Yep, been a primer shortage for a while now.

[AS30N]

Have you guys noticed lots of price gouging when I comes pistol powders and primers?

Just take a look at usedguns, private sellers are selling 1.5kg for $1350, 500g for $450 and 2kg for $1200. Primers are like $1000 for 5000....

And they always sold quickly, that's bloody sus, who pays that much to reload when we can still buy bulk 9mm ammo for under 50c a bang?

[rc42]

Heard today that a few guys at the pistol club are buying up 12GA shotshell in large quantities and then spending time cutting them open to extract the powder.

12GA will contain just over 20gn of fast powder and budget shells are about $95 for a slab of 250.
For calculation example, each three slabs (750 shotshell) will yield just over 15,000gn or 1Kg of fast powder for $285.
More than retail pricing but way cheaper than some current online pricing from gougers.

As a rough calculation, that's about 2c per grain of powder so if the 9mm load is around 4 grains that's 8c per round. Add in 10c per primer (if you bought some recently) and 15c per pill, that's 33c per round so still cheaper than the cheapest factory 9mm which is around 40c per round for PPU from Cleavers (more elsewhere)

[bladeracer]

Heard today that a few guys at the pistol club are buying up 12GA shotshell in large quantities and then spending time cutting them open to extract the powder.

12GA will contain just over 20gn of fast powder and budget shells are about $95 for a slab of 250.
For calculation example, each three slabs (750 shotshell) will yield just over 15,000gn or 1Kg of fast powder for $285.
More than retail pricing but way cheaper than some current online pricing from gougers.

As a rough calculation, that's about 2c per grain of powder so if the 9mm load is around 4 grains that's 8c per round. Add in 10c per primer (if you bought some recently) and 15c per pill, that's 33c per round so still cheaper than the cheapest factory 9mm which is around 40c per round for PPU from Cleavers (more elsewhere)

I suggested this idea a couple years ago, possibly even in this thread

[dnedative]

When this kicked off the smart blokes jumped onto 20kg drums of Nobel sport shotshell powder that were still available.
I'm not surprised people are cutting down 12 gauge target loads though, yeah its slightly cheaper than the cheapest 9mm ammunition but not everybody shoots that, anything else (357 sig, 38 super, 45ACP) is going to be $1 a shot off the shelf and that f***s the sport completely. And that not forgetting guys shooting all the other oddball calibers, if you bought an old 310 martini cadet you might as well hang it off the wall. Its easier to load 577-450. So I can see why people would be buying slabs of the heaviest 12 gauge target loads and breaking out the pocket knifes. Might see some cheap 7.5 shot and primed hulls for sale soon

If anything, pistol clubs will be running a lot more 22 shoots.

[Sarco]

I have heard of one Pistol Club here in Vic, they are said to be running Service Pistol with 22LR and saving their real loads for Opens etc.

I am not sure how that works but as stated in the Vic Gov Gazette, S266 30 Dec 07, "Must be shot with a revolver or semi automatic of less than 38 Calibre" (Service Match). Only Service Unrestricted specifically says "centrefire", so I would guess it is within the rules pretty much.

[Vince24]

And Cleavers still selling the 4kg pack of ADI 2208 / 2209 at 369$ ??

Why do I live in Canberra?!

A shame we can’t even organize ourselves to organize some form of grouping / courrier.

[wanneroo]

I can believe guys cutting open cheap shotgun shells for powder.

In the end I think everyone has learned their lesson and next time you can get 4kg cans of pistol powder, you will stock up. Powder stored well should last decades.

Primers too.

[Larry]

2208 and 2209 is still being made and available you should be able to get that without too much frustration if you keep looking and waiting. As for the Pistol powders it may be a lot longer than 2023 before they are back on the shelves if ever. The gov is hardly going to be putting any pressure on ADI making them available again.