Powder Availability Report

EddieZoom

EddieZoom

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Made the trip from MA to Hooksett yesterday. First time to the shops in that area after a *long* time away from reloading.

Shooters Outpost (might be the nicest shop I've ever stepped foot in) had great selection of powder, but being a pistol guy the only game in town was Titegroup. As I was standing at the counter the last 4lb went to the person in front of me. Picked up some 1lb's. Primers and bullets were abundant.

Down the road to Riley's...my lucky day. They were having a celebration/cookout and the place was jamming. Free burgers/dogs and t-shirts...nice. Decent selection, but again only one game in town for pistol...Power Pistol. Picked up some 1lb's along with some other odds and ends. Primers and bullets were abundant.

Heading for home south of Boston, hit a few MA shops along the way...man just makes me sad. A whole lot of nothing going on everywhere I stopped.

All in all, a nice way to kill a rainy day..with a free lunch as a bonus.
 
I picked up 4lbs of Varget last month from my local shop, which was literally the first time I had seen it in 18 months. Still trying to find more RL15 though.
 
Only 2 shops out of 5 down my way that I hit this week had a selection of powder. I will say reloading supplies are not common in most shops in my area south shore/ cape
Hunters had some random powders...... no prices. I was there looking @ guns.
Outback arms plympton. By far the largest selection I have see for reloading. Prices are OK. Better than some. Most powders are under 30$/lb
Outdoor shop in yarmouth...nice little shop. Had some reloading stuff...again nothing I particularly was looking for. Prices in line with ma shops.
M&M plimothbay plymouth. Again nothing I really wanted prices where so so.
Gunrunner.... same as above.

In the end I'm looking for varget, 4064, reloader 15. 224 and 30 Cal match bullets
Been a long time since I have seen any.
VARGET might be still a long time to come still. From what I understand it is made in Australia the plant goes through a rotation on production and varget is still a ways from getting on the line.
 
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Yep, this sucks. I'm fortunate in that I'm well off with Varget at the moment, but I'm getting really low on W231. I use it for 5 different cartridges, particularly my subsonic 9mm loads for suppressed shooting where I really prefer not to start playing with different powders. I have even seen Varget off and on here and there over the past 1.5yrs, but I've never seen W231 and am starting to get a little worried.
 
231 is like finding a purple unicorn! I haven't seen it on a shelf in a year and a half. Atleast. Luckily I had posted in the classifieds a long time ago about a surplus of titegroup I had and happened too find someone that wanted to trade 231 for titegroup. Scored 2 lbs. A week later a retired reloader friend of mine gave me 2 1lb containers and an 8lber. I feel rich!

I seen Varget at the Middleboro Gun shop recently. I don't recall the price tho.
 
xtry51 said:
I picked up 4lbs of Varget last month from my local shop, which was literally the first time I had seen it in 18 months. Still trying to find more RL15 though.
Click to expand...

RE-15 was abundant at Camp Perry this year in both 5 lb jugs and 1 lb. Pat's also had the 8 lb jugs of surplus RE-15 but they weren't as good of a deal as they have been in years past and they went pretty fast anyway. I ended up with two 5 lb jugs of the commercial stuff, which is about what I burn through in a season lately.

I think we're nearing the end of this latest powder shortage.
 
Heritage 1 in Warwick had a pretty diverse offering of rifle powders; very little, if any, pistol powders. A pound for $23 to $26 was refreshing. Some 8-pounders of IMR 4350, IMR 8208 XBR and IMR 4064, IIRC. at ~$177.

D&L, also in Warwick, had 1# Power Pistol, but their prices were a few bucks more per pound; primers were in the $38 range. The few 8-pounders I saw (rifle) were $199.
 
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A heads up. If you ask nicely at Outback Arms in Plympton you can get an email when a specific powder comes in. You are still limited to 1 Lb per week but they will let you know via email.
 
mac1911 said:
In the end I'm looking for varget,
VARGET might be still a long time to come still. From what I understand it is made in Australia the plant goes through a rotation on production and varget is still a ways from getting on the line.
Click to expand...

I just picked up a pound of Varget at Bullseye in Woonsocket. There was still several pounds left. Good assortment of primers too. I grabbed a box of large rifle while I was there,
 
Glenn's in North Reading has Unique as of this morning. $23/lb Several other powders as well.

Also lots of primers (all sizes) and projectiles. Plenty of ammo too, and couple of spam cans of 54r as well as other hard to find ammo like 7.7, 6.5, 8mm, french mas, tok, mak, etc.
 
dcmdon said:
I've not seen Varget in a similar amount of time. I scored some Varmint a year ago. Now I'm into Ramshot Tac, which seems to be very good.
Click to expand...

Shooters Outpost has a crap ton of Varget. They're selling 10lb boxes at $239. I buy more every time I go. I need a decent stockpile in case it disappears again.
 
jpm said:
Glenn's in North Reading has Unique as of this morning. $23/lb Several other powders as well.

Also lots of primers (all sizes) and projectiles. Plenty of ammo too, and couple of spam cans of 54r as well as other hard to find ammo like 7.7, 6.5, 8mm, french mas, tok, mak, etc.
Click to expand...
I really like Glenn's shop - he usually has a decent selection of powder and his prices are reasonable.

I found Varget at Cabella's in Scarborough Saturday - I didn't see what else they had because this was what I was looking for, but there were several varieties of Hodgdon powders, all 1 lbs that I could see.
 
I maneged to get to outback on tax free weekend. Had a good selection of powder but limits still in place. I snagged the only 8lb jug of varget he had. I can breath a little better now.... I plan on trying othe powders for my bolt guns to spread the amount needed around. Going with 4064 for 7.5swiss,8mm and 30-06 for the A3. I hope to get it soon.
The 8lb jug was only 35$ more than the last time I bought it in nov 2012. Not as bad as it could be I guess.
 
I just scooped up 2lbs of Varget the other day and 8lbs of H335. It seems that all i can find lately is a ton of 4064 and 3031 which meter poor. H335 is a great find for my AR relaods
 
sonofab!tch. I havent seen that stuff in a while. Bullseye is my favorite powder for 200gr SWC 45 acp. Congrats! How much did it end up running you?
 
Yeah, and I guess you use so little of it, its not a big deal.

I laugh because I use 4 gr of Clays in my target .45 loads and about 46 gr of IMR in my target .308 loads.

Its scary how fast you go through powder when you are dumping 46 gr per round.

An 8 lb jug of Clays is good for 14,000 rounds. [ (7000grans/lb x 8lbs)/4 =14,000 ]

It seems to last forever.
 
dcmdon said:
Yeah, and I guess you use so little of it, its not a big deal.

I laugh because I use 4 gr of Clays in my target .45 loads and about 46 gr of IMR in my target .308 loads.

Its scary how fast you go through powder when you are dumping 46 gr per round.

An 8 lb jug of Clays is good for 14,000 rounds. [ (7000grans/lb x 8lbs)/4 =14,000 ]

It seems to last forever.
Click to expand...

I know seriously. I was surprised how fast I was going through IMR-4064 and Varget for my Garand loads. I only use 4 grains of Titegroup for 9mm and that will last a while.
 
jhrosier said:
Where & what price please.
Click to expand...

Found it online and they only had a few cases. I bought 6LBs. Online for powder sucks because of the Hazmat fee but it was in the low to mid 20's shipped. It is my favorite .45 powder and you only use about half compared to other powders. I use about 4.7 with it and most of the other powders I have used are over 7GN for the same bullets.
I can get close to 1600 rounds out of a pound of powder.
 
Chet0729 said:
Found it online and they only had a few cases. I bought 6LBs. Online for powder sucks because of the Hazmat fee but it was in the low to mid 20's shipped. It is my favorite .45 powder and you only use about half compared to other powders. I use about 4.7 with it and most of the other powders I have used are over 7GN for the same bullets.
I can get close to 1600 rounds out of a pound of powder.
Click to expand...

The key is to max out the hazmat order which is for several places is 6-8lb jugs under one hazmat . My usual vendor does up to 65lbs total of primers or powder.
 

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