Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Having your loading room in an outbuilding

I just store and use it all in a bedroom closet. Handy access.

The refrigerator idea is a great one.

For a few years when my kids were young and money was very tight, I did no shooting and no reloading. For those few years, because space for five in a 10x50 mobile home was tighter than the money, all of my dies and an RCBS Junior press were stored in an outbuilding in a steel drum with a rubber gasketed lid.

I thought the equipment would be safe stored in that manner. But after a few years, when I opened the drum, all of the dies were rusted as well as the unpainted surfaces of the press.

Beware storage of such items in conditions with fluctuating temps, as they will draw moisture.

I am seriously considering cutting into the cement floor of my shed and forming a cement box in the ground, then getting an old heavy fridge door and bolting the hinges on the top so I can lock it down and seal the whole thing.

I am a bit leery of it as the cement floor is some eight inches thick...apparently cement must have been free for whoever built the shed.

It will draw moisture unless heated and ventilated.

Moisture isn't so much an issue here, heat is.

Do you store your powder in an open bucket or something?

If you use a propane heater, make sure it's vented. The ventless type will keep the humidity way too high for powder storage.

Average dew point where you live is probably a good bit different. Of course, I didn't see where OP stated his location. He could be somewhere it wouldn't be a problem. Where I am you would have mildew and rust.

maybe keep your powder and primers in the house and only take out what you are using that session?

This is what I'd do if we had the spare room. Did it about 3 houses back. Wife #1 actually supported building a gun/reloading room when we built the house.
Lost that due to a very bad pick in wife #2 the evil one.

I have a 24'x30' outbuilding w/10' side-walls. 2x6 construction and well insulated. Averages $80/Mo to keep it mid-50's in the winter and 72-74 in the summer, all electric heat. There's no water/plumbing in the building so between electric heat and AC, the humidity stays very low. I have 0 rust issues.

The bill can get a little ugly in Jan/Feb but it evens out Mar-June and Sept-Nov when neither the heat nor the AC run much at all.

I've got 40yr old primers that still light stuff consistently and am drawing out of an 8# keg of WW760 that's one of the foil-lined cardboard cylinders again w/no ill effects.

This was all prompted by looking @ dad's neighbor's shop when it burned down 12yrs ago. I know where he kept his reloading components in the shop and there was absolutely NOTHING left of that corner of the building, NOTHING for roughly an 8' semi-circle. At the time, in my own home, my reloading stuff was in my office/spare bedroom. My loading/component storage bench was directly under my newborn daughter's crib. My new building was up and my loading moved outside by the end of that summer.

The house I grew up in dad's "reloading room" was the unfinished utility room with the nat'l gas furnace and gas water heater. At any given time there was 20#-40# of smokeless powder in that room along with a fair amount of loaded ammo. Never a problem. Dad's neighbor's shop that burned down had nothing to do with any reloading components, he had a piece of slag jump and burn through an oxygen/acetylene line. Big boom, lots of fire, he was lucky to survive it. I don't generally worry about reloading components burning up, but, more the "What if they did?"

My shop is a nice escape from TV and the computer. It's a fun place to bring the kids out and get away from that stuff as well. My kids love drilling holes in scrap wood chunks just to drill holes. Same for using an impact driver to sink screws into them. I love the fact that my 8 and 12 yr olds can determine what bit they need for a given fastener and then swap bits in the impact driver to make it functional. They think that an air-blower on the end of the compressor line is great fun as well. When they're done it's a simple sweep and shop-vac cleanup then put the tools away. Nothing there to steal their attention beyond learning life-skills.

I load out in my workshop, keep all my reloading tools and supplies in metal office cabinets on wheels. I don’t reload that much, will set it up load what I need, put it back up. I need to load 358’s, 338 Fed, and 284’s now. I’m sure I’ll put it off until I’m in a bind.

Same here Paul.

I keep all my powder,primers,ammo in a gutted out refrigerator in an out building.No heat.Heat and humidity is the culprit,not cold.I have a small closet type space in the basement that my gun safe and reloading table is in. I reload,I get the components I need out of the refrigerator then reload there.

I can't figure out why people don't use their garage as garage for their vehicle.They want to protect maybe $5000 worth of junk at the most and leave a$35,000 vehicle out in the weather. Twice in past in my young and stupid years when O rented homes, I did the reloading thing in a cold garage .The heck with that.

Build a 12x15 out building with a small space heater that looks like a Tuff Shed and use that.

I’ve lived on the Texas coast for many years, kept my powder in a garage, both insulated and uninsulated. It gets hot in the summer and cold in the winter. Never had a primer or powder issue.

Will do just fine in an out building as long as it’s dry and in a closed cabinet.

People still have drums of surplus powder that have survived many many years of hot and cold. Just got to keep,it dry.

I own my own home , I bought it and paid for it twice. The first time with my wife and the 2nd time buying my wife out of her "half". That taught me at a minimum of 3 things 1. No one ever needs to be married more than once. 2. I have my reloading gear and stuff wherever I [bleep] want it not where someone else tells me what to do with it. 3. you really are better off if you just piss thru that thing. You asked I have spoken
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Thanks for so much input guys. At this point I am still leaning at building the room in the house.
I think the outbuilding is more suited for other things. None of the shop tools have rusted out in the woodshop so I feel it would be okay but I want to be in the house.
Lots of good ideas if I do use the shop though.

I built an 8' x 8' reloading room in a corner of my 30' x 40' shop. It also houses my gun safe. The only heat I use is a golden rod in the safe. Everything else is stored at ambient temperature and humidity is usually low here. I use a small space heater to warm the room when loading when it's cold.
Been doing this for 25 years, and if there are issues I am not aware of them, and will continue on.
Everything goes BANG! and shoots quite well.

Good subject, we just sold our home and are downsizing. I will no longer have the 3rd bedroom to be my reloading / hunting closet.

Was thinking of an shop / out building that will be insulated and climate controlled but have not decided on how big....

Once my kids started moving out I moved in to the smallest bedroom. I added shelves in the closet and moved my bench in. My garage is used up with 2 dirt bikes, my safe, a big rollaway and cabs that hold all the ancillary stuff for hunting, shooting and dirt bikes. It was just to damn hot out in the garage to do anything when we have our heat waves in SoCal.