Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Ammo shortage

Yep, but it's interesting that each "shortage" before this one tended to focus on one thing. The Clinton shortage hit primers hardest, partly because the then-new Internet helped spread rumors that new primers were being designed to "go dud" within 6 months. This wasn't true, but caused some panickers to bury a bunch of older "pre-dud" primers inside PVC pipe in their yards--which raises interesting questions.

For some reason the Obama panic primarily hit rimfire ammo, though it involved other stuff as well. It was over a year before the rimfire market started returning to normal. Somebody even started the rumor that Barack and Michelle were big-time ground squirrel shooters, so most of the the rimfire supply was going to a big Federal warehouse in a secret locations.

This one involves just about everything--though I have seen some of every kind of ammo and components start to reappear in local stores over the past couple months, and even more on the Internet. But it will still be a while before the shooters who apparently "missed" the previous shortages will be satisfied with their supplies, including those non-handloaders who only kept a couple boxes of factory ammo on hand.

From the standpoint of politics, my guess is that things will improve after the 2022 elections since it appears that Republicans will take back the house and thus create a check on what the Biden administration can do. If that happens, the political threat is diminished and people will be less likely to hoard, although there still may be supply chain issues.

I’m sitting in pretty good shape for this one.
I remember as a teenager in ‘66 or ‘67 when I had mowed enough yards ar $2.00 a pop, I had enough to buy 2, 20 round boxes of 243 ammo for $3.40 a box, Man, I felt rich. How times have changed. .
Those exorbitant prices 😁 are what convinced me that I needed to start reloading.

Here too, along with elephant rounds, ermine rounds (17 cal, etc) and hard ball military rounds. Wanna buy a box for elephant , it will cost you in excess of $100. Not seen any mammoth in Alaska in 10,000 years or so, but I guess hope springs eternal.

Buying the car doesn’t mean anything if you didn’t plan to buy the gas too.

This^^ what I didn't learn from Clinton's time, and Y2K, I learned during Obama.

Of course, then I went out last fall and bought a new to me cartridge, and had to chase brass, powder, bullets, and dies..........

Great analogy!

That's my take on it too.

I know where there 12-14 boxes of the ever popular 30-378 Wthby ammo is, just in case ya'll are interested........

I keep finding ammo, you just need to be proactive. I agree, it is all stashed in someone's closet somewhere... Luckily I handload, but I have been seeing rifle ammo while snooping...

My wife bought me a T/C Compass in 308 Win for Christmas last year. I have been shooting a 7mm Mag, 6.5x55 Swede, 9.3x62 Mauser and a 375 H&H for decades. Never had anything in 30 Cal so I found myself in a hurt locker for ammo. I have several thousand rounds of handloads for the 4 rifles I mentioned as well as plenty of powder and primers but had nothing for the 308 in the way of brass, dies and bullets and stuff was hard to get. However I did have nearly 500 rounds of once fired 243 Win brass that my late father shot up and I traded that for dies and enough brass/components to get the 308 going.

In my case it wasn't a matter of getting caught short or not being prepared, it was a matter of getting a new rifle going in a caliber I had never owned. If you really want to get ammo and shoot you will find a way to make it happen.

Haven't seen anything available other than 5.56 in rifle cartridges.

I'm fortunate that I purchased enough 270win, 30-30, 30-06 before things went sideways. Got enough for awhile and have the means to reload so I'm set for a long time. But the shelves have been bare and I don't believe it's going to get better because of elections and look for things to get worse and steadily more expensive due to copper and component prices rising. Copper will be in extremely high demand as well as other metals for new mandates on battery powered vehicles and emerging technologies. Also we lost our domestic supply of black powder. That's not good. Beside that all your ammo and component companies are being consolidated so there's no real competition anymore for powders, primers, and bullets companies are trending that way too. Bottom line is there's not a lot of positivity when you can't just go out and purchase cheap and plentiful 22lr, 270win, and 30-06. Only one time has that happened in our recent history and that was WWII.

Was in the Kansas City Scheels last week. All kinds of ammo on the shelf. And a large variety. Plus, Remington is coming back online. They had 30-06 150gr Corelokts for $25

boatloads of Remington 12 ga light field and target loads. Those were $9

No limits on amount purchased either.

Nailed it.

Government contracts keep ammunition manufactures very busy.Here are a few examples.

https://www.ammoland.com/2021/06/federal-ammunition-awarded-3-year-defense-contract/

https://www.guns.com/news/2019/10/29/winchester-wins-big-cbp-ammo-contract-for-new-glocks

https://www.speer.com/news/speer-awarded-norwegian-swedish-contract.html

https://www.americanthinker.com/blo...guns_and_ammo_purchased_under_obama.html

https://www.openthebooks.com/assets...fAmerica_06102016.pdf?mod=article_inline

Some of you should look into making your own bullets. It doesn't solve all your problems, but you will always have some.

I just swung into the nearest LGS after work yesterday to pick up a transferred rifle, and they had more ammo on the shelves than I had seen in quite a while locally. They had the usual oddballs that are mostly just dust covers for the shelves, but also some common stuff like 9mm, 308, 30-06, etc.

They even had a few different shotgun slugs, which I haven't seen many of online or in-store for quite some time.

I've said it a 100 times on the campfire...

too many guys somehow thought maybe there would never be another democRat in the White House after Trump won..

well he got in office, shelves were full and prices dropped....

I just kept on buying, primers for $19 to $20 per thousand... every time I'd go up to Portland on business, I'd stop and buy $100 worth of primers.

See powder on sale, I'd buy it if I used it. I was buying RL 26 for $22.50 a pound every time I'd go into a Sportsman's Warehouse, I'd buy a pound or two..

Local Bi Mart chain had tons of Benchmark... $23. a pound, bought one or two of those every time I had to stop by there for something.

Same thing with bullets on sale, which there were plenty of...same with 22 Ammo on sale... Did that for 4 years under Trump...

Pick up range brass all the time at my local range, take it home and process it, and get it ready to load when ever..

Same with 17HMr and 22 Mag brass when I saw it on sale..

I am experiencing ZERO ammo shortages....

When its available and plentiful on shelves, so much a lot of its on sale... folks who hunt and shoot a lot should have taken advantage of it..

and NO, none of my stuff is for sale....

Just the other day, I picked up like 80 , 308 Win Cases.. Mostly Federal.. add that to the zillions I have picked up.

I don't shoot a 308, but it necks down to 260 real easily... and 7/08 to boot.

I've probably picked up at least a 1000, 223 Rem cases in the last month, laying on the ground.. people shoot it them just leave it...

In the past 10 days I’ve been in Sportsman’s Warehouses and Cabelas on both the West Slope and Front Range, plus three LGS’s, none of them had much of anything in the way of components or ammo.

Interestingly there were LOTS of AR-15s, bolt actions, small selections of shotguns, semi auto pistols and single action revolvers. But nary a double action revolver in any of the stores.

I asked about the revolvers they said when DA revolvers trickle in they’re sold within a day or two.