The Firing Line Forums

Go Back   The Firing Line Forums > The North Corral > Curios and Relics

Reply
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Old March 19, 2012, 10:07 PM   #1
captianpattson
Member
 
Join Date: March 8, 2011
Posts: 35
Cheap C&R shooting

I'm looking for my newest toy and I'm wondering what is cheap to shoot. I love my mosin at about .20 per round. I just don't want to get something I won't be able to shoot often.
__________________
"...never shot at anybody, if I shoot they get shot!... He's still alive, ain't he?" - Orrin Porter Rockwell
captianpattson is offline  
Old March 19, 2012, 11:24 PM   #2
ccSnoopycc
Senior Member
 
Join Date: October 27, 2010
Posts: 123
Rather than look at weapons we must first focus on ammo. Look at ammo prices first, see what is cheap, then find C&R firearms that shoot that kind of ammo. A small list that I can think of off hand for cheap ammo are:

9mm luger
9mm Mak
7.62x54r
7.62x39

Wow guess I cant think of anything else!!! Most mil surplus firearms really are not cheap to shoot unless its in one of those calibers. For a little more you can add the cheaper surplus and russian made 30.06, 8mm, 6.5x55, 7.5 Swiss, and 7mm Mauser to the list. The Mosin Nagant is by far the cheapest thing to shoot.
ccSnoopycc is offline  
Old March 20, 2012, 03:09 PM   #3
Hardcase
Senior Member
 
Join Date: April 14, 2009
Location: Sunny Southern Idaho
Posts: 1,909
Not necessarily C&R and not necessarily milsurp, but don't forget about .22. I'll bet that I've put more .22LR rounds downrange than all of my other calibers combined. You can get a brick of bulk ammo for about the same price as 20 good .30-06 rounds.

Oh, and if you reload (or even better, if you reload and cast), almost any caliber starts getting cheap. I bought 400 rounds of HXP .30-06 from CMP a couple of years ago and I've been reloading that brass ever since...keeping in mind my first paragraph.
__________________
Well we don't rent pigs and I figure it's better to say it right out front because a man that does like to rent pigs is... he's hard to stop - Gus McCrae
Hardcase is offline  
Old March 20, 2012, 03:12 PM   #4
carguychris
Senior Member
 
Join Date: October 20, 2007
Location: Richardson, TX
Posts: 7,523
+1 ccSnoopycc.

7.62x25mm Tokarev and 8mm Mauser are currently cheap to obtain, but the availability of inexpensive decent-quality milsurp ammo in both of these calibers is becoming spotty.

Keep in mind that 7.5x54mm French MAS and .303 British were considered cheap milsurp cartridges for years, but then the supply of quality milsurp ammo dried up, and many of the guns have been relegated to owners' safes. New-made factory ammo in 7.62x25 will probably never be as cheap as other common pistol calibers due to the complex and unusual bottleneck case; keep this in mind.

FWIW 7.5x55mm Swiss milsurp ammo is not as cheap as the others, but the cartridge has a big advantage- it uses the same .308"-caliber bullets as common .30-caliber cartridges such as 7.62x51 and .30-06, making it much easier to handload once the milsurp stockpiles are gone.

My next major C&R purchase may be a Walther P38 or a Luger P.08; the guns themselves aren't cheap, but I can shoot them for cheap because I've started handloading 9mm Luger in bulk.
__________________
"Smokey, this is not 'Nam. This is bowling. There are rules... MARK IT ZERO!!" - Walter Sobchak
carguychris is offline  
Old March 20, 2012, 03:17 PM   #5
carguychris
Senior Member
 
Join Date: October 20, 2007
Location: Richardson, TX
Posts: 7,523
Quote:
Not necessarily C&R and not necessarily milsurp, but don't forget about .22. I'll bet that I've put more .22LR rounds downrange than all of my other calibers combined.
Also very true!

One of my all-time favorite C&R purchases was a Winchester Model 69- one of the early non-"A" 1930s models with the cock-on-closing bolt. It's pretty, it's refined, it's a tack driver, and it lacks the plastic parts and other cheap touches you find on new .22s. OK, you can't mount a scope on it without hacking it up, but it's a .22, who needs a scope?
__________________
"Smokey, this is not 'Nam. This is bowling. There are rules... MARK IT ZERO!!" - Walter Sobchak
carguychris is offline  
Old March 21, 2012, 10:02 PM   #6
kilimanjaro
Senior Member
 
Join Date: November 23, 2009
Posts: 3,963
US ammo surplus is gone. The UK .303 and .308 is gone. The Romanian 8mm is gone. French 7.5mm is gone. South African 5.56 is gone. I don't see 7.62x54R and 7.62x39 going away for some years, but the good East German stuff is gone. The well dries up and fills up again with something else. A good reloading setup is a great way to go, you can pick up dies and brass over time, then enjoy to your hearts content. Reloading is cheaper than the current prices on surplus, once you reuse the brass once or twice. Lots of the surplus is Berdan primer pockets or steel cases, so it's use it once and send to the recyclers.
kilimanjaro is offline  
Old March 22, 2012, 05:27 AM   #7
warningshot
Senior Member
 
Join Date: October 7, 2009
Posts: 995
The 9x18 Makarov is more expensive than 9x19.

.303 Brit, 7.62x53 (762 Argentine) 7mm Mauser, 6.5x55, 30.06: money wise is gone, gone, gone and gone. A ~buck a round? KM double 'Ayes'.

8mm surplus and 7.5 Swiss is close enough in cost to .223 and .308, so why shoot surplus. 8mm was cheap for awhile, but when it was available is was 50plus years old and in cardboard boxes...not in sealed tuna cans.

5.45x45 is cheap, but what kind of milsurp gun shoots it?

7.62x25 is now well past .20 cents a shot. Plus it's such a high pressure cartridge that no one I know shoots it. Can you imagine shooting this round thru thouse cheap 1911 knockoffs! I think I'll be seeing half used ruski tuna cans of this stuff now that I'm on the look-out for it.

If there is any other milsurp cartridge other than 7.62x54R available that is inexpensive and half way reliable please let me know.

Oh yea, don't forget...If you are thinkning about reloading for berdan cases...this ComBloc Eastern Euro stuff has 4, that is four, known...berdan primer sizes. That's right. 4!
warningshot is offline  
Old March 22, 2012, 05:52 AM   #8
SwampYankee
Registration in progress
 
Join Date: November 1, 2008
Location: I can be found on a number of other forums.
Posts: 1,333
Reloading is definitely the only way to shoot battle rifles cheaply anymore.

.308 or .30-06 is probably your best best. You can get pulled bullets very inexpensively and machine gun brass is also cheap. And you can load the ammo as light as you want, so you can shoot all day long without getting too exhausted.
SwampYankee is offline  
Old March 22, 2012, 12:24 PM   #9
kraigwy
Senior Member
 
Join Date: June 16, 2008
Location: Wyoming
Posts: 11,061
I shoot a lot of cast bullets out of my Mosin (and other rifles) can't get much cheaper then that.
__________________
Kraig Stuart
CPT USAR Ret
USAMU Sniper School
Distinguished Rifle Badge 1071
kraigwy is offline  
Old March 22, 2012, 02:08 PM   #10
bumnote
Senior Member
 
Join Date: October 13, 2008
Location: Northern Virginia
Posts: 407
P-64, lot of pistol for under $200 to buy and the 9mm Mak is cheap. I can't think of a C&R pistol that's cheaper to buy and shoot.
Lots of .38Spl revolvers to pick from as well.
__________________
"And remember, Abraham Lincoln didn't die in vain, he died in Washington D.C." - Firesign Theatre
bumnote is offline  
Old March 22, 2012, 06:19 PM   #11
emcon5
Senior Member
 
Join Date: July 10, 1999
Location: High Desert NV
Posts: 2,850
You guys are really overlooking the obvious.

.22LR

http://centerfiresystems.com/RIFLE-POL22.aspx
emcon5 is offline  
Old March 23, 2012, 08:32 AM   #12
jsmaye
Senior Member
 
Join Date: July 18, 2008
Location: Amarillo, Tx
Posts: 616
Though there are obviously .22lr C&R firearms, I don't the OP had them in mind when asking about cheap C&R.
__________________
No matter how big and tough you are, when a two-year-old hands you a toy phone you'll answer it.
jsmaye is offline  
Old March 23, 2012, 03:27 PM   #13
emcon5
Senior Member
 
Join Date: July 10, 1999
Location: High Desert NV
Posts: 2,850
He says he loves his Mosin. That Polish trainer is essentially a .22LR Mosin M38. What is not to like?
emcon5 is offline  
Old March 25, 2012, 03:18 PM   #14
boostedtt91
Senior Member
 
Join Date: January 28, 2011
Location: Danville, Pa
Posts: 520
get the .22LR Lee Enfield
boostedtt91 is offline  
Old April 1, 2012, 06:41 AM   #15
djwilson
Junior Member
 
Join Date: March 31, 2012
Posts: 1
This is my first post so hi all. now as to the op's question i have mosins' 8mm' 06' and a m69 romanian .22 trainer i shoot the m69 more then all the rest it is a full size weapon' and cheap 22. also get into casting lead and any cartrage's go's way down in price.
djwilson is offline  
Reply

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -5. The time now is 03:57 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.
This site and contents, including all posts, Copyright © 1998-2021 S.W.A.T. Magazine
Copyright Complaints: Please direct DMCA Takedown Notices to the registered agent: thefiringline.com
Page generated in 0.07863 seconds with 10 queries