Picking up Brass at the range

[Farmland]

I did run into a good buy over the summer and rebuilt my supply of 40 S&W with new Winchester brass. I was paying $13 per 100. Since it was my favorite type of brass I bought 2,000. I have to admit most of my 40 S&W brass is about 15 years old and I have long forgotten how many times it has been reloaded. When you get right to it the head stamp has disappeared from much of it.

I do like to recover my own brass and when I go to an indoor range I will use disposable ammunition with non brass cases.

[orionengnr]

$13/100 = $130 per 1000.
I have sold several thousand once-fired .40 cal brass for $30/1000. No longer own a .40, although I've been hoarding brass for several years now.

Think I have close to 2000 right now.
If you want about 2000 once-fired, contact me by pm.

[JAYBIRD78]

Pick up whatever you can find.

You can always sell/trade it.

Someone else has all ready done the math for you. Plus reloading is half the fun.

I can't wait to take my daughter to the range to "hunt" for brass.

[chris in va]

Knob Creek only allows recycling of your own fired brass. They don't even sell range brass.

Once I have some reloads done here soon, I plan to find a stall that has LOTS of 9mm already on the ground.

[got_the_itch]

I'll pick it up when ever I get the chance. What ever cal. I don't have I've got an army.... I mean family member who does have it.

I've been to a couple indoor ranges that frown upon picking up the brass, and it's usually the places that won't allow you to bring your own ammo in as well. Those places get my once over and thats the extent of it.

[boy412]

At the public range I go to hardly anyone collects their pistol brass. Echoing what the OP said, its kind of a pain in the ass. You've got brass from the neighbors hitting you on the head, and then you've got the range officers sweeping up behind you every few minutes. This makes it hard to find YOUR brass, and I am inclined to agree with the OP that it can be more trouble than its worth.

I haven't seen anybody get mad about me picking up THEIR pistol brass, but I was rebuked by a range officer telling me to take it easy...they sell that stuff! So I asked how much...and they sell sorted and cleaned range brass for $.05 when dealing in quantity. Deal!

I figure I'm avoiding the crawling around finding MY brass, and I pay a very reasonable price for (mostly) once-fired pistol brass, and at the same time support the range I go to. I can even request what head stamp I want!

[dssajj]

I pick up rang brass every chance I get, and my friends pick up brass when they go to the range. We have not been told not to but we don't get in any ones way.

[Jim243]

Boy412

What you are over looking is that they are selling you your own brass. I ask each person to my left and right about picking up their brass before I start. I have no problem telling the RO that it is not their brass but ours that we paid for.

I can walk in and shoot for $20.00 per hour and walk out with about $40.00 or $50.00 in brass in one hour. If you think brass is cheap than go to Cabela's and price it out. It is about $40.00 a bag for 100 rounds or 0.40 cents a round for rifle now about $25.00 for pistol.

Save all your brass unless you are shooting next to me.

Good Luck
Jim

[velocette]

I pick up range brass whenever I visit the local public range. Getting enough .40, .45 acp, .38 or .223 / 5.56 is never a problem. Always more than I could use. Nowadays, getting less common is the .308 and .30-06 brass. I said less common, not never. Last weekend, I picked up 51 Winchester .30-06, 3 .308, a handful of .45 acp and a large handful of .40 S&W.
My worst complaint is that the dude that was shooting .45 Colt, was only there twice (that I know of) I got a total of 47 .45 Colt brass in two years of looking. I want him to come back again! (I actually had to buy .45 Colt brass to satisfy my addiction to single action fun.)
Most folks are happy to help a fellow that "recycles" all that trash brass.

Roger

[m&p45acp10+1]

The range I go to they let me pick up all of the brass I want. I asked about it the first time I went there. The awnser I got was "if it is the bucket they did not want it." I was told also that I had to leave the bucket and make sure I picked up all of the brass off of the ground so it would not go flying when they mow the grass. I have 3 shoping bags of .45 acp, a shoping bag of .38 spcl., a 1 quart bag of .357 mag., a 1 quart of .45 colt, a sandwich bag of .454 casul, .50 AE, 35 .44 mag, and 10 .44spcl from my last weekend at the range.
I get away with a lot there becase I have purchased so many guns from them, and am a member. I also take over as range master when the range master is called in to work with the local PD.

[SL1]

I usually try to catch my pistol brass with a hand-net or one of my Rube Goldberg contraptions. But, some of it gets by. I try to pick that up. Only a couple of times has a range "officer" challenged me about some "rule". When that happens, I explain that I am a handloader and NEED the brass to check for SAFETY of my loads that I am working-up. That has always gotten them off my back for MY brass. I usually mark my brass with a magic marker so that I can identify it. I just show them some with the marks and ask them to help me find "x" missing cases. They usually go away very quickly after that.

When nobody is trying to abuse their authority to grab brass, I pick-up whatever types of brass that I reload that the real owners don't want.

SL1

[Sixer]

I pay a $10 range fee but feel like I actually make money with each trip. Its an indoor range so if I get there and see brass on the floor its as good as mine I usually hit the range on Saturdays about 2hrs before closing. Most of the time I'm the only one there so I spend a good 10min "cleaning up" before I ever fire a shot. To a reloader it's like free money!

[dsv424]

Finding brass is almost as much fun as reloading for me. I look at it like a big treasure hunt. Fortunately the indoor range I shoot at they really don't care if I scoop up a few handfuls after I finish shooting. So I usually bring home about 500-600 cases each time I go to the range. When I get home thats when the fun begins because you never know whats in the bag! I then tumble it and sort it out. I reload for 10 different calibers but I must have 50 or 60 calibers all sorted in baggies and stored in a couple big trunk suit cases I have. I have been reloading for about a year now and must have close to 25,000 cases of all different calibers by now. It's just another part of reloading that makes it so much fun!

[Paochow]

That is what I like about revolvers don't have to chase the brass. I always try to get next to a wall so my brass can't travel to far. But I still only get about 80% back where it go??????

You must really be kicking it out. I able to recover 100% for my revolvers, however the ones I reload for (.500S&W and .44M), I'm not in a hurry to reload.

[robhof]

I've gone one step further at our outdoor range, I pick up brass, but on days especialy after a rain, I scavange the berms for exposed lead. The jacketed cores are soft enough for b/p and the cast are usually hard enough for all other work. I can usually get 20lbs. in a very short time after a good storm.

[ilbob]

The indoor club I shoot at requires all shooters to police their own brass.

If you want to keep it, you can. If you don't want it, there are buckets for it. Members can search through the buckets if they want. The leftovers are sold as scrap or for reloading to a commerical reloader.

Sometimes during matches they do not allow brass pickup to speed the process. The ROs split that brass amongst themselves I think.