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Dumpster Diving - An Air Compressor Can Be Your Best Friend!


John Boy

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Went to the club today to scrounge once fired hulls for my BP reloads. All the barrels along the skeet range were empty with new plastic bags ... So,

In the dumpster I went, shaking the contractor bags, listening for the sound of empty hulls clicking. Came home with 2 contractor bags, opened them and found:

* It had rained when the bags were in the barrels along the range. Punched a hole in the bottom of each bag and about a 1/4" of water came out

* One bag had the remains of lunch, french fries and wet soggy donuts - a total mess :angry:

Well, mulled it over what to do and :excl: ... the air compressor. So got a clean empty contractor bag for the 500 + or- hulls and 2 empty large boxes

* Hand cleaned the outside of each hull ( donuts stuff & french fries from insides) - into Box 1 but the insides of the hulls were still wet

* The other bag, just cartridge boxes and wet hulls

So fired up the compressor to 150 psi and started drying the outsides and insides - 5 hulls at a time, blow dried the outsides and did the following for each hull on the inside: put the air gun with a rubber tip into the hull and watched the small water beads run up the side of the gun. No bubbles - dry inside hull - into Box 2, dried and cleaned

* Back to Box 1 - grabbed 5 and air dried the inside of the hulls, then into Box 2

All cleaned, dried and into a new contractor bag - Done!

Hind sight, I should have just bought 500 once fired hulls from our local reloading supplier! :D

What's the most popular shot shells at club? Estates and Clubs!

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Neighbors and friends had been giving me hulls when they found out I wanted some to reload. I had accumulated a couple of bushels. Then I made a good buy on 500 Remington STS at LGS @ 3 cents each. Good pard gave me a bunch of AA hulls. So I sorted through and pitched at least a bushel of Estate, Reo, Universal, Hurters, Challenger, Federal, etc.

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About 5 years ago I was the "lucky" bidder for all of the shotgun hulls from the AL state match (it was a lost brass match) 7 garbage bags full. What a mess. Anyway I hand sorted the whole lot of them disposing of all that I did not want to keep. I took the rest of them and dumped them into a bathtub full of water. I stirred them up and then dipped them all out and spread the whole lot of them out on the basement floor making sure they were not stacked on top of one another. I left them on the floor for a week, they were dry then. I got a lot of pretty nice hulls so it was worth it....back then. I wouldn't do it again though.

 

Kajun

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So after Christmas I went to Bass Pro Shops and bought two cases of Remington STS on sale for seventy-five bucks each. Had a gift card from the in-laws for fifty bucks which brought my investment down to fifty bucks a case. I think I'll shoot those and then reload 'em a bunch of times.

 

You guys work too hard.

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Man oh man..you shotgun shell reloaders are hardcore...Jim

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Neighbors and friends had been giving me hulls when they found out I wanted some to reload. I had accumulated a couple of bushels. Then I made a good buy on 500 Remington STS at LGS @ 3 cents each. Good pard gave me a bunch of AA hulls. So I sorted through and pitched at least a bushel of Estate, Reo, Universal, Hurters, Challenger, Federal, etc.

Warden, if you roll crimp the Federals do that the best of all of them.

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Warden, if you roll crimp the Federals do that the best of all of them.

Yes, Federal hulls work just fine for roll crimp loads. That's what I was using in the video I made.

 

 

I like the roll crimp hulls. The roll actually puts a slight tapper on the hull. But I consider roll crimped plastic hulls as disposable. I have so many premium hulls available, I didn't need all the odd two-pieces hulls with steel bases. I did keep about 1,000 Remington Gun Club hulls.

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Thanks for the video Warden....I like seeing the actual process...Jim

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Okie Dokie, did a test reloading sample this morning on the scrounged Estate Super Sport Target - Remington Gun Club - Rio Target - Herters Target and Federal Top Gun:

* Win 209 Primer - 75gr Goex 1F - WAA12R wad - 1 1/8 of # 7 1/2 shot. All gave perfect crimps except the Estate. Will have to add a tad more shot to bring the crimp up

In addition to the hulls in the dumpster - 26 perfect boxes :D

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Man oh man..you shotgun shell reloaders are hardcore...Jim

You should see Sporting Clays shooters, guys with $20K guns obsessing over 5¢ pieces of plastic. I think they'd trade their firstborns for a bag of once fired 28 or .410 AA's.

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