</font><font color="blue" class="small">( I thought I would share my new Christmas gift from my wife. It is a Walther P-22 with a Holosight on a bridge mount. It is a fun pistol to shoot. I enjoy shooting it because of the price of ammo. I spend $9.00 dollars on 550 rounds for it and can shoot for weeks. On the other hand I can spend $24.00 on a box of 45 Long Colt which only has 50 rounds in it. I have reloading equipment and do reload but sometimes I just do not have the time. I enjoy the revolver too. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
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Well, if you don't have the time, I guess reloading isn't an option. The .45 LC was the first pistol cartridge I started reloading. I not only had the time to reload but also the time to cast my own bullets. That is the key to really economical handloading and I found it fun and almost theraputic to cast bullets. My first mold was a single cavity Lee and I cast thousands of bullets with that thing (still have it). I had a little two burner gas stove in the basement and an old plumber's lead pot, a little dipper and a Lyman sizer/luber. I used wheelweights as the alloy because I could get all of those I wanted for free at gas stations and tire shops. That stuff paid for itself many, many times over. Back in the day, I think my actual expense was probably no more than about $2 per box of .45LCs. 'Course, that was when primers were a penny apiece and powder cost $7 per pound. And Gerald Ford was President. With ammo that cheap, we could (and did) shoot them almost as much as .22s.
I can't say enough good things about the .45 Colt. It taught me a lot about both shooting and reloading.