Ammunition shortage in US

Ammunition, accessories and shooting-related gear & equipment - including Optics and Sights.
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miroflex
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Ammunition shortage in US

Post by miroflex » Wed Jun 19, 2013 11:16 am

There are several reports of a nationwide shortage of ammunition, particularly of .22 rimfire and 9 mm, in the US.

http://www.alloutdoor.com/2013/06/12/am ... Newsletter
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Re: Ammunition shortage in US

Post by StampMaster » Wed Jun 19, 2013 11:48 am

one of the reason is recent shootout in the US and other hyped reason is the zombie attack.

Gun owners are stocking up their ammo inventory and we Indians are showing poverty even towards shooting sports with limits on ammo that one can use for practice and self defense. Indian Army during training insists on- One bullet One enemy.. got to follow it strictly with our limited ammo quote (without any practice)
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Re: Ammunition shortage in US

Post by Bill Poole » Wed Jun 19, 2013 12:11 pm

its aweful!

the big department store walmart sells ammo in most stores, the two near me always have a 4 foot wide shelf each full of .22LR, 9mm, .40S&W and .45 and .223 and other shelves of other stuff.

since 14-dec these shelves have been BARE, nothing! (there is some .270, .30-06, 20bore hunting ammo) apparently the factories are in full production with a year backlog and the stores get regular deliveries from the warehouse and the scalpers are in line at 6AM to buy it up so there is none for me (and NO this is NOT capitalism)

I planned ahead and have enough ammo and reloading for most of my shooting but some folks are either paying 3X the fair price from scalpers or not shooting.

I know most of you guys cannot imagine being able to walk into a department store and buying 200 rounds of 9mm, 550 rounds of .22LR, 100rds of .223 for the weekend shooting in the desert... but that's the way it should be in a free country

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Re: Ammunition shortage in US

Post by Skyman » Wed Jun 19, 2013 12:56 pm

What is the rational behind this much vaunted zombie thing? It is one thing to believe in Santa but this zombie thing is just rubbish.
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Re: Ammunition shortage in US

Post by HSharief » Wed Jun 19, 2013 2:37 pm

I strongly believe its the scalpers buying up all the ammo and selling for 2x to 3x the price. Check out any gun board, ammo is listed for exorbitant prices. The last time this happened I had to stop shooting after I ran out of ammo at home. This time, I was a little prepared and lucky to find a few boxes when the Gander Mountain "re-opened" and they had ammo the first couple of days. I stood in line for more than an hour to score the limit of 2 boxes. There was a guy in the line and someone joked that he was there only to resell, you should've seen the guy's face. It was as if his hand was caught in the cookie jar. He did not say a word. Like Bill said above, this is not capitalism, it is just plain price gouging. Things are getting better though. I hear more and more people say they're finding fair priced ammo now. Lets hope it gets better.

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Re: Ammunition shortage in US

Post by xl_target » Wed Jun 19, 2013 8:49 pm

It used to be that every Sunday, I would stop at Walmart and pick up ammo on the way to the range. Now, as Bill says, the shelves are bare. It is being bought up by scalpers to sell online. The simplest way to beat them is to not buy any from them at inflated prices. That is one of the reasons. Individual gun owners have been buying up all they can and storing it. Since the panic of 2009, I have always stocked up with ammo and components (for reloading).
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Re: Ammunition shortage in US

Post by timmy » Thu Jun 20, 2013 6:21 am

Te surplus scene doesn't look too bad, but it could be better.

What would really be wonderful is if someone could set up a new factory and start selling 22 LR at $10 a brick. All these greedy jokers would be sitting on ammo that's worth just a fraction of what they paid.
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Re: Ammunition shortage in US

Post by Bill Poole » Thu Jun 20, 2013 9:59 am

start a factory... now THAT would be capitalism. Unfortunately it probably takes $100 million for all the machinery and set up for a .22 LR factory.

Some american news reports suggest people are buying guns and ammo out of fear of crime. That is not really true, I'd say almost all the excess gun and ammo sales since 14-Dec has been hobbyists fearing some bad new senseless law making this or that harder to get. That explains 100% of the AR-15 sales since mid dec, but its hard to figure out the logic that caused the .22 LR ammo rush. It could be the ammo companies are running 3 shifts and they put all their machines and workers on more profitable 9mm so .22LR production is just plain lower this year.

as to the Zombie thing, it has nothing at all to do with the shortage, its just a fun game, you get to shoot at targets that look so evil they need to be shot, but you don't have to feel guilty about pretending you're killing something cuz zombies are already dead. Actually it was just a fun game, now that we are suffering under a shortage, we don't have ammo to waste on zombie targets :)

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Re: Ammunition shortage in US

Post by adrianS » Thu Jun 20, 2013 11:25 am

Pretty much bulk to midgrade target 22lr is in short supply... I buy the premium stuff, and there isn't any shortage there.

So my outdoor training is with the more expensive stuff.. thats fine because I'm not buying anything marked up. And in a way helps me try to make practice really count, which is the goal anyways. Now for plinking, I won't even consider honoring any of the scalped prices I see for normally bulk stuff.. I just shoot air rifle for next to nothing. :)

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