Gun Show Economics 101

We had a gun show here this past weekend. I bought a two-day pass and did a double-take.

Components for handloading were there to be had, if you didn't mind paying $4.00 a hundred for primers (I minded that, so I didn't buy any), or $145.00 for a 4 lb. jug of Bullseye, Red Dot, Power Pistol, or Unique (all about the same price). Single pound plastic bottles of the same powders were $30 or so apiece.

Likewise, there was plenty of 7.62x39 milsurp ammo there - communist, Egyptian, Russian: $9.00 for a box of 20 rounds, or exponentially more if you wanted 500 or 1,000 rounds. Some of that ammo was Norinco steel-core stuff - bought back in the good old days when it was $100 or less for a 1,000-round crate. The story was pretty much the same for .223/5.56, 7.62 NATO, and even the old 7.62x54 Russian stuff. There was .22 LR ammo available, if a guy wasn't averse to paying $4-5 (or more!) per box of 50 rounds. Gone are the halcyon summers of our youth, when a 50-round box of .22 shorts cost 39 cents at Western Auto. Oh, and there were plenty of AKs up for grabs - starting at around $650. Lots of SKSs - low end of about $395. An assortment of ARs too - none for under $1,200.

Some bargains were tucked away here and there. I found a box of 100 Speer 9mm Mak "Gold Dot" HPs for $10. Last time I bought some of those at our local Sportsman's, they were $20. Brass was all over the place, price-wise. Some reasonable, some way out of line. One vendor had a zip-lock bag full of 200 rounds of boxer-primed milsurp (once-fired) .30-'06 brass for $18.00. That was a fair price, given the work involved in removing the primer crimps from each round prior to reloading.

The Idaho Automatic Weapons Collectors Association was there with their always-impressive display of machine and sub-machine gunnery. I asked one of the members if they'd had a run on their full-auto collectables, given all the hot air lately about where Mexican drug lords and Somali pirates get their "assault rifles". The fellow minding the display allowed that all the cartel buyers and Cap'n Jack Sparrows of the world must've gone to another show - he hadn't seen so much as one of those rascals nosing around their armament since the show opened.

Prices for most "normal" guns were inflated, but not as much as I'd expected. One seller had a sticker on some old Sharps carbine that gave the "Cash" price, and a "Trade" price about 25% higher. I had to laugh, knowing that the first thing he's going to do when some poor schmuck rolls up to the table with a potential trade in hand is whip out the Fjestad's Blue Book or a copy of Shotgun News and quote him the 40% value to apply towards the "Trade" price of the Sharps, then shake him down for the balance in cash, plus the extra 25%. Then, when the schmuck walks away with the Sharps, the seller puts a sticker on the trade gun of somewhere close to or slightly higher than the Blue Book lists for a "100%" gun. Usually, when that kind of "bargaining" takes place between a man and a woman, someone gets pregnant.

Lost in the mists of yesteryear are the gun shows wherein an authentic bipartisan trade might take place, one wherein the tablemeister and the schmuck each get a square deal, walk away with a smile of satisfaction, and feel as though the bargain struck between the two was fair. Nowadays, every swingin' Richard on the backside of a seller's table is in it for the money, pure and simple. If you haul a prime specimen of your prized and pampered hardware collection to a gun show hoping to trade for the gun of the month, beware: once you cross the threshhold, a curious metamorphosis takes place - whereafter the only difference between your like-new-in-the-box beauty and a sack of manure is the sack. The table pirates, however, have the Midas touch. Upon contact with the tabletop, each of their guns magically becomes virtually indistinguishable from 24K solid gold in terms of dollar cost per ounce. If you're out to raise money to pay the rent, be prepared to bend over and grab your ankles as a part of the negotiations - if you can find a seller who will even consider a cash deal for your gun. You're far better off selling your piece in the want ads section of your local birdcage liner. You can get alot closer to retail for it and still offer the buyer the kind of discount that each of you can live with.

So is all that price gouging upsetting? To me, the answer is yes and no. Yes, because I feel like we (the "gun culture") ought to be looking out for one another a little better than that. And no, because it's capitalism on display - supply and demand. In the end, nothing is worth any more than someone is willing to pay for it. I figured the 9mm Mak bullets were worth $10 to me. Others thought shelling out $1,200 for an AR was the thing to do. To each his own. I'd wager that a good number of those on the seller's side of the tables went home Sunday afternoon with most of their high-priced inventory in tow. And they'll head on down the road to the next show, stick higher price tags on what they didn't sell this past weekend, and sell 'em for whatever the market will bear.

At the end of the day, the best thing about gun shows is also the cheapest, and that's the lookin'. And there's always an afternoon's worth of lookin' at just about any gun show.

The Tao of Kel-Tec

Hundreds - if not thousands - of pages have been inked over the years by gun writers either extolling, denouncing, or waxing ambivalent in consideration of the proper place - if any - to be occupied by so-called "mouse guns" in the self-defense venue. Most have taken care to note that the rodent-like moniker broadly applied to this diminutive genre of handguns was coined to describe physical size more than power. Never was this caveat more appropriate than today, when palm-sized repeating weaponry can be had chambering everything from the .22 short to such venerable and potent calibers as the 9mm Luger, .40 Smith and Wesson, and that hard-hitting old warhorse, the .45 ACP. There are, it would seem, mice, mighty mice, and even mightier mice. The one constant that governs them all, however, is that when it comes to concealment, size matters.

It’s been a while back now that I found myself at Cabela's, staring through the display case glass at one of the newest mouse gun offerings, a miniature semi-auto pistol chambered in .32ACP, designated Model P32 and made by Kel-Tec. It was small and mostly charcoal black, small and flat, small and razor thin, and just plain small! As I ogled it, the P32 beckoned me to hold it, to heft it, to work its action, to release and re-insert its magazine - to sight along the top of its narrow slide, to gently tease its trigger. I got a tingle up my leg. It was lust at first sight.

The P32 was born to live in deep cover, I thought and imagined what that might mean in the real world of undercover police work, back-up guns, and the growing fraternity of CCW license holders. Spurred by curiosity and smitten with desire, I surrendered myself to the wiles of the tiny black pistol. While the "outfitter" went back to the warehouse to fetch a boxed example of the P32, I sidled over to the ammo racks and returned to the counter with a couple boxes of Magtech .32 ACP ammunition, one each in 71 grain hard ball and 71 grain JHP.

With paperwork completed and money tendered, the “outfitter” escorted me to the threshold (a big-city custom that seems out of place here in Boise, Idaho), where I took possession of the tiny cardboard box that held my new mouse gun, a blued steel magazine, a sky-blue, zippered ballistic nylon pouch, instruction manual, and a rather sturdy-looking gunlock with two keys. All of that, plus the 100 rounds of MagTech ammo set me back a skosh under three Benjies. Jackpot!

Kel-Tec’s website confirms the P32’s mouse-like dimensions. Unloaded, the pistol weighs just 6.6 ounces. Stuffed with ammunition, the 7-round magazine adds a miniscule 2.8 ounces, bringing the P32’s fighting weight to 9.4 ounces. Its 2.7-inch barrel fits neatly into the steel slide assembly, which accounts for most of the P32’s unloaded weight and a good deal of its overall length of 5.1 inches. Height for this model is 3.75 inches. Width (thinth would be a better word) is 0.75 inch, making the P32 a skinnier package than many popular tricked out cell phones. I couldn’t wait to test its bona fides at Impact Guns’s indoor public shooting range.

The P32’s blued steel magazine holds 7 rounds of .32 ACP (also known on the Continent as 7.65 Browning), but I opted to load only 5 on the range. The little magazine effortlessly swallowed up the Magtech 71 grain FMJ rounds I fed into it, after which I relocated it smartly into the grip frame, where it clicked into place. A quick rack of the slide and the pistol was ready to go, double-action style. With a Birchwood Casey "Shoot N C" target center overlay applied across the 10 ring of my 25-yard slow-fire pistol target, I pushed the button that dollied it out to the 5 yard line, took a firm, two-handed grip (well, as much of my two hands as I could bring into contact with the gun), lined up the rudimentary sights, and coaxed the trigger through its seemingly interminable course of travel.

Travail would be a better term, as the trigger stroke is laboriously long, though not overly heavy. Let’s just call it deliberate. After what seemed an eternity (in range time, anyway) of easing that trigger back, the gun went off – quite by surprise, I must admit. That having been my first shot with the P32, I had no idea when (or if) the trigger would break and let the hammer fall. I brought the sights back to point of aim and let fly the remaining 6 rounds within about one second and nary a jam between them. I could see little splashes of yellow appear on the black overlay as I fired, so I knew the sights were at least useful if not match-worthy.

I pressed the dolly button again and the tram ferried my target back to me. As it approached, I counted 4 yellow splotches to the right of X on the overlay, and one outside of it, high and to the right. Hair-splitting accuracy? Nope, but I judge it to be acceptable for defensive scenarios such as I might encounter in or around the places I am wont to go, and a reasonable trade-off against the size, weight and concealment limitations of its larger, more accurate competitors.

Accuracy and function proved similar with Mag Tech 71 grain FMJs and JHPs, and Winchester’s 60 grain Silver Tip hollow points were strong contenders on both counts. Fiocchi’s .32 ACP recipe featuring Hornady’s 60 grain XTP bullet turned in a disappointing performance, with about 80% of rounds feeling and sounding grossly underpowered, including far too many squibs. Felt recoil with the Mag Tech and Silver Tip rounds was moderate, giving follow-up shots a reasonable chance of connecting with their intended point of impact. Report and muzzle blast were also moderate, less pronounced than I had expected from such a disgruntled belly gun.

Bottom line: the P32 exceeded my expectations in terms of accuracy, reliability and function.

The Kel-Tec P32 disappears into just about any pocket with ease. It fails to “print” except in the snuggest of confinements. Holsters for the little .32 are popping up like weeds in a well-fed lawn these days. My personal favorite is the Galco “STOW-N-GO”, a rough-out, inside-the-pants model with a wide belt-grabbing clip on the outside. It carries high enough to allow for short jackets or shirts worn untucked, and snugs up to the body just behind the crest of the hip for comfortable, virtually invisible carry. Stuffed clip side out into the front pocket of a pair of khaki pants, the STOW-N-GO prints just like a cell phone.

Someone wise in the way of the gun once noted that a handgun is something you use to get your hands on a rifle. That may be true on the battlefield, but in the world of concealed carry – especially in warmer climates – compact, highly-portable firepower that’s convenient to carry and quick to get into action beats the next best thing hands down every day of the week.

Online Resources:

http://www.kel-tec-cnc.com/p32.htm
http://www.impactguns.com/store/boise_map.html
http://www.birchwoodcasey.com/sport/index.html
http://www.magtechammunition.com/sitepages/pid103.php?productId=429&ltemplate=details&templateId=14&pageId=103&search=details
http://www.winchester.com/PRODUCTS/catalog/handgundetail.aspx?symbol=X32ASHP&bn=1&type=30
http://www.fiocchiusa.com/cat_centerfire.html
http://www.usgalco.com/HolsterPG2.asp

Blackpowder Revolvers for Home Defense? In a Word ... Not.

Been curious for some time now about whether and to what extent our ancestors could have relied upon their blackpowder revolvers for self-defense at home or on the trail. Obviously, they had to - for most folks, percussion cap or flintlock ignition was pretty much the only game in town until after the Civil War. But how long could a ranch hand, storekeeper or buffalo hunter leave a pistol or revolver charged and ready for action before it became even less reliable than such arms already were?

To find out, three months ago I cleaned and dessicated a Pietta 1860 Colt Army replica and stuffed it with .451" 180 grain Buffalo Bullets over veggie wad-topped full charges (about 25-30 grains) of FFFg blackpowder, capped the nipples with Remington #10 percussion caps, and stuck it on a display stand atop my dresser to await the day of reckoning.

This basic research was aimed at finding out where the guardrails might have been back when Wild Bill packed a brace of Colt Navy .36's on his hips. (It's been said of Hickock that he practiced daily, so his guns didn't lay around loaded for anywhere near 3 months.)

Yesterday, I took the Pietta out to the desert and fired it. The results were underwhelming.

Chambers 1-3 fired on the first lick. Chamber 4 was a miss. Chamber 5 lit off, then Chamber 6 missed. A second hammer blow on Chamber 4's cap did the trick. Chamber 6 failed to ignite after 3 more hammer strikes and was re-capped. The new cap set it off. So, 1/3 of the chambers failed to fire on the first go-round. Not a confidence-builder.

I wouldn't get too upset over those results if it meant taking an extra crack at a forest grouse or a squirrel, and on the target range it's no big deal ... but two out of three is not very good odds when the s**t hits the fan around a bad guy who's about to do you in.

Bottom line: Thank God for inside-primed metallic cartridges and modern firearms! The old charcoal-burning front stuffers are fun to play and hunt with, but for modern-day social interactions with evil-doers, I'll take a .380 that goes bang! 8 for 8 over a blackpowder big bore that goes click! 2 times out of 6. Not only that, but the .380 would get the nod every day of the week, and twice on Sunday!

A Hot Way to Stretch Your Shooting Budget

If you're of the habit of periodically making the rounds at your local sporting goods retailers and have strolled the isles lately, you've doubtless taken note of the sharp increase that the price of store-bought ammunition has taken of late. At one of our premier "big box" stores here in Boise, A 500-round “value pack” of .22 long rifles that sold for $11.99 back before Christmas (2007) is now "on sale" for only $15.99 ("regularly $19.99", the sign says). The cheapest 50-round box of factory-loaded .45 Colt cowboy ammunition will set you back at least $30, compared to around $20 just a few months ago. CCI Blazer ammunition, that aluminum alloy-cased fodder that was once an economical choice for general plinking and informal target practice, has taken its place among high-end brass-cased ammo from the likes of Winchester, Federal and Remington. Even Sellier & Bellot, and Wolf (both Eastern European-manufactured, primarily full metal jacketed boxer-primed handgun ammunition), that once was about the cheapest factory ammo around, have taken substantial markups in recent weeks.

As a die-hard practitioner of hand loading and reloading since the mid ‘80’s, I've noticed of late a pronounced ache in my back pocket as the same establishments that sold a box of 500 Oregon Trail LaserCast® bullets (.452 diameter, 250 grain lead flat point) for around $40 last autumn jacked their prices up to over $70 for that same 500-count box in time for this year’s vernal equinox. As I write this, lead is trading at about $1.26 per pound, copper (the major component in both bullet jackets and cartridge brass) is going for about $3.87 a pound, and tin (alloyed with lead to increased hardness) commands more than $10 per one-pound bar. Primers have about doubled in price over the past 5 years, as has smokeless powder. Even with skyrocketing base metal prices and the steadily increasing costs of primers and powder taken into account, however, reloading is still the biggest bargain in town, and hand loading is a close second.

So how does the hand loader/reloader stretch his ever-tightening budget to maximize the per-shot savings over factory-loaded ammunition? One way (the way we’ll focus on herein) is to take good care of the re-usable components, of which there is pretty much only one: the empty brass cartridge case.

Modern ammunition comes to us from the various manufacturers primarily in brass cartridge cases stuffed with smokeless powder of one blend or another and topped with a projectile of some kind. Smokeless propellant cartridges typically don’t dirty up cartridge brass to an appreciable degree when fired, nor is their residue generally corrosive to brass. Once in a while – mostly in handgun calibers – the empties will come out with a smudge of what looks like candle soot running the length of the cartridge case on one side. The majority come out of the chamber(s) only slightly less shiny than they were before they were fired and cleaning them usually does little more than increase their cosmetic appeal (which appeals to me, which is one reason why I tumble every batch of brass before re-loading). All that is needed to produce reasonably clean, reloadable brass is to wipe them off with a soft, clean cloth (I prefer laundered cotton baby diapers). You may still have to wipe or spray the brass with an appropriate lubricant just before re-sizing, depending on whether your resizing die is standard or carbide. Bottle-necked handgun brass such as the .32.-20, 38.40, and .44-40 must be lubricated, as carbide sizing dies are not available for them.

Firing brass cartridges, re-sizing them, reloading them, and firing them again subjects the brass to mechanical stresses called “work hardening”. As the brass is work-hardened, it becomes more and more brittle and is subject to cracking, especially around the mouth of the case (where the expander ball flares it a bit to allow an easier start for the bullet as it enters the seating die). While revolver cartridges with case mouths cracks of 1-2 mm in length can usually be reloaded and safely fired using standard data and components, doing so almost always results in a linear full-length crack that means sticky extraction and the end of the line for that round of brass.

Let’s assume that I shell out $30 for a factory-fresh box of .45 Colt ammunition in its standard loading of a 255-grain lead bullet over some kind of smokeless powder and that when I reload it, I use standard components and published data that approximates the factory loading. It has been my experience that out of the 50 rounds of factory ammunition in that box, as many as 5 cracked cases will emerge from the first firing, for a 10% “crack rate”. Successive reloading and firing of the remaining crack-free brass from that box will generally result in between 10% and 20% cracked cases on the second firing. The crack rate goes up considerably after that, as high as 50% by the third firing. By the 4th firing, only a cylinder full or two of crackless brass may remain. So, after 4 firings, my original complement of 50 rounds of brass will have dwindled to 12, if I’m lucky. About now my back pocket is starting to ache again as I consider the prospect of laying down another 30 simoleons for a fresh box.

So I whip out the debit card and limp home with a box of 50 shiny new .45s in hand – same brand and bullet weight as before. I know from experience that at least 5 of them will crack on the first firing. Not much I can do about that. But there is something I can do to drive the crack rate way down on successive reloading/firing cycles. And that something is called annealing.

What annealing is, in short, is the even heating of the mouths of empty cartridge cases, typically through the application of an open flame (I use a propane brazing torch with the flame set very low). What it does is soften the work-hardened brass so it can be worked some more without as great a risk of cracking. Much has been written by our era’s most notable gun scribes about how to anneal brass cartridge cases. Most advocate the use of water to quench the heated cases or to keep the case heads reasonably cool while the case mouths are being flamed. If that works for them and they’re happy with the results, more power to ‘em.

My way of annealing is a bit different but it has worked very well over the 25 years or so that I’ve been doing it this way, so I see no reason to fix what ain’t broken. The process goes something like this: first, I tumble the brass until it’s clean and shiny. Then I inspect each case for cracks – those that have them get set aside, those that don’t go into a plastic bowl of sufficient size to hold the lot, from which I’ll pick them out one at a time for annealing. Once I set up the brazing torch, light it and set the flame where I want it, I pick an empty case out of the bowl, hold it gently by the rim with a pair of pliers, and rotate the case mouth evenly in the flame until a golden-brown ring forms about halfway down the case wall. I never allow the case mouth to become red hot, nor has it been my experience that heating them to that extent is necessary. Next, I release the case onto a clean cookie sheet that sits atop a wooden cutting board and repeat the process until all the non-cracked cases have been similarly treated. Once the annealed cases have cooled to room temperature, I either store them for future use or head on out to the garage and reload them on my RCBS Rock Chucker/Piggyback III progressive press.

Next time I fire this lot of .45’s, I know with a fair certainty that instead of 10% - 20% cracked cases, it’s likely there will be none. And if I anneal them again before the next loading cycle, I may not find a cracked case after the third firing – or even the fourth! I may still have 45 crackless cases out of the original 50! Beyond that, a crack or two will show up now and then, but at nowhere near the rate for non-annealed cases. Historically, some of my .45 cases have survived as many as 8 firing/annealing/reloading/firing cycles with no evidence of case mouth cracks. I have a number of cases (a couple hundred at least) that have been in service for two decades, and although they have not been subjected to constant firing and reloading during those years, they have served well in a number of my .45 revolvers and rifles and have remained crackless through repeated firings.

So, is annealing worth the time and trouble? I guess that depends on how deep your pockets are, and how much enjoyment you derive from creating your own custom-made ammunition from empty brass and new expendable components. There’s a satisfaction in that process – akin to alchemy – that comes from turning lead, brass, powder and primer into gold of a sort – the kind of gold that you save by not spending $30 for a fresh box of factory loads, the kind that stretches your shooting budget in meaningful ways. That works for me.

Wolf Gold .32ACP 71gr FMJ

Gun scribes I've read over the past 30 years mostly have given short shrift to the .32 ACP as a defensive handgun caliber, if they mentioned it at all. You know the drill: it's anemic, underpowered, a "mouse gun" - a handy thing to have with you when you're not carrying a gun. Yadda yadda. And, while it's sound advice for any who by choice or vocation lawfully carry a firearm to "bring enough gun" to cover one's bets when one goes heeled, circumstances may place dimensional restrictions on what "enough" gun is. Maybe it would be better to advise, "bring the most gun you can". On a crisp fall morning out in the piney woods that might mean a full-sized .44 magnum sheathed in a heavy leather cross draw or shoulder rig. Walking fido during the dog days of summer could argue in favor of a smaller, lighter-weight, more concealable platform tucked into the cargo pocket of your khaki shorts - something along the lines of one of those pint-sized, razor-thin, flat-sided .32's they make nowadays.

So you pays your money and takes your choices, and a .32 it is. If you're wise and responsible, you'll go practice with it - alot - until you can reliably hit a target of reasonable size from every reasonable shooting position at any reasonable distance. And you'll practice with the factory ammo you carry (or if you're a capable handloader, with carefully developed handloads that duplicate the factory stuff).

A wide variety of factory-loaded ammunition in just as wide a range of price, brand and bullet configuration is available for the .32 ACP. Hollow points, "hard ball" and high-end specialty rounds can all be had. Due diligence is required on the part of the shooter to fit the ammunition to the purpose, environment and circumstances in which it might (but hopefully never will) be pressed into service. Whichever round seems most closely to fit your specific requirements is most likely the one worthy of consideration. A no-brainer, right? Right.

I've tested a number of .32 ACP rounds of various brand and bullet type against such varied and menacing targets as angry cantaloupes, maruading plastic milk jugs full of water, hulking hunks of firewood, and plain old 25-yard slow-fire pistol targets. In general, hollow points give more dramatic results vis-a-vis expansion than does hard ball, but hard ball offers better penetration. Both dynamics are worthy of factoring into the equation when it comes to choosing the right round to carry. But the most important factor is neither expansion nor penetration. It's ignition; i.e., does the round go BANG! when you press the trigger, and is the round thereafter sent downrange with sufficient vigor to accomplish something worthwhile at the terminus of its flight. Therein lies the rub.

Just prior to a recent trip to the range, I laid out close to 30 clams for a couple of boxes of Wolf-brand "Gold" .32 ACP ammo in the 71 grain FMJ configuration. I had it in mind to see how they stacked up against the hollow point fodder from Speer, Magtech and Federal that I'd been practicing with up until then. The Serbian-made Wolf ammo wasn't particularly cheap - in fact, as I recall it was about the same or slightly more costly than its American-made counterparts. One never knows when one will happen across a pill more easily digested by a sometimes finicky sub-compact autoloader, however, and since I hadn't yet tried Wolf handgun ammunition in any caliber, I thought it a worthwhile exercise to give it a shot, as it were. I'm glad I did, because now I know that the Wolf can't be trusted to hold up its end of the bargain.

Out of 100 rounds I sent downrange, at least 10% were squibs - noticeably underpowered - so much so with one in fact that I unloaded the magazine, cleared the chamber and checked the tube to be sure the bullet had in fact found its way out of the muzzle. Another 10% were hot loads by sound and feel, probably bumping up against the ragged edge of what a "proof" load would be like to touch off. The rest fell somewhere in between, and seldom were any two alike in terms of report, accuracy or felt recoil. Thus by such experiments do we live and learn. But we are not amused.

So, from here on out, no more wolves in the magazine, whether for practice or for carry. Oh, I'll reload the empty Wolf cases with 71 grain FMJs using data from one of the big-name manuals and use the reloads for plinking and for range practice - that's a fact. But I wouldn't trust my life to a Wolf, and that is also a fact.

Post Script: Reloading the Wolf .32ACP brass went off much more reliably than did the factory-built ammunition from whence it arose. Each backed by a Winchester small pistol primer, 3.2 grains of Alliant Power Pistol, and topped with a Mag Tech 71 grain full metal jacket bullet, 50 re-invigorated Wolf cartridge cases rolled off my RCBS Rock Chucker/Piggyback III progressive combo in a leisurely 15 minutes, using RCBS carbide dies. A single factory primer that (apparently) stuck to the decapping pin and got re-seated with the priming stroke constituted the only fly in the ointment and was easily remedied.

The reloads performed flawlessly. Accuracy was far better than had been expected. Shot-to-shot uniformity in terms of report, felt recoil, extraction and ejection was excellent, indistinguishable from Mag Tech or Winchester FMJ factory loads.

The long and short of it stacks up like this: while I can't recommend Wolf .32 ACP ammunition for reliability out of the box, their brass cartridge cases reload as good as any. So, if the Wolf is holed up in your stores of ammo and you have the where with all to reload it, go punch some paper with the factory stuff. Then, depending upon where your .32 shucks the empties, you'll have the beginnings of some reliable ammo laying at your feet.