Stop going "full toilet paper" on the pellets please.

Could all of you with huge disposable incomes do the rest of us a favor and not buy up every freaking pellet that becomes available online within the first minute or so? I know many of you are sleeping better at night with enough pellets to handle an army composed of the entire human race in zombie form but some of us would just like to be able to buy pellets every once in a while without getting out a second mortgage on the home and staying up until two in the morning and planning ahead months in advance.



peace!
 
I bet when you find some you buy a significant quantity... It's just the nature of the beast - stuff gets scarce, you spend too much time trying to find it, then when you do, you buy more than you would have otherwise. Multiply that behavior times the whole market, and the scarcity builds until prices get so out of hand that very few are buying. Then things will moderate. Availability will start to improve (because no one is buying, but manufacturing continues) and prices will slowly start to come down because there won't be a renewed rush to buy (barring external changes) due to availability. Prices will finally settle, probably at a 10-20% increase over what they were in 'the good old days' - and then, my friend, is the time to stock up, because it will all happen again.

I've seen this cycle way too many times in the powder-burner world, and now it's hitting airguns as well, though probably due to other factors (covid shut-in, higher consumption of magazine fed guns, etc). Looks to me like PB ammo and components have reached peak-stupid and stock is starting to return. I don't think pellets have reached their zenith yet, but it doesn't seem far off. But first, stupid high prices...

I wish you luck in finding enough to weather the storm, but it will pass...

GsT
 
HA. You would have better luck asking for world peace.

I give the guy credit for asking. Right now the hoarding is at fault. Long term it’s going to be lead

I have more then I could ever use in this life time and the next but I bought most of it 10 years ago because I could see the environmentalists moving in that direction. Don’t get me wrong we need to protect the environment in every way we can but we need practical solutions. And frankly I don’t see a replacement for lead. We’ll be chucking stones using sling shots or arrows which can be retrieved. Of course none of this will apply to the military which probably is the biggest offender 
 
just trying to bring up the old "pellet shortage" topic in a (hopefully) funny way after striking out on jsb heavy .25's. :)


I got a few molds along with my first pcp rifle so I can cast what I feel are more than acceptable slugs but sometimes I'm lazy and it's nice to have a pile of pellets to fall back on when I want them.


anyway melting some lead from my putty trap (stinks) to cast some of those MP mold 38 grain round nose boat tail (feel like I'm ordering a latte for my wife at Starbucks here) slugs Gregor of krazcool designed for the older k1 models. 8 cavity mold so I can crank them out

I also got heavier slug molds as my main rifle is high powered but having some jsb heavies on-hand is key as they are heavy enough to remain subsonic. Any source of those in 300 count tins? I tried pyramid trenier and a couple others with no luck. I have been able to get nsa slugs but I "can't afford" (=too cheap) to shoot those at the rate I'm going.






 
All I can find locally are Crosman pellets, aka wal mart, so for anything else I must order on line. I take into my order, availability, cost per tin and cost of shipping. One of the popular vendors seems to have good prices, especially some of the buy 4 get one free deals, but their lowest shipping cost is just under $30. Another vendor does not have prices as low per tin, but shipping around $8-9., so I consider cost of a total order and go by that. I will usually go with the lower shipping cost, as my cost per tin or cost per pellet is still less. I also look at amazon and eBay. Generally I will order 2000-4000 pellets at a time as no more than I shoot they will last me a long time. Nice thing about pellets you can try different brands, and within a given caliber, many different weights and shapes of pellets, as a result I do have a lot of pellets. Some are not so great for precision shooting, but I have never found one that was unsuitable for for plinking. I recently made up a 22xx type Crosman pistol, steel breech with a Lothar Walther barrel and found wadcutters and some of the JSB domed pellets , probably with their short shape were difficult to load/chamber. I pulled out some old Beeman Silver Bear pellets I had from nearly 40 years ago and found they drop in easily, so found some H&N of similar shape and weight so ordered a supply.
 
Could all of you with huge disposable incomes do the rest of us a favor and not buy up every freaking pellet that becomes available online within the first minute or so? I know many of you are sleeping better at night with enough pellets to handle an army composed of the entire human race in zombie form but some of us would just like to be able to buy pellets every once in a while without getting out a second mortgage on the home and staying up until two in the morning and planning ahead months in advance.



peace!

I haven't had any problems. Pellets are not out because of hoarding, they are out because of Covid-19 problems with overseas shipping at a slower rate. I stocked up on ammunition for years, because I don't wait until there is a crisis and spend 2-3 more money for the same amount of ammo. I also stock up on pellets for the same reason.
 
I had a 5 week old order for 3+1 tins of JSB shipped today. I spoke to one of the sales people and was told that all of the pellets that came in last week were already committed to orders and the rest of the outstanding orders were "yep" on back order again. I also was told that some of the orders were for as many as 40 tins. Just me but this definitely sounds like HORDING.
 
Buying 3+1 at Pyramid is not logical... you don't take advantage of the free shipping at least with JSB exacts until you buy 12+4, so you get 16 total tins, and remember that's just a minimum order, and for those of us that compete, that's less than a years supply of pellets. Then you want to make sure you get them all the same lot for the year, so 18+6 is more like my order for a years supply, for one rifle. Remember that's right about $300, I've walked out of the grocery store that deep and not been hoarding anything...
 
Never thought about the competitive aspect - the need for specific batches from specific dies or whatever for maximum consistency. That's wild but totally makes sense now that I think about it. Anyway seems this topic rubbed a few the wrong way but that's life for you. Anyway I've been doing this for a year and right away last April it was not at all hard to see that relying on in-stock pellets and slugs was going to mean a bunch of waiting and hunting and bargain shopping. Casting is great but again full of its own problems.
 
Never thought about the competitive aspect - the need for specific batches from specific dies or whatever for maximum consistency. That's wild but totally makes sense now that I think about it. Anyway seems this topic rubbed a few the wrong way but that's life for you. Anyway I've been doing this for a year and right away last April it was not at all hard to see that relying on in-stock pellets and slugs was going to mean a bunch of waiting and hunting and bargain shopping. Casting is great but again full of its own problems.

You didn't "rub anyone the wrong way". You stated a view. Everyone has one. Some believe it's Covid. Some believe it's firearm shooters entering the airgun sphere. Some believe it's issues with lead. Each of those views is just as silly and just as valid as your view or mine because no one can be certain of the reason. It might be bits of all of them. I have more than enough for a long time because I "hoarded" a bunch in large lots over the last couple of years, because of bulk discounts/shipping discounts/sales and because I was approaching retirement and planned to shoot more. Sorry about that. I hope you get what you need to shoot.
 
One thing about being a dumb newbie to air guns is I’m still in the try everything stage so I can usually find something to send at a target. I’ve found pellets a lot easier to find than some reloading supplies for powder burner but can definitely see an issue trying to get some of the more popular items.



i spent 43 years in a paper mill. In the old days we made news print, freezer paper and napkins. Now they make paper towels and toilet paper. 

Except when times were really slow we always produced 24/7. With the increased competition from competitors and big lot buyers like Walmart and Costco, quality control and being first to market with the latest and greatest was huge. You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff they’ve done to tissue paper to make it special”.

When covid hit the company advertised they were making the sacrifice to produce 24/7 as if it were something new. Quality flew out the window at least for the short term and they are selling anything that will stay together long enough to get it in a case or bundle




 
Got to make another plug for casting. Guessing not an option for the high accuracy folks?



Pays for itself quickly, simple to do reasonably well, feels good to reuse trapped lead, nice not be at the mercy of supply and demand and rising prices. 


done outdoors with a lot of ventilation and some other basic precautions and PPE it seems safe enough as well.