Hi Alhof,
No one ever did anything big without planning to, I admire your ambition
.
Here are a few examples of guys starting out small who have found a niche making ammo componants, you could do worse than to read up a little on them and perhaps speak to any who are still alive.
Bear in mind that many other people have had the idea of making bullets cases etc and the good ones found a proffitable niche and are now supplying the market with what it
used to be short of.
You need to find a niche supplying something the market is short of, perhaps because yours is better, cheaper, or completely different and a must have.
some stuff is high price, but that is probably coupled to a small market, so the cost probably partly reflects stocking stuff that stays on the shelf for a long time, e.g African big game numbers. some of those are very demanding to make as well, eg loads for double rifles must shoot to the same point of impact out of both barrels, you'd need access to a lot of double rifles just for load development!
You will never compete with govt arsenals working with tax payer's mega$$$$, don't even try current military calibres. there might be mileage in good target or hunting loads in obsolete military calibres, e.g. .303, .30-40, 7mm mauser.
RCBS started out making .22 bullets with re swaged .22rf empties for jackets. They may still supply the dies for doing it on a hand press. I think it was in the 1920s or 30s they started, and factory made bullets were hardly available.
One of the Brothers who founded RCBS set out to make cases, but i think he had trouble securing the right quality of brass on a consistant basis. i think that was late 40s or 50s.
There is (or was until recently) a guy called Jim Goodwin who traded as North Devon Firearms services, who used to make dies and things like .577 snider and .577/.450 Martini henri cases, turned from solid. Britain wasn't exactly the biggest or most friendly market for that sort of business.
The benchrest and long range target shooters have a whole string of guys making custom bullets to very tight tolerances. Bench resters are always looking for that extra something to give them an edge and shoot a lot of bullets. They also tend to be analy retentive obsessive types who'd weigh and measure every aspect of every single bullet, and likely some would bitch about anything they could to explain a bad score
. You might be better selling them lots of dies, so they can junk them at the first measurable sign of wear, rather than have them blame you for not doing it...
Is B.E.L.L. still on the go making solid drawn cases?
If you're still reading
How about doing the rounds of the guys who are doing the small scale custom bullets, cases, and commercial re loading, talking to them and mabe work for one or two to suss out how the market and the manufacturing side work and if it is for you?
Good luck
Keith