Local Sheriff's office says they have no practice ammo

[XD in SC]

I was in a Citizen's Police Academy class Tues night, and the instructor told us they haven't had an open range session in months now because of lack of practice ammo. He said they have plenty of Duty ammo, but what they use for practice isn't available in the quantity they need, all is going to the war.

.40 FMJ is all being used up by the war?? I know they need a LOT of ammo over there, but our local LEOs can't practice with their weapons????

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[P95Carry]

This has been quite high profile for a while - the shortage of practice ammo for PD's.

It is certainly evident that supplies have been getting less available ....... but one would hope PD's are front of the line for supplies - seems not so. I can understand .223 being hard to get but - .40?? That is odd to say least!

I am real glad I kept a good stock of ammo from a ways back and ... have reloaded to keep the stock up to snuff. It's not good when LE is having this problem tho I do hear some departments have a 6 month wait for re-supply!! Crazy!

[HotGuns]

I dont understand it. We've got cases and cases of .45. .40 and 9mm practice ammo as well as the duty issue Golden Saber at the Sheriff's Office.

We average 2500-2600 rounds at each qualification and we havent slowed up yet.

[BigEFan]

i dont think 40's are hard to get because 40's are going over to the sandbox. I think 40's are hard to get because the mfrs are making a ;lot of 9mm instead of 40 to send over there.

[Supertac45]

It probably has more to do with the amount of money that they have to spend for ammo. The stuff has really put a bite on the dollar.

[packinnova]

I'm not quite sure the effectiveness of it, but given the concerns of ammo shortages (that should have been foreseen going into a war), why haven't the PD's been sending their departments armorers etc... to reloading schools etc. I would think it would be fine for practice ammo.

[rabywk]

An article I read said that it is not hard to get handgun calibers other than 9mm. The problem is the cost of it has gone through the roof and departments don't have funding to purchase the pallets of ammo they had in the past.

I believe it is a funding issue vs. a supply issue.

[Knuckledrager]

We are paying higher ammo prices period. Delivery times are much longer. We can get "duty" ammo easliy as there is more of it laying around. FMJ ammo takes longer with 5.56 and 9mm taking the longest. The makers deny that the war is the problem. They claim that the raw materials are more expensive due to a decrease in supply. China, as well as others, are buying up a lot of metals. That leaves less for our ammo makers. Kind of scarey!

[AutoFan]

I still don't understand this - my local gunshop has so many boxes of ammo sitting around we use them as chairs to sit on. And they include 9mm and 5.56. I just ordered 600 rounds of ammo over the internet and got it in 3 business days. Is there some special police supplier that the LE agencies all go to that has run out?

[MitchellCT]

You and I can buy ammo from many sources at our discretion. Also, do you really care if you practice with 230 grain ball from federal, but carry 185 grain Golden Saber?

Agencies may need to determine which ammo best matches the duty ammo, set prices and quantity, get money budgeted (My word, says the mayor, "Do you REALLY have to shoot that much ammo in practice...I'll take a look at your budget and get back to you...", then they send out proposals for type of ammo, cost per bullet, have a bidding process to see who can come in with the quantity at the right price...

It's not just a matter of "Lets go get some ammo..."

What if they can find 230 grain ammo, but the insurance carrier specified they need to qualify with ammo that matches the weight of their carry load which is at 185 grains.

Switch carry load, you say?

Oh...well...we can't. We have 200,000 rounds of 185 grain on hand...and even if we wanted to, we have to then go through the budget/bidding process again...

[SIXTO]

We have had trouble finding 223... but pistol ammo is easy still.

[jualdeaux]

I have heard that some departments have more of a budget problem than a lack of availability. One case in particular happened several years ago. I was taking some training at a regional facility and the lead instructor told us that one department that does some periodical training at there usually didn't have the budget to buy all the ammo they need for the training so the facility would donate enough for them to finish. The stupid part came later when that same department decided to switch from the cheap (at the time) 9mm ammo to .357sig. Can you imagine how much training they could afford after that?

[Colin]

Most of the LEO up here are budgeted 200rds a year for training, most never use it and give it to the "keeners"

I know the West Vancouver cops near my house use to reload their own training ammo, but I suspect those days are gone, they aren't even allowed to take their Glocks home or to the range off duty now.

[semperfi.45]

I just got a 25 case shipment of Speer 180gr. GDHP that took 10 months from the order date. We stay ahead of ordering ammo by always having one year's worth on hand.

[packinnova]

Most of the LEO up here are budgeted 200rds a year for training, most never use it and give it to the "keeners"

I know the West Vancouver cops near my house use to reload their own training ammo, but I suspect those days are gone, they aren't even allowed to take their Glocks home or to the range off duty now.

Ugh. 200 rnds a year? I used to go through 200 a week PER firearm and I'm not even an LEO. I'm not sure I'm seeing how one can be proficient when one never fires their pistola. Sounds like a setup for disaster.