Ep. 063 - How Bullets are Made 

Please do a shop tour. I think that would be interesting to a lot of people. You don't have to show us any of your super secret processes.😉

Love the pod and especially love Mr. Timmerman's skillfully placed "Leftist Tears" tumbler!! A+

This has to be one of my favorite episodes and Seth is doing an amazing job with these podcasts. Appreciate the resources put into making these 🇺🇸

I want to thank the hornady team. i just switched to the hornady outfitter cx 165gr for my 308. I went form 1.5-2 MOA at 300+ yds to sub MOA. previously I was shooting big name brand ammo and noticed one day that the cantaluers, projectile to projectile, weren't in the same place. also they weren't seated the same. in a box of 20, i could visually identify different seating depths and cantaluer groove placement. i switched over to the cx line and by the end of my tune up session i was stacking bug holes at 330yds (where i like to hunt).

You guys remember a guy named Mike Hester? He was a machinist there in the 90's that we (National Guard Marksmanship Training Center) stole from you guys. Taught me a lot about ballistics.

One thang I like about Hornady, they sell their blems to midway❤

What a great video and nothing but respect engendered listening to John and Mike so humble and unassuming but obviously a very integral part in the manufacturing process and well-being of the company going forward. At nearly 80, reloading since 69, 17 REM to 460 I learned so much today, just awesome podcast. Look forward to more.

Hearing the stories of John and Mike, the work they do what they have done its amazing! At the end of the video when they are talking about their favorite bullet and how grateful they are to be there and I could hear the emotion in their voice it brought me to tears because it is amazing that these men have given so much to this company and yet still feel valued and appreciated. Mike and John if you ever read this message I can assure you that you gents are truly classy gents and thank you for all the hard work and dedication you have put into your craft. I was 6 years old when you all decided to change the world haha. Thank you Hornady for taking care of those employees that have been there for that long and for showing them that you really care and that they are valued as PEOPLE not just employees. As a 46 year old retired vet, graduate of SDI and avid shooting competitor and outdoors man I am forever grateful to John and Mike, hope to meet you gents one day and personally shake your hand and say thank you for helping me to win a few competitions. Be well, be blessed, be awesome.

Fascinating stuff! Definitely need a shop / process tour, especially, the QC. Thanks for sharing.

I 2nd the shop tour and up you to start making primers.

Seth thanks for having these guys give their history with Hornady, I always love learning what it was like years ago compared to now there as well as what has changed in the industry in even a short time such as your start more recently.

I mainly shoot Hornady bullets, specifically, Interlocks. They're reasonably priced and accurate. Now, if some 6ARC brass brass would start showing up at the retailers I frequent, all would be right with the world (a bit of hyperbole there, but you get the sentiment).

When is Hornady going to step up their game and sell PRIMERS!

Thank you Mike and John - you've given me some amazing days with your product :)

I will agree, Hornady is kicking ass in Bullets today. I was thinking back to 1996 that I was shooting Nosler partitions and ballistic tip. Today, I am shooting Hornady. Great video. I was measuring the bullet diameter on .308 180gr SP & BTSP interlock figuring out what bump bushing to run at 6 am this morning. And now I know why their is a difference from lot# to lot#. Thanks for the information

This was just great listening and learning for me thank you guys!

Yall do good work. Thanks. When I first started hunting and shooting I had no idea a rifle like my 3006 would shoot so different…accurate or not . After shooting many boxes of different weight and brands. The horady higher velocity was it. So I have stuck with it for 20 years. Thanks

I fell in love with swaging my own projectiles. Started off with making .224 from expenses 22lr hulls on a Lee press and just kept adding more and more calibers and jacket does. I have various hand presses from Corbin as well as his Hydro press. This podcast just hits home for me. Compared to my little home shop of equipped, I'd absolutely love to get to to see their process and equipment in person. Hearing their tooling automation process sounds like an amazing sight to see for someone like me. People can keep their beach or Disney vacations, I'd gladly take a vacation to see this facility instead.

Questions in my mind, one was about seating the core and expanding it into the jacket, was about some form of explanation of getting air out of the cup when doing it, a bullet like the Interlock could be tricky. The other would be lead blends for the cores and how much they vary, or don't. Are you using harder and softer blends for particular bullets and weights?

One of the best! Good job you guys!

Has Hornady considered making primers?

Another outstanding presentation of the awesome people that make some of the best bullets made

I really like the Hornady Black Match 168-175.

Factory tour!

Awesome stuff guys. I just started shooting and now reloading for .223, 22 hornet and now 30-30. And use hornady in allof it from 40gr for hornet to 80gr for 223 and the new flex tip for the 30-30 is amazing. But why no 22lr?

You guys are doing great things. Very impressed with the .224 ELDm bullets. They perform very well in my service rifle. Gonna try the A-Tips this year as well.

Yay! More technical talk!

Ever consider taking the pod cast into the shop so we can actually see what is being discussed. Great information, but not easy to understand without seeing it happen Thanks Greg

I always enjoyed shooting against Team Hornady in 1000 BR. Especially John.

I'm hoping yall have some jobs available in the plc programming or electrical trouble shooting areas of production once I get out of the navy in a couple years. I'd love to work for Hornady utilizing the knowledge I've gained in the navy

Great podcast! Its awesome that Hornady is willing to take the time to put this info together for us.

Great video. Now, I am a fan of the vmax bullet and have shot many through a .223 rem. What would be nice to see is a version of the vmax bullet that has a slightly thicker copper jacket towards the heel of the bullet, similar to the Nosler Ballistic Tip Varmint. Not sure if Hornady is taking requests through youtube comments, but for what it’s worth, it’s something that I think would be a good addition to the Hornady lineup of bullets.

Great content! Thank you.

Excellent video! Loaded a lot of Hornady .223 and 30 cal back in the '80's. Carry your CD in .380 and 9mm...😊

I love this podcast.

I greatly appreciate this video. I’ve been handloading since ‘93 and Hornady has been part of my journey every step of the way. My greatest loves are the XTP, SST and, especially, the InterLock. The latter doesn’t get the attention it used to what with all the new shooters/handloaders, hurting it’s sales. Many of them have been discontinued. I truly miss the the .430” 265gr FP, the .321” 170gr FP, .358” 250gr RN. I hope they, and others, make a return someday. Something I would like to see in the XTP line would be lighter constructed bullets for the lower velocities of 40 S&W, 38 SPL, 44 SPL and others. Nothing fancy like expensive FlexTips. Just XTPs constructed a little different. A slight weight change to denote a difference from the mainline bullet maybe. I digress. It was great hearing some of the history of your company. I’m looking forward to the next

The majority of the bullets I shoot (handgun and rifle) are Hornady. Decently priced accurate projectiles! In fact, every handgun caliber 9mm, 38/357, 45acp and 45LC) are all loaded with the XTP bullets. I trust my life to the tried and true XTP! Love the ELDM and wish I could find SSTs again. The 150gr .308 SP Interlocks have put meat on the table for decades!

So much respect for these men.

Very interesting conversation on how bullets are made and how they work. My limited understanding, mostly from the internet is that bullet manufactures buy primers and powder which often limits production of ammunition. Do you guys think Hornady will ever make those two items to help avoid shortages in the future? Another question I have is government contracts on ammunition. Whether military or three letter agency, it seems to mess with the publics ability to obtain ammo. Does Hornady make ammo for the government and does this really conflict with the general publics ability to obtain ammunition?

I love Mike’s ‘Leftist Tears / Daily Wire’ thermos!

When Johnny is sorting components by weight, what tolerance does he use for ordering bullets and cases into groups? I measure each powder charge but have not segregated the components. Bullet manufacturing podcast was really interesting. Would love to tour your factory some day.

Love the coffee mug : )

Great coffee cup!

I have one of those Sharp calculators, & it still works well also!

They need to make primers so we can actually reload their bullet

great video, sounds very comjplicated, but what i have to say is that in a box of 50 or 100 bullets, the grain weight variance can be up to a full grain difference. that makes it very difficult for accuracy when the bullets weight vary so much. as well as bullets length vary as well so OAL of the cartridge varies

Core jacket separation was solved decades ago with the interlock design. The only bullet for hunting you will ever need.

Hi guys really appreciate all your hard work, fantastic products been using for several years now having problems purchasing your hunting bullets in 65 over here in the uk most dealers can't get them can you shed any light on this on my last 100 heads 😢

Great info!

What are the common issues that would make a bullet be sold as "blemished". Accuracy, diameter, weight? Thanks

Thanks for this one. Let them go back to making those bullets. I am in need of the 6mm 108gr eld-m Keep up the great work

another great show, I managed to resize some brass while listening, now if only I could find some large rifle primers up here in Canada life would be good. Keep up the good work.

So am I the only one that is thinking about this? when do we get to see what happens behind the walls, do us a production video for all the components from start to finish so we can see the machines, the quality control and the operators doing all the good work. PS I know this will be a the highest viewed podcast ever, so if you wondering what I would like for Christmas, my flavor is 250Grain A-tip .30cal. 🤣

I know you guys make 17 hmr an 22 win rimfire ammo but have you considered doing 22 LR ammo?

I'm really liking the Hornady 255gr subsonic 7.62x39. Think I saw one of those pills in the thumbnail. But I need to start reloading. Buck and a quarter per round is a bit much for plinking.

Great video! Very interesting to hear about how a bullet is made. Would have been great to have visuals with the discussion, but understand there is proprietary information you do not want to show. Listening to what was said about 57 minutes into the video about being frustrated because there is a problem, it reminds me of a saying in the software world, "The longer the debugging of an issue is inversely proportional to complexity of the fix".

I shoot a lot of hornady . 22-250 and 6.5 and it’s the most consistent factory ammo I’ve used…. In those calibers anyway. Ahhh and .17 cal too.. they do a good job in my opinion.

I would love to see a video showing how the bullets are made. A walk through the factory and a step by step of how a bullet is made n

We are being dragged down a dark hole we’ll all be buggered soon

I got 10 boxes of 22-250 v Maxs years-ago and that shot phenomenal in my ruger

Seth I'm just a good old Boy truck Driver that hunt in the deep woods of northern Minnesota and Wisconsin I don't understand much of what you Guys are talking about BUT... I KNOW ONE THING AS FACT... I CAN HIT A DIME AT 100 YARDS.. A QUARTER AT 200 YARDS ... THATS WHY I LOVE MY HORNADYS ..ONLY AMMO I USE...NOW I KNOW WHY... LUV YA..

Congratulations on your 10 year tenure.

At about 45:25 he said "to shoot somewhere in the 40% range". I can't figure out exactly what they are talking about. 40% of what? Thanks

How can I go about finding your nickel plated 257 Weatherby brass?

Need more in New Zealand.

Does you 4DOF app work on Android phones and work with Barnes TTSX bullets?

I chose to carry Hornady Critical Defense (standard pressure) in .38 .spl, .357 Magnum and 9 mm and will when I start carrying my Bursa .380 use that round. I adopted there round after seeing the testing Paul Harrell did several years ago now of several manufactures hollow points in calibers from .380 up and barrel lengths from 2 inches on out. The ONLY round that ALWAYS opened up and NEVER over penetrated was the Hornady Critical Defense.

I love the show - However, I am disappointed in the lack of graphics during your discussions. I understand the difficulty of predicting the progression of the conversation, but even an eraser board would help!

Love the Mug! 😢😂

🤩🤩🤩

I use 143gr ELD-X for hunting and 140gr ELD-m for target shooting ( just because the eld-x is a bit scarce) and 140gr SST for varmint hunting they make a nice hole at close range. All of them are extremely easy to get a load for in my Tikka tact A1 in 6.5 CM. My favourite is the ELD-X 143gr

Go Big Red!

375, can we get some Outfitter in 250-275 CX?

You make a 155g ELD-M in .308 any plans to make a 150g weight range ELD-X? If not why?

I love this shit. We live in some great times for bullet tech. Hornady is leading the pak

Hello Gentlemen, Some of us are eager to learn but some of us do not know the meaning of cups...or other basic components of the bullit. Please advise a podcast that is bullits 101. Thanks, T

Open up a plant up here in Sioux Falls and I'll quit my current job and come work for Hornady

How about a podcast talking about the ELDX constitution and use on game? Is it good for high shoulder shots?

Where are the all copper bullets being made?

Yall hiring 👀

Make 6mm ARC brass for us so we can shoot more of these bullets.

How are bonded bullets made?

A picture book of everything you guys were talking about would make a better understanding of your conversation.

285 grain eldm out of a 338/06 is a good deer bullet

Make a 25-6.5 PRC please 😂

how does hornady brass compare to Lapua brass

So if the bullet fails the test after say 50k has been ran how does the consumer of that lot know or do they?

I know a podcast is essentially audio, but since these are being presented on video, they would benefit greatly by cutting in appropriate images or videos.

need video on actually making bullets

All hornady did was copy Winchesters sliver tip to make their A-tip wish they would put the interlock ring in the A-tip so we could use it as a hunting bullet the Winchester sliver tip was a great hunting round dont know why they stopped making it

little misleading Ep. 063 - How Bullets are Made --- podcast would be right

Good interview but Berger makes better target bullet.

Great podcast right up till the point you started ripping on your competitors. While your match bullets maybe the best, your hunting bullets are complete garbage. In sales, if you’re ripping on the competition your product can compete.

Love the leftist tears mug! 😅

I spy a leftist tears tumbler! Guaranteed to make your drinks taste better haha

"30 boo boo" ?? Wtf? Why tape this if you forget there's an audience? Talk so listeners can follow and learn.

Fascinating ….. but I still don’t understand how bullets are made from your presentation. Very Disappointed How about some graphics

So, was the political statement prop absolutely necessary?

....YOU REALLY SHOULD HAVE "SHOWN" PHOTOS"/VIDEOS" OF THE MACHINERY, AND THE STEP BY STEP PROCESS"!!!... [TOO MUCH CHITTER-CHATTER HERE!!]...

the more i hear you guys talk the more i buy berger bullets you definitely do NOT make the best bullets good bullets yes the a tips are not the most concentric bullets on the market either just work on being less full of your self