Perk Hand Loader
	Fallout: New Vegas requirements Level 6 Repair 70 ranks 1 effects Twice as likely to recover ammunition cases Unlocks custom ammunition recipes base id 0016581b

 

Hand Loader is a perk in Fallout: New Vegas.

EffectsEdit

This perk allows you to craft 6 more types of ammunition at a reloading bench (plus 1 more with the Honest Hearts add-on, and another 6 with the Gun Runners' Arsenal add-on), each requiring slightly more supplies to create than the standard form. The perk also doubles the chance of recovering a shell/casing whenever you fire off most rounds. With Gun Runners' Arsenal installed, it also adds a more efficient recipe for making powder charges. This perk is favorable for players who prefer saving cartridges and casings and making their own at a reloading bench rather than spend the caps to get them from a vendor, and those who prefer the Guns skill over most other weapon skills. This saves money and when utilized to its full potential, can prove to be a very lethal proposition when choosing this perk.

Custom ammunition typesEdit

Ammunition	Repair required	DMG	DT	CND	SPRD	Other
10mm JHP hand load	50	x1.65	x2
.308 JSP hand load	50	x1.3		x1.5
.357 magnum JFP hand load	50	x1.25	-3		x0.8
.44 SWC hand load	75	x1.2	-6
.45-70 Gov SWC hand load	90	x1.2	-6	x3
.50 MG match hand load	100	x1.15			x0.65
.45 super hand load Honest Hearts	80	x1.3	-4	x2.5
12 gauge 4.0 buck mag hand load (GRA) Gun Runners' Arsenal	50	x1.30	-2	x1.15		4 projectiles
12.7mm JHP hand load (GRA) Gun Runners' Arsenal	75	x1.65	x2
20 gauge 3.0 buck mag hand load (GRA) Gun Runners' Arsenal	50	x1.30	-2	x1.15		4 projectiles
5.56 match hand load (GRA) Gun Runners' Arsenal	50	x1.15			x0.65
5mm JSP hand load (GRA) Gun Runners' Arsenal	50	x1.30	-10	x1.50
9mm JHP hand load (GRA) Gun Runners' Arsenal	50	x1.65	x2

Notes on ammunition termsEdit

• JHP - Jacketed Hollow Point; a lead-core bullet mostly enclosed by a copper jacket with a recessed nose, allowing the bullet to rapidly deform and fragment after striking tissue, essentially flattening out the bullet in the target, allowing it to efficiently expend more energy instead of going through the target, only making a small hole.
• JSP - Jacketed Soft Point; a lead-core bullet mostly enclosed by a copper jacket, but with the soft lead tip exposed. This allows the bullet to deform more readily after striking tissue, while retaining stronger penetration than a jacketed hollow point.
• JFP - Jacketed Flat Point; a soft point bullet with a flat tip instead of the usual rounded tip. Used in centerfire rifles with a tubular magazine, typically a lever action. A happy medium between penetration and tissue destruction. Due to the flattened point of the bullet, it creates a larger wound channel in tissue, but does not flatten out like a hollow point thus allowing it better penetration.
• SWC - Semi-Wadcutter; an all-lead flat-nosed bullet, originally designed to punch clean holes in paper, making scoring easier in competition shooting.
• Match hand load - match loads are rounds manufactured for accuracy and ballistic consistency, to ensure that multiple rounds fired from the same weapon will —all other things being equal—fly along the same path, at the same velocity, and strike the target in the same spot. Typically manufactured for applications such as competition shooting and long range shooting.
• Super - .45 super is an ammunition load designed for much higher pressures than the gun was originally intended to fire. Muzzle velocity is 20% greater than even +P resulting in much better armor penetration and damage, but causing considerable weapon damage to guns not specially designed to operate these "Wildcat" rounds. In real life the round is lengthened slightly to prevent it fitting in guns not specially designed for the higher pressures.

NotesEdit

• Certain custom hand-loaded ammunition may greatly deteriorate gun condition. This specialized ammunition is still practical to use, however, as the rapid deterioration of otherwise rare weapons can be countered by the relatively easy ability to repair them using weapon repair kits, taking the Jury Rigging perk or having Raul Tejada as a companion (for the Full Maintenance perk).
• It does not work with Junk Rounds in the Dead Money add-on.
• It should be noted that lead is not weightless as it might appear. Rather, its weight is so negligible that the game doesn't display it as a unit (weight is only displayed to the second decimal). It takes roughly 714.5 units of lead to make a full unit of encumbrance. To put it another way, 1000 units of lead weighs 1.4 lbs. This might not seem like much, but (with hand loader) the player can easily accumulate tens of thousands of units of lead, which then adds substantial weight if carried around in their inventory. With the game update that shows aggregate weight for stacked items in inventory, this becomes much more obvious and one can see at a glance how much weight in lead they carry.
• New Hand Loader recipes are unlocked with the Gun Runners' Arsenal add-on.

Behind the scenesEdit

• The name of the perk refers to handloading, a process of loading firearm cartridges or shells by assembling the individual components (brass/shotshell, primer, powder, and bullet/shot), rather than obtaining completely assembled, factory-loaded cartridges.
• .45 Super cartridges produce significantly higher pressures than standard .45 ACP rounds. Weapons designed to fire a normal .45 ACP round often cannot handle the pressure generated by .45 Super rounds. Weapons, most notably the M1911 pistol must be modified before they can safely fire the .45 Super.
• In actuality, the flattened tip of the Jacketed Flat Point also eliminates the risk of a round accidentally setting off the one in front of it, in tube-fed rifles.