Why YES, YES YOU DO! You can get one now days for a piddlin' hundred bucks. Might have to save for that, but shouldn't take that long. /enabler...
Now, I loaded for years without a chronograph, stayed within published specs as I do now, for that matter. BUT, I had NO idea what my loads were doing. Now, if all I loaded for were handguns, I could live without one if I just HAD to, but with rifles, I think I'd miss that chrony if you took it away from me. I'd have no clue about down range ballistics. I could shoot at a 1000 yard range, but I don't have one. Most I can shoot out here is 100 yards and I like to know what my rifle is doing somewhat beyond that, not necessarily 1000 yards, but out to 4 or 500 yards I wanna know hold over, ballistics tables. I went so far, in the 80s, as to write my own ballistics program for a tiny little 16 K Timex/Sinclair toy computer, later converted that to run on a 125K Tandy Color 3. It was a whole new world of understanding. I would run those ballistics, go to our club range on a weekday when nobody was there, back off to 300 yards on the 200 yard range (longest we had) and test off the hood of my truck. It was fun and informative. I have my load ballistics data taped to the top of my .308's 2x10 Weaver scope so's I won't forget 'em. I've made shots out to just under 400 yards with that rifle on coyotes. It does work to be an informed rifleman. Now days, I have a free internet download for exterior ballistics, though I prefer my own as I wrote in statistics calculations for it. I didn't have to get on the net and get a standard deviation calculator or sit down at the dining table and hand calculate it all which takes a while and reminds me too much of college stat class, "analysis of variance". :rofl:
Now, I could justify NOT bothering to know anything out here in the woods, but all that chronographing and calculating back over the last 3 decades has made me a more informed rifleman, methinks. I may never take another shot beyond 50 yards out here, but it's in my head if I need it. So, just to load rounds for the range in a 9x19 or something, no, you don't NEED a chronograph, but it sure helps to understand what's going on. Even with pistol loads, it's a good thing to know velocities of your rounds to make sure they coincide with published ballistics so you know you're safe. The chrony is as much a safety tool for the handloader as anything else when it comes to handgun loads, not so much downrange ballistics. But, to me, any tool I can have that gives me info on a load is a good thing. I flew blind for years, but no more.
I'd dearly LOVE to have an Ohler with a strain gauge and all the neat gismos like the triangulated microphone thing they have for putting up around your 100 yard target, senses the sound of the bullet as it passes and you can sit there at your shooting bench after 5 shots and see your group without ever getting up and going down to check. That'd save gas in my ATV is nothing else. :rofl: It also calculates the actual ballistic coefficient for you sense the time to distance from the chonograph screens to the target. The strain gauge gives actual chamber pressures so you KNOW if you're within SAAMI, don't have to take the book's word for it. But, I compromise and live without that. I ain't got the cash outlay for an Ohler, but the little Chronys are affordable and they give me enough data, I suppose.
So, you see, this sport is never ending, always something you want to spend money on, but you don't absolutely HAVE to. :laugh: I think the best thing about having my chronograph over the years is how it has expanded my knowledge of ballistics and loading, not necessarily that I NEEDED it to handload. I have my press, components, and my Speer manuals.
