How many full powered reloads..

[Murphy]

Just out of curriousity, I've long wondered just how many times you can reload a magnum handgun case to full powered loads?

What magnums? .357 & .44

Thanks,

Murphy

[Bullshop]

All depends on how much you size, bell, and crimp. If you didnt do any of those they will last a long long time. The failier of straight wall cases is at the mouth from those three things.
BIC/BS

[bisley45]

I have some 45 colt starline brass that has been loaded at 1500fps 250gr boolit :Fire:
it has been reloaded 12 time and still going

[Johnch]

It depends on your chambers and how hot your loads are .
If they are BIG like my Black Hawlk 8 is about what I get .
For the Dan Wesson I can get 15+ before need to I trim the cases a 3 time .
2 trimmings is my max for hot loads , brass is cheap .

But I have a batch of cases I have loaded 20+ times with wimp loads .


Johnch

[versifier]

I have batches of .357mag brass that have had 18 and 20 loadings. They last longer with jacketed bullets as you don't have to work the brass as much. Gas checks help that way, too, and I crimp just enough that they don't move under recoil. Those I used when I began casting back in the dark ages didn't last more than 5 or 6 loadings, but I was belling the mouths too wide and crimping too heavily. Live and learn. Annealing might improve longevity, but I have never bothered. Nor do I shorten them to .38spec as I don't want to get them confused. I separate them in boxes of 50 or 100 and I toss the whole box as soon as I start to see mouth cracks. I usually notice them appearing at the belling stage.

[Four Fingers of Death]

I usually put a pretty strong crimp on, especially when I use 296, but make sure that you don't overwork brass unecessarily by belling them too much. Expand it bit by bit until the boolit just fits.

The best way to avoid worrying about these little matters is to buy bulk brass. Splitting, losing, wrecking a few cases here and there is then no big deal.
Mick.

[Bret4207]

357 I can get at least 12-15 before I start seeing cracks. Oddly the little 32-20 I loose after 5-6 in Remington brand. Hopefully Starline will be better. 44 Mag- I used to have a Blackhawk and a Contender (sold the TC, my Dads, STUPID!) and I recall getting 8-10 usually.

[Bass Ackward]

Murphy,

The recommendation for trimming a straight case and case life is more dependent on what the brass is meant for and the age of the brass itself. So advising someone has to many variables to tell you what is safe. Brass is the weakest link in the shooting chain. Respect that to a level of risk that you are willing to accept. Personally, I will trim once and then relagate that brass to moderate stuff from that point on until it dies a useful death from the loading dies. Otherwise, I destroy the brass.

Brass is seldom considered for anything but case life. Especially by cheap casters. And I think this is a mistake. Especially with straight case calibers. Brass is the most important place to put your money and your trust. I believe that brass can cause problems that cause a lot of people to formulate opinions and dictate how they mold and reload too. Then it becomes a topic that get discussed on this board. Seldom is brass considered as part of the problem. Everything from bullet diameter, to choice of the brand of dies, to choices of bullet designs, both with and without gas checks. Certainly bullet hardness opinions can be affected by brass too.

Brass seems to work better for different purposes too. I believe manufacturers make their brass based on two considerations. First they want to safely keep their costs down which supports cheaper materials and harder brass. Second, they make their brass to perform with what they load (sell) the most. High pressure jacketed.

Reloading die manufactueres recognize this and make their dies to reload what their customers use most. That is why you see such a variance in sizing dies and expander stems. Generally, you see less brass sizing with RCBS dies and more with Lyman dies. Even Lyman seating dies tend to support larger cast bullet diameters than RCBS. Lyman dies used to be made more for cast. I don't know if they still are.

Long life, brass cases are designed for high pressures. They will generally be too hard to have a consistent bullet pull on a lubricated bullet without over sizing on the down side. If not when new, certainly after a few firings. Then the brass is so hard at this reduced size that it can size down softer cast bullets. I believe that a lot of people's need for a harder PB bullet or GCs on bullets can relate just as much to their brass choice or condition as it does to bullet design or bore condition. And how many casters have you heard say that new bras shoots better than old brass?

For jacketed loads I use Winchester brass but in truth any brass will do. For cast at any pressure level, I use Hornady. Some has 17 reloadings and still shoots as well today with cast as it did new. The problem for most people? Cost.

[44man]

I have gone to as many as 40 heavy reloads in the .44 without a single loss of a case. Most of the time I just buy new ones --because! A split case will not hurt anything, just toss it. Sometimes a case will split with the second reload. Others last forever. As long as case tension stays even, don't worry about it. Inspect with each reloading and toss the bad ones if you find any.

[StarMetal]

I have a box of factory Winchester 357 mags that are jacketed hollowpoints that a friend gave me years ago. They aren't ancient, but have some years on them. Almost every one of them splits shooting them out of my Model 19 Smith. Don't have that problem with any other 357 ammo in the same gun. I'd have to say they are brittle and they got that way awfully fast. They are also pretty damn hot for a factory load too.

Joe

[Dale53]

I have been shooting the .44 magnum for a LONG time. In my youth, spendable income was considerably less than what I found later in life (most of us probably fall into that category). At any rate, I would buy most any offer of "once fired brass". It actually worked out well over the years. I only got burned one time - I got a lot of mixed brass. I made the buy for myself and a friend. I sorted it out and it came almost even, some Winchester and some Remington. I arbitrarily gave the 'brass" brass (Winchester) to my friend and kept the plated brass (Remington) for myself. My friend had WONDERFUL brass life but my plated stuff would lose a few cases each time I loaded it. I don't know if the plating was the culprit or just a bad lot of brass. I tend to believe that it was just a bad lot.

Another bad lot was had when I got my first .32 H&R magnum. Federal quit selling components to reloaders at almost the exact time I bought my little Ruger. So, I was temporarily stuck with shooting factory loads and then using the brass for reloading. The Federal cast bullet stuff wouldn't shoot worth spit. The jacketed stuff shot well but was expensive. The killer was that the brass was absolute garbage. Every time I shot a 50 round box I would lose several cases to body splits. I had a friend who dealt in once fired brass and I bought several thousand .32 S&W Long empties (I was mostly loading wadcutters, anyway) and never looked back. I still have a "burr under my saddle" towards Federal :razz:. Several years later, I heard that Starline was going to start offering .32 H&R brass. I ordered a couple of thousand ahead of release and have been happy since.

The Ruger has now gone, and I have a S&W Stainless Kit Gun, a S&W 6" K model, and a JDJ barreled TC Contender for the nice, well mannered, little .32 H&R.

So, to answer the question at hand, good lots of brass in good guns lasts nearly forever if you don't "overload". My .44 magnum is shot mostly with 23 grains of H110 or Carbine Ball (original slow lot) and a 250 Keith. If I increase the powder from 23.0 to 24.0 grs the velocity goes from 1200 fps to 1300 fps. The deer don't seem to be able to tell the difference, so, I have standardized the 23.0 gr load. I never shoot light loads in my 44's. If I want to shoot lighter loads I just break out my .44 specials or even the .32's.

One advantage to shooting modest, but reasonably full powered loads in the .44 my guns have digested thousands (tens of thousands?) of rounds and are still as tight as the day they were made. Using cast bullets and full but not heaviest loads leads to longevity.

YMMV

Dale53

[44man]

Dale, that is the reason my brass lasts such a long time. I never load max, only to the most accurate which is just under max. It makes no sense to load as hot as you can and not hit what you shoot at.
I found the same problem with Federal nickel brass with my BPCR. I don't size or expand and use only black powder. Some of them split at the first loading. The rest last forever and I shoot them in my revolver now where they are sized and expanded over and over. I have lost Hornady brass with the first shot from my .475.
You just can never tell about brass.

[Linstrum]

When I shoe spoon the boolits in without belling the case mouths I get right around sixteen loadings in .357 Magnum. With the very minimum amount of belling that will keep from shaving a slice off the side of the boolit, I get right around nine uses before the mouths split. After the mouths split I can still get maybe three more loads before the splits get so they start to leak powder real bad unless I am using H110, which falls out tiny splits enough to cause big problems. So with H110 I let them go as soon as they split.

When the mouth splits showed up after reloading, I used to dismantle the cartridges but quit because it is a big pain between the hip pockets that doesn't really accomplish anything. In a revolver and a lot of other guns mouth split cartridges can be fired individually without problem and shooting them as a barrel warmer is easier than dumping the powder out and wasting a primer.

I also get around sixteen loadings with most rifle cases, too. So at least for me, that seems to be a constant with brass whether it is small straight-sided cases or very large cases with bottlenecks.

I did an experiment maybe ten years ago with one of my Mosin-Nagant rifles to see how many times I could reload one 7.62x54R cartridge for it. I loaded it with IMR4064 and 150-grain .308 Sierra Match Kings to about 2500 fps and did not resize the cartridge at all, I just kept putting in primers, powder, and bullets until it got to the point where it was too long and then trimmed it to length. I kept going and trimmed it to length twice more. When I got to 55 loads in that one case the primer pocket gave out and would not hold the primer anymore. I silver-soldered up the pocket and remachined it back to size, and kept going until the head separated at 77 reloads. It was far too tricky to silver solder that up to fix it, so I left it at 77.

[doghawg]

My strategy is 8 to 10 warm loads out of a case and then it gets put "out to pasture" with milder loads until it expires. I get 20 to 25 loads from .41's and .44's that way. As the above posters pointed out, a minimum of belling helps too.

[44man]

Very old brass gets brittle just from sitting around and can split at the first shot. I find brass that is fired often lasts longer then stored brass. Brass that has been sitting around for 20 yr's is not worth messing with.

[BOOM BOOM]

HI,
I have to echo all the above posts. 10-15 reloads is normal in pistols 38, 357, & 44.
I have never trimmed a pistol case in 30+ yrs. of reloading. If I don't spot a crack before seating a new bullet I have just shot it & chucked the case for years with no problems.
Annealing & trimming rifle cases is worth the effort, 30+ yrs ago NORMA got 90 firings out of a rifle case. Over the years I have collected so many cases that I have not annealed anything for 10 yrs. unless I am case forming for a wildcat.

[44man]

Starmetal can rejuvenate old brass so you can get 10,000 reloads out of it.

[StarMetal]

44man,

I'm not doing that to you...that's a low blow. I cannot do that.

Joe

[44man]

OK, Joe I will quit and apologize. But damn, I like to pull your chain! You get excited so fast it gives me the giggles. We entertain a lot of the guys here too. What would they do without us?

[redneckdan]

are you two kin or somethin? ya sure bicker like it...

[StarMetal]

Vomit, split, puke...vomit, choke....KIN!!!!!!!!!!! Why I wouldn't have that vermin for an enemy even, alone kin. :Fire:[smilie=b::redneck::kidding:


Joe

[waksupi]

They sound like brother and sister. Don't know which is which!

[44man]

Darn it I dropped the end of the chain and it fell in cow flop. Where did you learn all them nasty words Joe? Aint no ways ta talk ta kin!

[StarMetal]

Hey Jetro, watch that kin kaka. [smilie=s:

[StarMetal]

44man,

:violin:[smilie=f:Forgot, you dropped that chain in your own doodoo.

[44man]

Might be, but ya was behind me!