Originally Posted by
ReloaderFred
Watch the A-Merc brass, as it's heavier than most of the other brands. You'll have to swage them separately since you'll have to set up the swaging die just for them to get them to come out right. At least that's what I found with their lousy .380 brass.
Also make sure your S&B brass isn't copper washed steel. You can't tell the difference by just looking. I'm finding that about half the S&B brass I get is actually steel, so I just run a strong magnet over it while sorting.
You'll also find that with swaging bullets from cartridge brass, that the finished product will come out longer than a conventional jacketed bullet of the same weight. With long revolver cartridges this isn't a problem, but with short pistol cartridges it is. With the longer straight wall revolver cartridges, I use loading data for the next heavier factory bullet to compensate for the longer swaged bullet, which reduces the volume of the loaded cartridge.
For example, I'm making 225 grain JHP .44 Magnum bullets from military .40 S&W brass (headstamp: FC 08) that is left at our range by the Coast Guard. I use a soft (bhn 6) unsized 158 grain .38 bullet for the core. For loading data, I start with the starting loads for the .44 Magnum 240 grain jacketed bullets and work up to what I want. This gives me the safety margin that I want when working up the loads and gives a good starting point, too.
The decreased volume situation could be problematic in the shorter 9x19 case. If you can locate some .32 auto brass, that makes ideal 9mm bullets, but they're not as common as some of the other calibers. I've managed to accumulate about 1/3 of a coffee can for my next run of those bullets.
Hope this helps.
Fred