Do you sort your revolver brass by head stamp??

[brassrat]

I sort it all and the same way. Size/deprime, then measure and sort by 3 or 4 lengths. Next I pull out the same HSs from these sortings and fill plastic ammo boxes with them, a few or many at a time. At 50 or 100 they get further work and saved or loaded

[M-Tecs]

This issue seems to come up fairly frequently and it is one of the mostly easily settled . Load up 25 rounds of sorted and prepped base and load 25 rounds on mixed none sorted and test for grouping. With that you have a legitimate answerer and not an opinion.

[Bazoo]

I've done just that very thing m tec. I went from 2.5"-3" groups at 15 yards to 1"-1.5" with the wife's 686.

[M-Tecs]

Like the saying goes "your results may vary". I have tested this with handguns a lot in the 70's and 80's and early 90's. Never observed anywhere that much difference but that being said with the exception of IMI 45 acp brass none of my brass was foreign. Lot of foreign stuff in the system but unless it's IMI it gets junked out when I do case inspection.

Never tested at less than 25 yards and most was tested at 50 yards for handguns. Rifles I do initial load development at 100 and final mostly at 300, 600 or 1,000 yards unless it's handgun caliber lever gun. Things like my 6.5 JDJ and 7-30 Water's Contenders get final testing a 200 yards.

I sort by headstamp for 50 yard + handgun loads and 300 yard place rifle. For 600 yard + loads I neck anneal 100%. Even with annealing every firing long range competition ammo is sorted by headstamp and if LC year of manufacture and finally but amount of firings.

For my .223 prairie dog loads I can hold 5/8" MOA out to 300 yards with a mix of LC and use commercial. I generally load and fire 4K to 7K of these per year and I have zero need or interest in sorting by headstamp but they do get neck annealed every 3 or 4 firings.

Sorting by headstamp makes sense if you have substandard accuracy or your are only sorting small quantities. When you are shooting 1K or 2K or more a month you tend to eliminate steps that are not required.

[fatelk]

Sometimes I do, sometimes not. I do when loading towards maximum load. I learned about that a long time ago. 25+ years ago I was reloading for my first revolver, a Dan Wesson .357 Magnum 15". I hadn't been loading very long back then, and I was young, so I tended to load them as close to maximum as I thought I could, probably hotter than I should have. Using mixed brass from who-knows-where, I had some that would stick in the cylinder, and I had to beat them out. I noticed that every single time it was a case with a "FALK" headstamp. I figured they must have been thicker or something. Eventually I got smart, got a chronograph, backed off on the hot loads.

[Three44s]

I sort all brass. Rifle, revolver, single shot pistol and autloader hand gun cartridges.

For high performance revolver I delegate my best newest handgun brass to one or two firings before it gets relegated to a slightly backed off load, then subsequent firings to even further reduced pressure levels. (We are talking bear defense loads as to what my high performance criteria consists of)

I don’t fool with small sets of a given head stamp generally but utilize brass in a sufficient quantity to that it is in itself, enough to constitute a “batch”.

I also use different head stamps as an identifier of different loads. For instance, I hold 44 Mag Starline in very high regard. I hold my load of HS6 powder and the RCBS 250 in very high regard. Those three components are wedded at the hip around my place. No other variations allowed on my bench ... Similarily, my bear stompers are loaded exclusively in WW brass in the .44 Mag.

Powder coating opens even more avenues of ID’ing loads.

Though my loads may work fine with mixed brass, I also prefer to separate head stamps so in loading, I do not have to make compromises in die adjustments to smooth out variations.

It is all in what you make of it.

Three44s

[kevin c]

I sort my action pistol 9mm match brass, but not practice or plinking brass.

It started with inspection to cull damaged cases, then moved on to eliminating certain head stamps that I had problems loading. That I do for all brass I use, but sorting and loading by head stamp was a decision made when I found single head stamp brass could achieve single digit ES's and SD's. Does it shoot more accurately? Perhaps, but I haven't tested it as it is accurate enough for my application.

The reduced SD's and ES's matter in my sport, where lower recoiling loads are a big advantage, but not meeting the rule for required velocity for bullet weight can carry severe penalties in scoring, such as point reductions of up to 50% for "going minor", or even shooting for no score, period, for going "sub minor". Skirting the power factor floor is less likely to give me problems at the chrono stage when I use a soft shooting load that very consistently give me the velocity needed for the boolit weight loaded.

Anyway, I'm already committed to looking at the HS to pick out the unwanted brands, so it is minimal additional effort to pick out the wanted ones by brand.

[samari46]

I sort by headstamp all of my brass. Even separate the wadcutter brass from regular jacketed 38 special brass. Buddy used to teach CCW classes and got tired of picking up all the 38 brass. One day handed me the broom and said have at it. In one summer ended up with a 40mm ammo can full of both wadcutter and regular brass. Told me he was running out of room in the garage. In military calibers separate by year and mfg as lot numbers aren't generally known. Pistol leave it right there brass is usually MFS (Hungarian),A-merc, and S&B except 45acp. All you have to do is use a case chamfer tool and break the edge of the primer pocket so you see a slight chamfer on it. Frank

[Hickory]

I do not shoot competition anymore, so, I don't sort brass, about the only shooting I do now is plinking.
Plinking has the advantage of little or no frustration of making a bad shot or a miss. Plinking is fun and relaxing.
With all that said, no, I don't sort brass anymore, nor do I care.
If I want to load for hunting, that needs to be good and accurate, I'll buy a new batch of brass!

[lightman]

This issue seems to come up fairly frequently and it is one of the mostly easily settled . Load up 25 rounds of sorted and prepped base and load 25 rounds on mixed none sorted and test for grouping. With that you have a legitimate answerer and not an opinion.

I always wanted to buy a Ransom Rest just for things like this, but I never did. At one time I might have shot a pistol good enough to tell the difference. And I might not have been good enough? But I am for sure not good enough now to tell any difference.

[Biggin]

I always wanted to buy a Ransom Rest just for things like this, but I never did. At one time I might have shot a pistol good enough to tell the difference. And I might not have been good enough? But I am for sure not good enough now to tell any difference.

Dang lightman you took the words right out of my mouth! It's almost like we've had this conversation before!!!! Lol!

[JAMESGR]

Thanks for the input. I have all of the brass separated. Ended up with several HS that have 20 or less, think I'll trim them for my 38's. All mine were fired who knows how many times when I got them, so I don't worry about how many time they've been fired. Won't be correct anyway. The only competition I have is me. My bench is set up in the back door of my shot and I shoot pistols at 25 yds. and rifles at 50 yds. In the next week or so I'll move the rifle target to 100 yds.
Thanks
James
JAMESGR

[kerplode]

For light range/practice loads, I just load mixed brass. For these uses, sorting doesn't seem to matter enough to make it worth my time.

If I'm making "match" or heavy field loads, though, I'll generally start with a batch of new brass and keep them together so that they're grouped by times-fired.

[rbuck351]

Rifle yes, revolver no, autos no except for 45acp lg/ small pp.

[dragon813gt]

except for 45acp lg/ small pp.

Sorting these is the worse.

[JAMESGR]

Finally got all .357 brass sized and decapped . Next clean the primer pocket, trim, chamfer, and deburr.
Thanks for the advise
JAMES
JAMESGR

[2A-Jay]

I only sort my Handgun Brass by Caliber and Primer Size on some.

[Lloyd Smale]

yup ive done lots of testing in lots of guns and find if accuaracy changes you need a caliper to measure the difference. Guess to me it comes down to whether id rather be shooting or loading. I load to shoot. Long time ago I quit sorting handgun brass, cleaning primer pockets and trimming handgun brass. All ocd things that take lots of time and do very little in the end. Ive got a pile of ppc and bullseye trophies shot with ammo that wasn't sorted, trimmed or primer pockets cleaned. Matter of fact I kind of made a habit out of shooting comp with my oldest wore out brass because I couldn't pick it up and reuse it like I can at my own range.

I pay no attention to head stamps! Especially for revolvers, 9mm, and 40 S&W semi's.

Do it if you want. I see no need to waste time for general plinking & shooting.

I DO inspect all brass B4 reloading. VERY IMPORTANT! Have found a few cracked and junk ones in there over time and they go right in the trash.

Stay safe!

banger

[Lloyd Smale]

I guess a lot of this comes down to volume. Some think there ammo flush with 6 boxes of shells loaded and range flush when the show up with a WHOLE box of shells and usually come home with a few left in the box. I go to the range with ammo cans and coffee cans of ammo. If I had to give up my dillons id quit shooting. I took up casting not because its fun but because it allowed me to show up at the range with coffee cans of ammo. im sure not about to wade through 10k of 9mm 38spec 40 or 45 brass to sort headstamps. Im not about to buy all nice new shinny brass for them either when I can get mixed headstamp once fired for a 1/3 the price and many times for free.

[bmortell]

I have to. after a few times i was loading and going through the motions and all of a sudden seating a primer or something feels different than the last 50 rounds did and red flag goes off in my head i start looking, did something on my press change, did i slip, maybe the primer or pocket was deformed. Then i just find out i got a S&B case in my remington pile, and they just feel different to load. I just cant have that. To me lack of consistancy is a sign that i messed something up, and heads up about safety hazards. So i need the cases to all feel the same.