“A USA” head stamped brass?

[justindad]

Is this stuff any good for reloading? I read another forum where folks unanimously threw it in the scrap bin, but that was .45 ACP. This .38 Special brass is all range brass of unknown history.

[Recycled bullet]

I consider it as some of the worst. I found it to be stiff crappy brass that cracks easily work hardens extremely quickly and it's ugly.

[Bazoo]

I've reloaded a couple of handfuls of pieces here and there without any issues in calibers 38 special and 45 auto. Not enough to really get a feel for it.

[Dusty Bannister]

I had an opinion about the quality of this many years ago. I saw case splits on new cases. However, presently I know of an individual that uses this head stamp on 223 cases with slightly reduced loads and gets several reloading cycles shooting them in an AR platform. He happens to use the FC head stamp for match and the A-USA for practice with Junior Shooters and they work fine in that application. Those are the only caliber that I have personal knowledge about for that head stamp.

[beltfed]

To answer your question, A-Cor stands for Armscorps company

I have had no problems with loading A-Cor so far with 223, 9mm, 40 cal

beltfed/arnie

[trails4u]

I bought many, many thousands of 223 years ago, and got a lot of the same feedback about them being junk. So....I torture tested 20 cases, and I think I quit at 8 or 9 full house loadings with zero splits. No annealing, FL sized every time. I also tested them for consistency in case capacity (another gripe I heard about them) and over several 10-round samples, they were not quite as good as LC brass, but awfully dang close. Over the chrono....the same. Not quite as good...but again pretty dang close.

FWIW - I still have, use and shoot most of it....and don't mind it at all. I seem to recall reading somewhere that there was a change in source for their brass, and that the older stuff was, in fact, pretty inferior. My experience with newer A-USA brass, in .223, has been pretty good. YMMV.

[scattershot]

I haven't loaded any of it for a while now, I just pitch it. The problem I had was off center flash holes.

[armoredman]

The very few 9mm I found in my bucket had very off center flash holes, almost as bad as Perfecta, so it goes in the scrap bag. Every time the bag is full I sell it to the recyclers for enough to get some high quality Chinese food.

[Bmi48219]

…..The problem I had was off center flash holes.

^^^this^^^
But to be fair the only experience I have is with 38 spec and 45 acp.

[ACC]

Is this stuff any good for reloading? I read another forum where folks unanimously threw it in the scrap bin, but that was .45 ACP. This .38 Special brass is all range brass of unknown history.

Toss it. Garbage! I had some once that was given to me. It was once fired. At the first reloading half of the necks cracked.

ACC

[justindad]

Different people have different experiences with this product, which is the definition of poor quality. I’ll scrap these. Thanks everybody!

[Strtspdlx]

I tried to use it in 10mm. Anymore id prefer to just throw it in the scrap bin, it causes alot ftf's

[armoredman]

Let the recyclers turn them into doorknobs and candlestick holders.

[Bmi48219]

I was priming 30 carbine in today. Several hundred mixed HS, all of which I’ve reloaded several times before. Probably had around 40 of them with the ‘A-USA’ head stamp. Of those 13 wouldn’t fit into the LEE Auto-Bench shell holder. The base below the extraction groove was too thick to slide into the holder. I then remembered I had experienced the same problem while trying to prime some of this brass before. They will fit into the shell holder that’s part of my 30 carbine die set, but the Auto-Bench uses a different style holder.
What’s even more perplexing is that both times this has happened the problem cases HAD fit into the primer shell holder during previous repriming and reloading sessions. So I checked the base of these faulty cases with a straight edge and couldn’t perceive any out-of-flat ‘proud’ distortion across the base that might be making the base too tall to fit. I alway load all 30 carbine loads at 14 gr 4227, which is at least .5 grains below max. This gives me 2000 fps from the carbine and 1930 from the pistol, with both firearms functioning flawlessly.
I don’t have this ‘base growth’ issue with any other HS 30 carbine brass.
Guess this will just be one of those unsolved mysteries.