Reloading Cast in Wolf Steel .223 Cases

[zxcvbob]

I loaded some 62 grain FMJ's with Varget tonight in brass cases; Last time I used 25.5 grains and this time it's 26.0 -- probably getting close to max. Then I loaded just a few Hornady 55 grain SP's in steel cases using the same powder charge. Not sure if I'll get to the range tomorrow or not to try them out.

I need to dust off my old Chrony and see if it still works, and clock some Lake City ammo to get some baseline numbers. My gun is a 16" Mini-14, and I'm not sure it will stabilizes 62's with that short barrel unless I load them hot. (it does just fine with NATO ammo)

[Plate plinker]

Any thoughts on work hardening the steel cases versus brass?

[Mud Eagle]

What was accuracy like?

Accuracy was "okay". I didn't shoot it from a rest and it was a pretty windy day, so I don't have any useful data to show as far as that's concerned (like a nice target with a nice grouping!).

I was, however, using bulk Armscor bullets, which I don't read all that many positive reviews of their accuracy. I didn't want to load up (read: "waste"!) my Hornady VMax or the Sierra bullets on this experiment. I was regularly ringing the 8" gong at 100m over the course of the 50 I loaded. Not match grade by any stretch of the imagination, but a successful 'test' in my book.

My real aim was to see if the cases would all load and cycle with Varget in my rifle (I used 24.5 gr and 25.0 gr, and they both worked fine -- the cases were filled nearly up to the bottom of the bullet before seating with 25.0). I was mostly wondering if the bare-steel without the polymer coating would have any issues. I found none, even in multi-shot strings when the rifle was both cold and hot. I'm not exactly a clean freak with my rifle, but it's not overly dirty, either, and I didn't see anything abnormal in the chamber when I was done.

My take-aways from the experiment: it's only slightly more work for case prep, but other than that it's no different than loading and shooting brass. The extra case prep work has to do with me using wet stainless pin tumbling, and thus I have to take more care when the cases come out of tumble to dry them quickly, then store them so they don't rust. I air dried the cases in the three batches of steel I've tumbled so far, and I never saw any rust on the outside, but the insides (where residual water was) took on an extremely light but noticeable rust after only 24 hours. Swabbing a q-tip inside the cases before leaving them to air-dry kept the necks rust free, though.

The other somewhat down side is that I found it a little more challenging to inspect cases for cracks, especially, before tumbling. After tumbling, it was a snap, but before I just could not decipher what was rust, what was dirt, what was powder residue, and what was scraped or cracked polymer coating. So, you have to tumble first, then inspect.

One thing I learned about tumbling steel cases in SS pins: if you tumble them at the same time you have brass in the tumbler, they come out looking gray and dingy and ugly. If you tumble only steel cases in the batch, the cases come out nice and shiny. Like the previous post, the Lemi-shine in the water causes the cases to take on a bit of a gunmetal gray hue a couple hours after coming out of the tumbler. They look almost lightly blued.

I did not have to trim these cases, but I have read reports that people saw noticeable dulling of their trimmer blades after a lot of cases, so that could be an issue. Every single case I have picked up at my particular range (Tula and Wolf) have been less than 1.76 when measured, so I did not trim them at all. That could be another future issue, although I may just end up pitching anything greater than 1.76 since they're "free" anyway".

Anyway, good job with the steel cases and keeping the bling factor down!

Thanks for the comment on the clean rifle. I completely intended it that way, and don't see adding anything significant, although at some point I may go with some kind of optic.

It's funny to go to a range these days, bring a plain-jane AR, and shoot it standing/offhand using just irons on an A2 handle. You definitely get some looks from the other folks! Strange how the hobby has changed with respect to both shooting styles (lots more benchrest guys in my neck(s) of the woods) as well as equipment (optics, optics, optics) -- and I'm under 40 and only been shooting since the late 80s.

I did have a conversation with another shooter who noticed my blue cases and came over to see what kind of reloads I was shooting. It blew his mind that, not only was I shooting Tula, but I was shooting reloaded Tula!

Not sure where I'll go with this from now on. I'm going to shoot this batch at least once more and see what the cases look like. Most of the reports I read about this online spoke of cracks after the 2d or 3rd loading, so I'll be on the lookout for that.

I'll keep picking up discarded Wolf and Tula at the range, knowing that in a pinch I can use it. It's probably most useful in a situation where you can't/don't want to pick up your empties for whatever reason.

[Mud Eagle]

Any thoughts on work hardening the steel cases versus brass?

Do you mean in terms of how the cases work harden and become more brittle than brass in the course of shooting and sizing?

Yes, there definitely is a difference, which I think manifests itself in the limited number of times you can reload.

There are a good number of people on the internet (that I've subsequently read about after seeing this thread) that reload steel in .223 a lot. Some of these guys are getting similar numbers of loads out of their steel cases that they get out of brass before seeing signs of fatigue or failure. Loading and shooting thousands of rounds, so a way larger sample size than the few that I worked yesterday.

Because the cases are free, if I choose to load the cases several times I can afford to be extremely conservative with what I keep and what I toss. I'll probably toss the entire batch once I see one or two split necks develop, and of course I'll ditch anything that even looks suspicious just to be certain.

[JKH]

Hey Mud Eagle,

AR15 owners do seem to run the gammut, I mostly see uber tactical carbines (gotta be an M4 of course so to other my standard CAR seems odd but they dont realize that the M203 barrel cut is the only difference and I dont see many of those on the market!), for the life of me I cant understand why people want to take a light, fast handling weapon and load it with gadgets till it ways 8 or9 lbs, might as well carry a Garand! Personally I prefer 20" rifles and will swap my CAR out for an A1 clone and preferably built on a Vulcan Kevlar lower, last one I built weighed in under 6 lbs empty, that is the epitomy of what the rifle should be, I,m older and trained in boot with a Vietnam era A1 and of the 30+ AR's I have built and owned that configuration will always be my favorite

On ar15.com there are a number of members with REAL M16's that regularly reload and shoot steel case ammo in their very expensive machine guns, those boys dump TENS of thousands of rounds a year and are a testimony to dispelling the fasehood of steel cases ruining your firearm and other such nefareous deeds

I still recommend rice in your tumbler as it will clean well but preserve the polymer coating, they look like they did out of the box and when loaded still afford the same corrosion resistance.

[Mud Eagle]

I will definitely try the rice!

[Plate plinker]

Interesting stuff here. It's definitely easier to pitch out free. Junk versus paid for trash. As long as you clean well wear should not be an issue.

[Tracy]

I have reloaded quite a few hundred Wolf steel .223 cases, both laquered and polymer, the last 100 polymer I loaded were not very accurate but I was using up some old commercial FMJ's with blunt tips (cant remember the brand off hand, got them as part of a larger deal).

I havent loaded any of these cases more than 3 or 4 times, however they dont seem to have degraded noticeably except for some wear to the finish from loading and cycling trough my AR15 ( I did shoot some through my sub 1/2 moa Savage 10PC and got almost 2" groups! In an AR they always give good plinking accuracy except those funky blunts I had).

When I tumble mine I use untreated white rice for 2 hours, wont always make tarnished cases super shiny but does make them completely clean, even removes any rust from steel cases without risking case failure from chemical break down.

My ultimate cheap ammo is Wolf steel cases with Lee Bator boolits, using homemade gas checks and 30+ year old CCI primers I bought 10 years ago at a lawn sale for $5/1000 and a pinch of fast powder, only way I can do it cheaper is to reload spent primers with match heads

Jeff

The match head thing works better with Berdan cases.