Buying used Brass

[CT Kid]

Looking for some information about using "once fired brass".
I am a new shooter and reloader and decided on 45 ACP.
I bought a used Lee press, a Lee electric pot, 4 gang RN 230 grain mold, 100 lbs of WW,some accurate #5 powder and a box of winchester primers.

I bought a batch (2000+) of once fired brass on E-Bay and went through and deprimed and gave them an inspection.


So I have fired about 1000 rounds it took about 300 rounds to make them cycle reliably and I bought a gage to check my bullets for size. Some slide right into the gage and the headstamp falls right into the gage and sits flush.

On about 25% of the shells I put in the gage the headstamp will not go flush. It looks as though the headstamp is not concentric to the case. Does anyone know why a case would do that? Should I get rid of these cases?

[kywoodwrkr]

You didn't say what kind of resizing die you used on the cases before reloading them.
The description you render sounds like the cases were not resized.
I'd reccommend a good set of carbide dies. that way you can use nickel plated cases as well as the brass ones without worrying about galling the resizing die.
DaveP kywoodwrkr

[jcadwell]

Are you sizing the bullets after casting?

[D.Mack]

To expand on kywoodwrkr, not all of your brass was fired from the same gun, some of it may have been fired in a chamber larger than yours. If you don't full length resize them the first time some of the bases may be too large to fit in your barrel or gauge. Also depending on where they came from, some of those once fired cases may have been fired more than once. But would I get rid of them, nope, first try to decern whether its a sizing or length problem, and I would use the custom case guage that came with your gun.( the barrel). first remove the barrel from the gun. Then drop in some sized brass, and see if it enters to flush with the hood. It may go a little deeper, thats ok for now. then try a few loaded rounds. again see if they will go to even with the hood, If they go deeper than the hood, they will be head spacing on the extractor, and the firing pin may not get full impact, and you may want to seat the bullet a little longer to insure the base of the case is in contact with the breech face. If they dont go in to even with the hood, they may be too long or too large in diameter. It is rare that a 45 brass gets too long, but the loaded round may. As for diameter there are three possible culprits. 1 the base was fired in a larger chamber, and not fully resized. 2.the bullet diameter added to the case diameter is too large for your chamber. and 3 You may be crimping too much and causing the case to swell just behind the crimp. This can happen when you set your dies on a short or normal length piece of brass, and a longer one comes along and gets crimped too much. Coat your loaded round that wont chamber, with Motor Mica (aluminum oxide) flour, a marking pen, or something that will rub off, and drop one of the offending rounds in the chamber, and try to see what is making contact where. DM

[Baldy]

It may be as simple as the crimp which should be .470" and no more than .469". Now when you measure this it is right on the edge of the case before the bullet. Now sometimes in range brass, it will have a burr on the head where the extractor claw nicked it. Take a small file and file off the burr. They should fall in a gauge free and not stick out the other end. Those will be shooters. OAL on mine are 1.250" on most of what I shoot.

[grumpy one]

DM, I'd be really reluctant to coat a cartridge with aluminium oxide and then chamber it. Aluminium oxide is the same abrasive that is used to make most grinding wheels and oilstones (not to mention toothpaste); even a small amount of it in the chamber can be a problem to remove, and it will do plenty of harm if it stays there. Motor mica is a much better choice - it is a sort of pseudo-lubricant, like graphite.

I was always taught to try to keep abrasives away from machinery, and if you can't do that, clean up pretty carefully afterward.

[Firebird]

When you get used (or even new) cases :

1) - Clean them. You don't want someone elses gunk and grit in your dies, presses & guns.

2) - Inspect & size them. Look at each case before you size it. Make sure it's not cracked, not so worn that the headstamp is gone, that the primer hole is there and the correct size. Most cases use .080" primer holes, 220 Swift are .060"; blanks and the new lead-free primer ammo uses some big (.125"+) holes and shouldn't be loaded with standard primers & loads.

3) Measure the length and sort and trim them to .010" or better tolerance. Even semi-auto pistol calibers like the 45 ACP go through the reloading process better if all the cases are basically the same size. For calibers that need a roll crimp for use in tube magazines or revolvers having all cases the same length is critical to get a proper crimp.

4) Load them up; use recipes from the manuals, follow the safety rules and pay attention to hat you are doing.

5) Take the ammo to the range & have fun shooting.

[georgeld]

Looks like a newbie one time poster. may not come back ever.
But, don't hurt to share info among ourselve's.

I realise this is about loading for an auto.
But, I just got started loading for a .45 Colt blackhawk and had quite a time getting the dies adjusted just right. So I've been dropping each case as it comes out of the seater into the cylinder to make sure they'll fit right easy. This has eliminated the problem of having some that will and some that won't. Much like dating both twins!!

This gun has the ACP cyl also, so whenever I get around to it, intend to load up a bunch for that one too.

What will I run into loading 250gr SWC's in the ACP for this revolver?? Any problems with the heavier bullets?? I don't have a mold for anything lighter except the 200gr REAL. Which seat nearly flush. They seemed to shoot fine, but, have gone to the SWC's since that mold arrived.

Thanks much,

[CT Kid]

Wow! what a response! To answer some of the questions:
I am sizing my cast bullets (Lee Die to .472).
The offending ammo slips into the barrel of my 1911.
The Lee gage I got is where I see the (problem?).
The bullet does not seat fully because the rim of the headstamp catches on the face of the gage. When you look at it the rim appears to be touching on one side and you can see a space on the other side.
Sometimes there is a nick on the rim, I touch it up and it slides in the gage like new ammo.
If I take a shell that does not quite fit into the gage (as described above) and chamber it into the pistol its fine because of the clearance in the chamber.
I am setting these aside to see if it will affect performance. My real question is were these shells distorted, perhaps by someone overcharging when they reloaded? The headstamps are mixed, Federal, Winchester, CCI etc. The rims are .476 in diameter. The area of the crimp is .472, my sizing dies are Lee carbide.

[NVcurmudgeon]

CT, for best results, your .45 ACP cases nust be sized full length. Once over that hurdle, be aware that ALL .45 ACP cases are shorter than standard when made, and tend to SHORTEN upon repeated firing. There was a tediously long discussion about the whys and wherefores on this board, but it doesn't really matter. I got my start loading the .45 in 1959, and load thousands every year, mostly semi wadcutter target loads. As others have said, the barrel hood is your best seating depth gauge. I use the old bullseye target shooter's trick of setting headspace by the shoulder, or ogive, of the boolit. Because of the short and variable case length, you can't control headspace with case length, as is "standard." Instead, using the barrel hood as your gauge, increase seating depth until the base of the case is exactly even with the hood. Boolits should be sized to .452". Sizing to .451" will make your ammo look like a snake that has swallowed a mouse, sizing larger than .452" will give you trouble with loose boolits. Expand case mouths ONLY enough to prevent seating of a .452" boolit without shavng lead. Taper crimp is the best for accuracy, leave roll crimps for revolvers. After taper crimping, case mouths should measure .470" outside.

[CT Kid]

I went back and checked my resized brass, just as D Mack sugested.
I could not find any cases that did not fit into the barrel or my gage after resizing.
I did find a few that had nicks from the extractor but once I filed them they were perfect.

When I made my first few rounds they were too long so I shortened them from 1.275 to 1.240 then they would cycle through my pistol 95% of the time.

I have a feeling I am making them too short and distorting the cases. I will do as suggested and use the barrel of the pistol as a gauge.

The bullet mold I am using (230 gr RN) has a gas check and the formed bullet has a lip where the rounded part of the bullet meets the lands or straight part.
(Sorry for the poor terminology) This was leaving rings of lead in my barrel when they were to spec length of 1.275. I will try and fit to my barrel and creep up on it to get the size that will work.

Thanks for all the help and advice!

[jcadwell]

Why are you using a gas check? Are you going for full house loads? Seems like extra money and time...

[Four Fingers of Death]

With autos I find that if you sort the brass to length and then compare groups with each length, you will find a length that is optimum for that gun. I then trim to that length and discard the shorter ones. Having siad that I have been shooting my 45acp revolvers and my 9mm and 38 super for awhile now without doing it, I'd better get on it, project number 498! Mick. Buy a box of premium ammo to use for cmparison testing, you may be doing better (or worse :-) ) than you think. Mick.

[D.Mack]

Maybe I need to stand corrected, I was under the impression that motor mica was aluminum oxide, I know it is sometimes called "white graphite," But if it isn't aluminum oxide, what is it?
....Georgeld, the only problem I can see, is if you seat the heavier (longer) bullets too deeply, the base of the bullet may be into the case where the brass is thicker, causing it to expand, and not chamber. The good news is you don't have to seat the bullet that deep, if your front band is small enough to enter the chamber mouth, you can ignore standard OAL and crimp them where they fit. ..DM

[Phil]

Not sure what Motor Mica is for sure (doesn't say on the can) but I do know it isn't aluminum oxide, which is an abrasive used in sandpaper.

Cheers,

Phil

[ron brooks]

Mica is a mineral. Usd to be used in large sheets for the windows in wood and coal burning stoves. Ground up, today it is used for rotary drilling rigs for the "Law of Circulation" which is used to bring up the 'waste" out of the drill hole.

Ron

[KYCaster]

Kid: A lot of good advice here, but it can be a bit overwhelming, can't it. If you're new to reloading there's a lot to learn, but the 45ACP is a good place to start cause it's probably the easiest cartridge to reload.

First, a few definitions: (please forgive me if this is too elementary, but you seem to be new at reloading)
HEADSTAMP is the lettering on the BASE of the CASE. When you put a primer, powder and bullet in the case, you've made a CARTRIDGE.
The bullet has a GAS CHECK SHANK at the back, a REAR DRIVING BAND, a LUBE GROOVE, a FRONT DRIVING BAND and a NOSE. The curve from the front driving band to the tip of the bullet is the OGIVE. The ogive can vary widely in shape and the common factory Full Metal Jacket is what Lee calls a 2R OGIVE.
There may be a slight SHOULDER at the junction of the front driving band and the ogive. If this shoulder is very pronounced then it's called a SEMI WADCUTTER.

You didn't say what brand of reloading dies you have. If it's a standard three die set, then you have a RESIZING DIE which also removes the old primer, a CASE MOUTH EXPANDING DIE and a BULLET SEATING/CRIMP DIE. For auto pistol ammo, you should also have a TAPER CRIMP DIE, which you need to purchase seperately.

I load about 25K 45ACP per year and I NEVER sort brass. There are some cases that won't go through my progressive press for various reasons and those get discarded during the loading process, not before.

To remove a lot of variables it's best to start with cases that won't cause any problems. Pick at least fifty brass cases (not NI plated) with R-P, WINCHESTER (not abreviated), FEDERAL(not abreviated), PMC, Star Line(*-*) or WW MATCH headstamps. This will eliminate any cases that could cause any problems.

You also didn't say what kind of reloading press you have, so these instructions are for a single stage press.
Raise the ram to its highest position and screw the resizing die down till it contacts the shell holder. Back the die out about one eighth of a turn and lock it down with the lock ring. Resize and deprime the cases.
Prime the cases with whatever method you choose.
Adjust the case mouth expanding die so the case will accept a bullet without shaving lead while seating the bullet.
Dispense the powder charge with whatever method you choose.
Put the bullet seating/crimp die in the press and back out the seating stem till it doesn't contact the bullet then adjust the die till it JUST REMOVES the case mouth bell, but does not crimp the case into the bullet. Now adjust the bullet seating stem till it seats the bullet to the proper length.
Put the taper crimp die in the press and adjust till the case mouth is .468-.470 dia.

Bullets that duplicate the factory FMJ profile should be seated to 1.250 Over All Length. Most bullets with a shoulder should be seated so the shoulder is 1/32 to 1/16 outside the case mouth.

Most functioning problems with 1911 style autos are caused by sizing, crimp and overall length. Follow the procedures outlined here and you shouldn't have any problems. Try this and when you have more questions, just ask.

Jerry