Dillon Primer Pocket Swager Dilemma

[FISH4BUGS]

I use a Dillon swage on all my military brass - 223 and 308, and load it on a Dillon 550. Rather than sort the brass, I just tumble it all, decap and size, trim and swage everything. It doesn't take all that long to swage and it makes sure I don't miss anything.
Since I shoot machine guns, I use up a LOT of brass. I have been prepping 223 and 308 and have worked my way through a bunch in brass prep. Thousands of cases that have been prepped are being loaded now and shot.
I went shooting the other day and of course picked up all my brass. The bad thing is that there was a lot of other brass (not all my perfectly prepped brass :-P ) that got mixed in. There were some people shooting next to me that gave me all their 223 brass and being the brass ***** that I am, I didn't turn them down. I have no shame when it comes to picking up brass.
I began to wonder - what is the downside of swaging all this brass again? Other than the perceived waste of time to swage military brass that might already be swaged, I wonder if there is any down side to doing that. There is a mix of once fired military, swaged and fired twice (or more) military and commercial brass.
Can you "stretch" a primer pocket by swaging again and again? It is a set die that can't really stretch the brass unless improperly adjusted I would think. I guess that if I don't set the swage too deep, it can't really hurt....can it?
Seems to me that the Dillon 1050 swages all the brass....so some must be swaged again and again......
Anyone with experience in swaging brass again and again?
Thanks for the info!

[joesig]

Every time you size brass you are swaging (cold forming) it. If you take a case and resize it five times in a row without firing it, do you think you harm it? Once you have displaced the brass, you are done.

Besides, doesn't the pocket swage mainly work the crimp ring and leave the rest of the pocket pretty much as is?

I would think you do more "damage" to a pocket by firing it than swaging it.

[Bayou52]

Once the primer crimp is swaged open, re-insertion of the swage spud should have zero effect.

Bayou52

[Outpost75]

No harm in double-swaging. I run multiple 5 gallon buckets of '06 for a group of guys who all shoot M1s, and they throw new range pickup brass into the buckets and it takes less time to swage and trim everything everytime than it does to sort and pick through it.

Do also clean primer pockets under power, so primers are always seated into a clean pocket. However, I always prime by hand and any cases with loose primer pockets (all Federal!) get thrown into a boltgun bucket and get stained to keep them separate, using them only with cast bullet gallery loads for the 03A3s we use for Appleseed classes.

[LUBEDUDE]

Dillon 1050's Swage everytime at station 3 (2nd die station), I have cases that have been run through and re-swaged at least a dozen times. The primers still hold tight.

[FISH4BUGS]

Well....thanks gang. I just wanted to prevent myself from doing something stupid. It wouldn't be the first time!

[ballistim]

I had a problem recently where I made an error in adjustment on my Dillon swager & set it up wrong after switching from small primer for 9mm to LP for 7.62x51 & now 100 cases have primers pockets that are overswaged & I also hand prime so felt that new primers seated too easily. I've sealed the primers with sealant cement & will do as Outpost75 has suggested & relegate them to gallery loads. Wish I knew a way to recrimp the pocket on these ones!

[Walter Laich]

this will tighten primer pockets:
http://www.rwhart.com/store/proddetail.asp?prod=dhb-f-swage-lg

[LUBEDUDE]

this will tighten primer pockets:
http://www.rwhart.com/store/proddetail.asp?prod=dhb-f-swage-lg

That's good to know. I've only seen this tool for Shotshells.

[oley55]

this will tighten primer pockets:
http://www.rwhart.com/store/proddetail.asp?prod=dhb-f-swage-lg

good grief, wish I knew about this before. I over swaged and had to toss a bunch of cases a while back.

[9mmsubgun-m11]

Good info. Have been wandering about this for a while. While not reloading rifle yet I may get a Dillon swager and begin processing some of the brass I have on hand just for something to do.

[ballistim]

this will tighten primer pockets:
http://www.rwhart.com/store/proddetail.asp?prod=dhb-f-swage-lg

I never knew about this, thanks!