45 Mag Brass for 45acp shotshells

[sparky45]

Anyone using 45 mag brass to convert to make 45 acp shotshells? Would there be any down side to using it, such as headspace problems, ect.?
S45

[frankenfab]

Been wanting to do it myself. I'm sure it would work well.

[Mk42gunner]

It should work just fine. I remember looking at the case length a day or two after I got done trimming some excess .243 brass and it is supposed to be within a thousandth of an inch or two compared to what I trimmed mine to.

Frugal person that I am; I haven't bought any to try it, and won't until my homemade brass wears out or is lost.

Robert

[sparky45]

Just tried some this morning and got mixed results. The only problem I encountered was when I was finishing by trying to put a roll crimp on the brass. Seems the 45 Mag brass is thinner than cut down 308 brass and all I got was a crumpled neck. What I did do, however, is to apply nail polish to the top to seal it and keep the GC in place. They chamber fine, but I think I have effectively a single shot round for my 1911. These would probably work fine in my 45LC/45ACP Super Blackhawk, but without the rounded crimp on the loads, I don't think they would chamber. They do cycle the action and pattern well, but I'll probably be going back to 308 conversions.
S45

[reed1911]

I've made shot shells for years using 45WM brass, works perfect for me. I charge them, drop a .44cal GC on top of the powder, neck them down, drop the shot on top, put a .375GC on top of the shot and I star crimp. The cycle when shooting and eject cleanly shot or un-fired.

[sparky45]

Ron, what do you use to get the star crimp? That's what I was wanting to do but I don't have the tooling.

[reed1911]

CH4D (among others) makes a die just to do this. The set I have includes the die to neck the brass down as well. The added benefit is that if you swage, you can also use the same star crimp die to notch bullets for the XTP type HP.

[sparky45]

Thanks Ron; I'll check into those dies.
S45

[curator]

I did this a few years ago when I was dealing with snakes along the canals I was treating for weeds. I found the .45Mag brass has a much smaller extraction groove compared to regular .45ACP brass and chambering them bent the extractor on my GI 1911s .45. They worked OK in m Llama X1 "beater" because it has a different kind of extractor.

[sparky45]

I'll keep that in mind when using them in my Taurus 1911

[Ervin]

Terrible waste of rare 45 WM brass. Yes I have done it and it works great with RCBS dies. I now use 243 Win brass but you will need a 45 inside neck reamer. Works good for me because I also make 45 WM brass and 451 Detonics from 243 win.

[reed1911]

45WM brass is easy to find, Both Starline and Top Brass make it and generally have it available.

[mannyCA]

I've done 45 shotshells using 308 brass and some dies you may already have on hand. Simple.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CaGzIk3azNo