5.56 brass

R

rebs

New member
I have been collecting 5.56 and 223 brassfrom our club range and bought some once fired processed brass, the problem is that if the crimp has been removed you don't know how many times they have been reloaded. I have bought some processed LC brass that the necks on some split on the first firing. Plus its a pain in the neck to keep track of all the different brands and head stamps. I have brass in zip bags, cans and containers all over the place. It has gotten to the point of being a headache, lol
I have decided to buy some new LC 5.56 brass. It will be all the same year date and head stamp so all I have to keep track of is how many times I reloaded it. No crimp, no need to trim to length. Just chamfer, deburr, run it through the sizer die and load. I turned 70 yo last month and it is time to simplify things some. Eliminate the work of processing brass and just enjoy reloading it and shooting it. I am also going to buy some new Starline 38 and 357 mag brass. For my 45 acp brass I get it from a state trooper who is a training officer and I know it is all once fired and all the same brand.
Is anyone else buying new brass ?
 
Nah...I'm just sixty and can still bend over enough to pick leavings. Only takes three days to recover. Maybe when I get older...
 
Even with new brass, unless you can catch it all, you still have to bend over to pick it up. I mostly buy new brass so I can sort the best out for match shooting before I even start using it. It's rainy day work and it probably makes little difference most of the time, but it's one less variable to consider if there's a problem. And it lets me track the load history of the brass and keep like-condition brass with like-condition brass.
 
I love once fired mil surp type brass. Always know it's only fired once. It is a bit of a pain to process, cleaning, trimming, removing pier crimp etc. But a couple weeks of doing it a couple hours a day will leave you with a big Ile of clean sized brass ready to load and shoot. I always trim new brass too.
 
I picked one brand ( LC ) that is what I use
got 1000 once fired and processed them, I now have plenty

still pick up, save and process the rest and sell to
the others at the range ( use the money for loading supplies )

I now anneal so I do not have to keep track of number of times fired
 
How do you mark it so you can track it. ?

"And it lets me track the load history of the brass and keep like-condition brass with like-condition brass. "

Or are you one of those people that are really good at labeling things and keeping them sorted out?
 
Nah...I'm just sixty and can still bend over enough to pick leavings. Only takes three days to recover. Maybe when I get older...
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Yea that's me.

If you look at people that are shooting, its semi auto 223 and they don't reload.

Its all pretty much once fired.

You could go wrong, but odds say no.

Or pick it up after they leave.

Pick up enough to keep you happy, match the mfg, recycle the rest.
 
I buy new Starline brass for .45colt, .357magnum and (from another supplier) .45 cowboy specials (.45 colt at .45ACP length). for .223 and .38 special I buy once fired brass. The .38 special, I shoot a LOT, is just polish then load, but the .223 needs processing. I'm only 62. But, to be honest, I'm rethinking the processing thing...I told my kids just the other day (Christmas, actually), 60 is the new 40. So I'm really only 42.:D
 
Or are you one of those people that are really good at labeling things and keeping them sorted out?
Click to expand...

I am , I to use zip-loc bags for brass and keep them separate when loaded . So when I shoot I generally only take one head stamp with me so when I pick it up I know what it is and where it goes to keep separate .

Although I just bought and started using a 200ct lot of Lapua brass I almost exclusively use LC brass . I've found most modern LC 5.56 cases ( LC-10 through LC-16 ) are pretty close to the same . I buy them in 500ct lots and have several thousand I'm cycling through . LC-14 seem pretty good in 223 but I don't like the LC-14 308 brass . I just prepped 750 LC-16 cases and will start loading it soon . Hoping it will be good to go .
 
at 70 yo with a bad shoulder and torn bicep on the other arm and a bad back I just don't feel like sitting and processing brass. I would rather be loading and shooting. Plus I bought once fired processed and some of them split the neck on the first firing. Now I am buying brand new brass and shooting more
 
I'm 76 and still am a range rat. It's been a good week for me. On Monday I picked up 100 9mm cases that were left. On Tuesday a guy and his sons were shooting his Xmas present Glock 36 and left 200 .45 ACP cases I scored. Yesterday I got 75 .40 cases that a guy shooting an M&P left.

As far as 223/556 cases I bought a bag of 500+ processed once fired for sixty bucks and 500 PMC Bronze rounds last year for my new AR to get me started. Guys at the club say they reload theirs 10X safely so I should be good for a while.
 
I quit sorting brass for the most part,
Once fired or new are seperated, the rest get run and inspected.
When it fails inspection, it's scrap weight.

With annealing, it's usually pulled rims or dents/gouges that get culled, the occasional neck crack.
Since I don't find any real difference in accuracy when properly prepared I couldn't justify all the sorting & bother.

Once fired 5.56 brass is dirt cheap, several large government auctions lately,
I've seen it for as cheap as 3 cents each.
Good time to pick up raw NATO brass if you don't mind the processing.
 
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RC20,

Plastic storage bins are your friend. Assign one to each rifle and keep its brass in there. Gallon plastic zipper bags keep fired and cleaned and any that's in various stages of preparation separate. If you need to label something "Match", you can write on the bag with a Sharpie. You can just use hashmarks to keep up with the number of reloads. You've just got to go to the bin with your recovered brass.

I picked up the habit of labeling in school, where I started out majoring in chemistry. However, I am enough of a slob that I found out I need to buy a good supply of Sharpies and have one in every bin, or I won't be able to lay hands on them when I need them.

For one year in the mid-1990's, I took a cheap automatic centerpunch with a wimpy spring and loosened the knob until even that strike was minimized, then added a small punch mark to every case I brought back from a match right around the headstamp perimeter. I didn't bother tracking my practice brass. I don't like that for precision bolt rifle (half moa or better), but for the Service Rifle matches, the M1A didn't seem to care. You could also mark the bottom of the extractor groove that way, which even the bolt gun couldn't tell, and I can't think why I didn't do that for the gas gun other than it's quicker to glance at the bottom of a case than roll it around to spot the right place in the extractor groove. One good feature of this kind of marking is you can always ask the fellow on the next firing point to keep an eye out for the punch marks so you don't accidentally swap brass with him.

I dropped the centerpunch practice because of the time it took, but it worked pretty well. Dumping into a plastic bag is faster, though.
 
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