Dedicated brass for cast bullet load

T

tangolima

New member
I practice segregated brass for lighter rifle loads with cast bullets. Those brass are for cast bullets only, never to be used for jacketed bullet load again.

The reason is headspacing. Firing pin strike bumps back the shoulder, while the light charge lags the pressure to blow it back.

Are there other reasons not to mix brass for cast bullets with those for jacketed bullets?

I come across a rifle that seems to have short chamber. I can't lower the sizing die any further, and yet the brass still can't chamber. When I tried the cast bullet brass, it worked. It didn't seem to have excessive headspace clearance either. Now I'm tempted. Should I use those cast bullet brass to load jacketed bullets for this rifle? Headspacing doesn't seem to be a problem here.

Your inputs and comments are much appreciated.

-TL
 
The only caliber that I sort cases for lead bullets and cases for jacketed bullets is 9mm.

The reason is that I bought a bunch of once fired mixed brass and found that those with FC on the headstamp proved to be thinner at the mouth. Since I shoot bullets sized to 0.357" in my 9s, the thinner mouths accept the oversized cast bullets better.

To remedy your case to chamber fit, I suggest you try Mr. Guffey's method of using a feeler gauge between the shell holder and the case. This will push the case a teeny bit further into the sizing die. Start with maybe a 0.005" feeler gauge and go more or less until you have a case that fits to the chamber.

I call it Mr Guffey's method because he is the one member of TFL that mentions this method many times.
 
And if that doesn't work, sand a little off the top of the shellholder.
You could cut the die mouth but shellholders cost less.
 
Thanks guys. But I am afraid the discussion may have been slip off a tangent a little. I have a few tricks to bump the shoulder back further. No problem there.

Rather I am curious about reusing the brass that have been exclusively for cast bullet loads. It is more out of curiosity than necessity.

-TL
 
The reason is headspacing. Firing pin strike bumps back the shoulder, while the light charge lags the pressure to blow it back.
Click to expand...
If that is happening, don't you want to fire the brass in regular load after a few reduced loads to bring back the length!
 
I think the conventional wisdom is that the cast bullet brass could have developed such excessive headspace in the same rifle that a full load with jacketed bullet would lead to head separation. And hence the brass segregation. In other words, you just keep on firing light loads with cast bullets and ignore the headspace. Pressure is low so no concern on head separation. Theoretically the head clearance could eventually be so much that misfires start to happen. You then retire the batch and start over. At least that's how I understand it.

In this case, though, the rifles are not the same. There is no headspace concern.

Did I misunderstand and miss anything? That's the question.

-TL
 
I think that TL is concerned about stretching the shortened case near the base, approaching a case separation, if fired with a jacketed bullet and a full load. That seems like a possibility. I presume that the cases have been measured before and after firing with the light loads and the reduction in case length has definitely been verified and all cases determined to have been shortened. However maybe some are and some aren't, requiring that all cases need to be checked for length and segregated. I recently ran a case length check on a high number of '06 cases and what made the job fast and easy was the use of a Wilson Headspace gauge which is actually a case length gauge.

I have loaded a good number of cast bullets in several rifle calibers and have not noticed any potential problems when later switching the cases to jacketed bullets. All of my cast bullet loads are with a max load of Trail Boss powder but they seem fairly potent and probably wouldn't result in a case reduction as reported by TL. About all of the '06 cases, before and after sizing, were within limits except for just a few needing very light trimming.

So if TL's cases continue to be a problem, I would be inclined to measure them all after sizing and not use the shortened cases for full loads.
 
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I didn't really measure every brass. In fact I don't own a gauge. I use the rifle chamber.

The said rifle, an Egyptian Hakim in 8mm Mauser, won't close the action with any of the 5 brass I took out of the jacketed bullet bin, all sized with the sizing die all the way down. The bottom of the die is touching the top of the shell holder with a brass in the die. Can't go any lower. But the action closes with ease with all 5 sized brass from the cast bullet bin.

So far as I read, there doesn't seem be concerns "recalling" cast load brass back to jacketed loads, other than potential headspacing.

I'm not going to do it anyway. Those cast bullet brass had been through as least 15 firings with jacketed bullets before they "semi retired" into cast bullet load duty. They are "tired".

I have fixed the problem by grinding 0.02" off the bottom of the die. I ended up lowering the die 0.01". That includes the extra head clearance for an auto loader. No problem there.

Thanks much everyone.

-TL
 
But the action closes with ease with all 5 sized brass from the cast bullet bin.
Click to expand...
The reduced load does not have enough energy to expand the brass to fully fill the chamber, not necessarily mean shorter.
 
So it could be thinner (less in diameter). I compared the head diameters. They were almost the same. When dropped in the Hakim's chamber, neither seemed limited by chamber diameter. I could wriggle it in all directions very slightly. I am quite certain the length (from shoulder to the head) is the difference.

-TL
 
"...reason is headspacing..." No such thing. Headspace is a rifle manufacturing tolerance only. Excessive headspace has nothing whatever to do with the case either.
There's no reason to separate brass between cast and jacketed.
"...touching the top of the shell holder with a brass in the die..." It's without a case in the die.
With the Hakim, check the case lengths and OAL of your loaded ammo. That you FL resized, of course.
 
Although I try hard to follow the purists' terminology, sometimes I still fail to distinguish headspace to head clearance in my wording. My bad. What I meant is I would have excessive head clearance.

The Hakim couldn't close action on a sized brass. The rifle's headspace is too short?

Thanks for the comments on the cast bullet brass. I take it as another yes vote. Yes: OK to use cast bullet brass for jacketed bullet, if there is no excessive HEAD CLEARANCE.

-TL
 
In rifle's I shoot military case's. I've never found a military case other than some LC Match that worked well with jacketed bullet's. I recently got some once fired 308 case's and they were all LC05 case's, trying 20 in my 243 to see what happens.

With the cast bullet's, a load that won't expand the case can be uped a bit and get it there, 13grs of Red Dot in my 30-06 expands the case. Easy to tell if it doesn't, the case will be blackened down past the shoulder, up the charge a bit!

In hand gun's I've never had any military cases but I don't sort by brand either. I don't shoot a handgun well enough to make a reasonable decision on how good the load really is. I was shooting my 32 Long some years ago with 90gr cast bullet's and a light charge of fast powder, you can't get it any more. At about 20", bit more or less, I was shooting it into a downed log and the bullets actually bounced off and came back and hit me. Come to think, I've known a lot of guy's that hoot handguns in my life but don't know on that can shoot even a 3" group at 100 yds! I don't think special dedicated brass would help!
 
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