SmallCaliberCentral

I was preping some new Win brass and decided to weigh the cases. I was surprised how much of a varience there was in weight of the brass. I was wondering how many people weight their brass and how much it improves accuracy to sort them by weight.

I weigh mine (WW) after full prep. Does it help? Dunno, but I would think ANY change would have to be for the good. Don't know if you debur flash holes, sometimes you can get a pretty big chunk shaved off that would have to effect powder ignition. By the time you do that and uniform primer pockets and trim to length and maybe clean up the necks a bit I suspect you will see the variance in weight tighten up quite a bit. With all these things having been done, the remaining variance in weight will also be a measurement in the difference in volume. That has to mean something. How much it means will always be pushed back and forth. Kinda like Cummins, Dura-Max, Power Stroke. I know which one I think is best, but I don't see the others broken down on the side of the road much either!

I don't weigh brass or bullets for PDs.Now when I have time,and want to see how tight a group a particular gun can shoot,,in addition to all the brass prep work,I'll sort by weight,and sort bullets by weight and ogive.I'm not a competition shooter.They do that all the time.

The only times I have ever noticed a difference when weight sorting was in 2 places. My 6.5X300WSM wildcat with a less than optimum powder, and at 1,000 yards with my .308. Under about 500 yards for me there is no practical difference. Yes in typical commercial cases you will find a rather large weight variation, but it doesn't necessarily mean volume difference. For my 1,000 yard stuff what is much better for me, is sorting by case capacity. Put your brass on a scale and use the tare function, then fill it with water. Sorting by actual capacity will give you(IME) a better consistency needed for very long ranges.

When I was first loading .204, I had nasty accuracy problems, so among all the stuff I started doing was evaluatiing brass, and part of the eval. was weight sorting. Nosler was tops, for consistency, followed very closely by Federal, and WAAAAAAAY behind was Hornady.

I was "fixing" so many things over that period, that at this point I can't say weighng brass made a difference in groups size. BUT it was one variable to get out of my poor aching head. I didn't like the idea that weight variation MIGHT equate to capacity variation

I think Darkker said it correctly about capacity, not weight, being the issue, and that weight variation dos not immediately indicate capacity variation. BUT!... even if I knew capacity was equal case-to-case, I still don't want to wonder what effect my brass weigt varience was having on accuracy.

weighing brass is OK if shooting for the # ONE , the main thing I run into is the type of brass MFG. keep the mfg.s in lots like Rem. Win. and so on, Norma brass has always been the best if your cal. falls in to what they make saw cut a win. and a norma brass half base & 1/2 " up and out and you will see the differance.
Problem that get worse each time you load brass is the PSI that makes the OAL of the brass longer, then one has to trim the brass back to std. AOL, in doing this several times makes the thickness of the OABrass get thinner each time you shoot them, so keeping the number of times you reload brass is good.
What I do, select 20, 40 or 50 brass clean, inspect. and over all work them ready to load with powder.
using a LYMAN 1200 digs. scale always same powder, tho I use Varget and loading 29.3 in as I type this loading New Win. brass when I dump the powder in 204 brass I always tamp it on wooden desk three times settling powder in case (a drop tube is also good) after loading all cases with same powder sitting in same tray then I select cases that are same level as the eye can see.
By this selection I complete the loads box and off too the bench.
Point is load one new case both of same MFG. and one case that has been shot three or more times same powder same weight and you will see what compression each case with have, making a differance in PSI , this is no bigee but is a DIFF. Just a reminder NEW BRASS should be neck sizied & deburred before seating bullet Hope this helps the Eagleye 1953 TC Encore 26" SS 1/4" at 88yds.

Like above as, it matters only if they are the same MFG. I buy 1000 pieces of LC brass and then weigh them into a single one grain lot (90.8-91.8gr). After I did the segragation I noticed my groups and pressures really evened out and tightend up. You only have to do it once and it's well worth the effort. ADam

We all sort this and that, weigh this and that, uniform things, turn necks until we cramp, carefully seat every primer, dribble powder in the scale pan until it kisses the zero mark, seat the bullet with a competition die and sit back to admire our work.

Then we shoot the stuff. Chances of having the chemical reaction after ignition going to exactly the same point is slim. Dang - why the flyer? Then we agonize over the chronograph readout. Crap, that load had a S.D. of 9 and an E.S. of 27 fps, so why is the group twice as large as the load with a S.D. of 75? Were those low S.D. bullets from the box I dropped on the floor?

Just as we begin to pack up, a little lady with a benchrest rifle painted in a Hello Kitty motif arrives and plunks out groups in the .1's with factory ammo. I really hate when that happens.

Wrangler John wrote:Just as we begin to pack up, a little lady with a benchrest rifle painted in a Hello Kitty motif arrives and plunks out groups in the .1's with factory ammo. I really hate when that happens.

LOL

Wrangler John wrote:Just as we begin to pack up, a little lady with a benchrest rifle painted in a Hello Kitty motif arrives and plunks out groups in the .1's with factory ammo. I really hate when that happens.

I picked up an old Diana air rifle from my father inlaw a few months back, shot okay, but then I watch my 8 year old niece pull the trigger for her first time. Couldn't believe it when she started calling her shots.

Sth Oz Dan wrote:

Wrangler John wrote:Just as we begin to pack up, a little lady with a benchrest rifle painted in a Hello Kitty motif arrives and plunks out groups in the .1's with factory ammo. I really hate when that happens.

I picked up an old Diana air rifle from my father inlaw a few months back, shot okay, but then I watch my 8 year old niece pull the trigger for her first time. Couldn't believe it when she started calling her shots.

You might want to start the "hello Kitty motif" about now!! LOL

btlbrn wrote:You might want to start the "hello Kitty motif" about now!! LOL

Might have to give her the Diana, and get me one o them Hello Kitty's if they're that good
Wouldn't be the nut behind the bolt would it

Wrangler, you're a genius....
Shot this group about 3 months ago....5@100yds.

Four different brands of brass; (neck sized with .224 bushing)
(2) Federal's (98.4 gr. & 98.9 gr.)
(1) Remington (95.8 gr.)
(1) Hornady (101.7 gr.)
(1) Winchester (98.3 gr.)
Wanted to see how much of a difference there might be..
My best group to date is this,from a rag-tag fleet of miscellaneous brass.
I keep my brass segregated by brand. A box of 50 rides together to the end.
26.8 IMR8208/40gr .Vmax/Rem 7 1/2....measurements were taken with primers

Shtnrise, I should report your post and have you banned! That group, with that mish-mash of ammo, makes a complete liar out of me. Please repeat that test several times and report back. BTW, is that a factory rifle w/ a 1:12" twist? Even more remarkable as many rifles do NOT shine with the 40gr V-Max!

That is with a factory rifle/barrel.... (Savage Model 10 max-1,24 in. 1:12)

My two best groups (39's &40's) are with Vmaxes... They are a little inconsistant for me though.. 39BK's (with a healthy dose of 8208) are more consistant in my gun...
I have another post (CFEtooslow4me) that has Nosler and Remington(39BK's) brass groups... I never weigh my brass or bullets..
Probably doesn't make a lot of sense after purchasing Redding Competition dies.... Thx!