Winchester Brass

[mvpal]

I am not a purest. I have found all the accuracy that I need to vaporize vermin with the loads I have made using Winchester brass. About two weeks ago I picked up 200 cases and sat down to load them up today.

I looked in the primer pocket and found most every single flash hole double pierced or oval/dented. I opened the other bag and noticed the same thing and bag numbers were entirely different.

My first thought was what kind of quality control do they have? I have to assume that every so often they are visually inspected. Maybe not or maybe not often enough.

[Duker]

Recently ran into the same issue with a recent purchase of 100 - 223's. looked all over Winchester websites for a customer support link but didn't find a thing.

[fishnbob]

Same here. So I went and bought rem brass and by looks it appears higher quality. It even shoots better groups for me. Couple days ago I found some old dusty bags of ww brass on a discount shelf at Gander Mountain $20 a hundred I bought all 5 bags. These were all very nice quality and flash holes look nice and appear better then the rem brass. Now I have 1100 rem 204 and 700 204 ww brass just need to find the tim to do some loadin.

[mvpal]

Congrats on the discount purchase. For me, it is like finding cash laying on the ground. Makes my day when that happens.

When taking the brass back, I almost bought Remington but did not because I am such a cheap skate.

I loaded up 3 different concoctions last night with the Winchester and am going out today. Well see what happens.

[Wrangler John]

Don't worry about the flash hole diameter, or out of round condition, it won't make any difference. Flash holes can be drilled out to quite large diameters without any change in accuracy. The only thing that can make a difference to accuracy is the primer pocket depth as that sets primer seating depth. Severely off center flash holes can however make a mechanical difference as a depriming pin can be bent or broken. In the last batch of Lapua .22-250 brass I purchased there were a few distorted flash holes and one primer pocket so mangled the uniformer tool wouldn't work, so all manufacturers have culls that reach the market.

In days past, brass was packaged in 20 round boxes with trays that required hand packaging, hence more chances for visual inspection. Now it's just dumped into bags and probably inspected randomly or by computerized graphic inspection. It was rare to find a reject in those boxes, but an occasional off center flash hole was the exception.

I purchase .204 Ruger and .223 Remington brass in 1k case lots, the normal reject rate is around 2% for all brands. I suspect some sale lots are seconds, hence the good price. I discovered .223 Remington Privi Partisan brass to be of high quality and very consistent without the high number of rejects. Hornady .204 brass was the worse, but maybe they rectified the problem by now.

[Darkker]

The word on the street is that Winchester is "outsourcing" their production

[mvpal]

Don't worry about the flash hole diameter, or out of round condition, it won't make any difference. Flash holes can be drilled out to quite large diameters without any change in accuracy.

I hear that.

I dont want to buy factory retail brass and have to do extra work just to make it work. There was no small margin of failure here. Two different bags of 100 with two different lots numbers and more the 50% of them not up to par or requiring an extra step. I understand getting what you pay for but this variance is not listed on the package.

I will say that I returned both bags and traded them in for another lot from Winchester and had an excellent day on the range today.

The fact that those two bags were released in that bad of condition is just curious to me. My background works with QA in the technology industry.

It's funny actually. I bought 100 Speer TnT 32 grain seconds from a guy that gets them directly from the factory here in Idaho. While loading them I felt like I was wasting my time. I took out 4 different concoctions today which included ranging makes of bullets and sizes. The seconds from Speer plus Winchester brass using 27grns of Win 748 powder and Rem 6.5 SR primers put out half inch groups at 100 consistently. I did not even trim the factory brass either. (I just got lazy and wanted to see what would happen if I did not trim the cheap Winchester brass before putting up some groups. I normally take every step)

My observation as a relatively new to the game re-loader is that some of this information can get over analyzed and criticized for those that just want to go out clean up our lands from the virus infected vermin that plague us. I have come up with less than 1" groups at 100 with just about everything I have produced and that is more than acceptable for me. Maybe I just got lucky with my Thompson Encore that just loves to spit out anything that I have loaded including all of the way to hot stuff that I have regrettably punished it with while testing.

[jo191145]

mvpal

My suspicion is during the shortage on all ammo related supplies 4 years ago lots of stuff may have been packaged up without much QA.
Your background may object but when the factories are running at peak capacity the first thing to go is QC.

IMO you did the right thing returning them. The flashole is designed to allow only so much pressure to reach the primer which is the weak point.
Folks have reamed out Lapua primer holes to standard size in an attempt to create better ignition for slower burning powders. Personally I would'nt want to ream out a standard hole to oversized.

Rem 6.5??? If thats not a misprint I would suggest you stop using those in any modern cartridge such as the 204.
They're designed for low pressure turn of the century cartridges like the 22 Hornet, 25-20W etc.
You pop one of those thin primers in an Encore action and you may have a devil of a time breaking it open.

748 was always one of my favorites, good luck with the vermin.

[mvpal]

mvpal

Rem 6.5??? If thats not a misprint I would suggest you stop using those in any modern cartridge such as the 204.
They're designed for low pressure turn of the century cartridges like the 22 Hornet, 25-20W etc.
You pop one of those thin primers in an Encore action and you may have a devil of a time breaking it open.

748 was always one of my favorites, good luck with the vermin.

Thanks for this comment. As I said, I am new to reloading and I was not aware of that nice little fact about rem 6.5. I have never had a problem breaking my action with them however. Would they flatten easier than a recommended primer? I loaded up 32 grain v-max with 29 grains of 748. The Hornady book calls for 30.6 grains for max load so I figured using my encore, I was okay. I know I am only 6% back from max and recommended is 10%.

My question is; If the book shows a max load, wouldn't that mean there is a primer produced that will handle that load? Most of the loads that I am producing that are 10% off of max are flattening/cratering the primers. Is this because I am using the 6.5's?

What is suggested?

[Rick in Oregon]

What is suggested?

I'd suggest trying the Rem 7-1/2, the one I usually end up using in cartridges like the 204. Others to try would be the CCI 400 or BR4, Win WSR or the Federal 205 or 205M (Match). All of these primers are designed for high-intensity rounds like the 204. jo191145 is spot-on about the 6.5's...I only use them in my Hornet-based wildcats, as they're designed for lower pressure cartridges such as jo mentioned like the Bee, Hornet, etc.

[Hedge]

Rick -

I tried CCI 400s but was getting severe cratering even at moderate loads. Did some research and found that they're .005" thinner than the Rem 7/12 or BR4. James Calhoun did a paper on primers and pressure which indicated that the 400s were more of a 40,000 psi and under primer.

Or did you mean to type CCI450?

[Rick in Oregon]

Hedge....yep, you're right, should have been the CCI 450.

In regard to primers for the 223 family of varmint calibers, I've pretty much standardized on primarily the Rem 7-1/2, then the Fed 205M for everything from the .17M4 to my 204's and 223 Ackley; no cratering/blanking or undue flattening for all book loads.

[mvpal]

Rick -

I tried CCI 400s but was getting severe cratering even at moderate loads. Did some research and found that they're .005" thinner than the Rem 7/12 or BR4. James Calhoun did a paper on primers and pressure which indicated that the 400s were more of a 40,000 psi and under primer.

Or did you mean to type CCI450?

Thanks a bunch for pointing me in the direction of the article James wrote Hedge. Here it is for anyone curious if it is miraculously not already in this forum.

http://www.jamescalhoon.com/primers_and_pressure.php

I feel sort of silly after reading this. I was loading the 6.5's not realizing the critical difference. I bought a bunch on sale. I was starting to get frustrated with cratering and flattening on book loads with some examples 15% less than max. Now I see the light.

Thanks you guys!

[Hedge]

Mvpal -

Glad to help. I posted a link to Calhooun's article, here awhile back. Can't remember which topic, though. Doesn't hurt to have another.

No need to feel silly. It's just part of the learning experience. Consider yourself more knowledgeable, now.

Good thing is that you can probably sell them for a bit more than you paid.
I have a brick of them, myself, that I'm going to use for trading.

[mvpal]

Now for the big question.

I loaded up 40 of each of the following using the data from the Hornady book thinking the money I saved on the primers would work fine. After firing 2 groups of 3 each I was noticing cratering and flattening of the primer however the groups were less than half inch at 100. Do I pull the rest down (I hope not) or go ahead and fire them as they work great with exception what looks like being to hot?

Case: Winchester
Powder: 2520
Pwdr weight: 28grns (measured every one)
Case length: 1.840 (measured every one)
Bullet: Hornady 40gr V-Max
OAL: 2.38

Case: Winchester
Powder: 2520
Pwdr weight: 29grns (measured every one)
Case length: 1.840 (measured every one)
Bullet: Hornady 32gr V-Max
OAL: 2.38

The good news is that I learned a few good lessons here. 1 - when loading up something new, load up 12 or so test and decide from there. 2 - Use every single component the book calls for when sneaking up on max loads to start. 3 - Primer differences. That article was lifetime information and understanding including another technique for testing. 4- dont take information from your dad just because he knows more than I ever will when he is not paying attention or distracted.