brass options

[snipersam]

Looking at getting brass for the future, choices are Winchester, norma, and nosler. nosler being more money than norma, and Winchester being cheapest. How is norma?

I left out Remington. for a reason. I bought 400 originally and they were fine. This was many many years ago when the 204 first came out. A few years ago I bought another 300. Many had mangled necks, they dipped down on one side, and measure thin on that side. A trimming or 2 makes it square, but the neck thickness is all over the place. I'm pretty sure that is the reason I had runout issues with that brass.

[Duker]

I use Norma in one 204 and Nosler in the other to keep them separated. It's my understanding the Norma is the maker of the Nosler 204R brass. It's very good stuff.

[RAMOS]

I agree with Duker. Norma/Nosler should put you into some real nice 204R brass. All of mine is WW and about eight or nine years old. It's been, and still is, great. However, most everything I have heard about WW 204R brass in the last two years has led me to believe that the quality has become much less than what it was in the past. I would pay the Norma/Nosler price in exchange for much, much better odds of being happy for years to come.

[Roach68]

Winchester hasn't produced stand alone .204 brass since around 2013ish

[Darkker]

Winchester hasn't produced stand alone .204 brass since around 2013ish

Winchester sold all production capacity MUCH longer ago than that. Anything with a Winchester name, is least-cost bidding my whomever; stamped with the name on the head.

[Silverfox]

snipersam--When I bought my first Savage 12VLP in .204 Ruger I bought 200 Hornady factory 32 gr. cartridges and 60 Hornady factory 40 gr. cartridges. The Hornady brass served me well, but I have read where many folks have had lots of problems with necks on their brass cracking. I bought some used Hornady brass and the primer pockets were so tight I couldn't get my primer pocket cleaner in them.

I've never used Remington brass.

When WW started making .204 Ruger brass available I started buying up lots of it. I retired my Hornady brass and used WW brass until I found out about Nosler .204 Ruger brass several years ago. I was a bit disappointed when I measured the length of the new Nosler brass and found that it only measured from 1.830" to 1.832" which is well under the 1.842" Trim to Length recommended in my reloading books. The necks on .204 Ruger brass are quite short to begin with and the Nosler brass is about .010+ shorter than the Trim to Length. That being said, the uniformity of the Nosler brass is very good and I get excellent accuracy. I do turn the necks on my Nosler brass.

I currently have three .204 Ruger rifles and use WW in one, Nosler in another and Norma in the third one. The Norma brass measures 1.842" in length and I just started using it this past summer. It, like the Nosler brass, is very uniform and I have only turned the necks on five casings to check how that affected accuracy. It didn't seem to make any discernible difference, but it was only a small test sample. The casings I have reloaded and fired have given me excellent accuracy. I'm debating if I should turn the Norma brass necks just for obtaining more uniform neck tension, but my rifle shoots very accurately without neck turning so far.

I would definitely recommend both the Nosler and the Norma brass, with the Norma brass being my #1 choice.

[Bill K]

Am I wrong in that I have heard Norma makes Nosler's brass for them. Or has Nosler began making their own now ? Bill K

[Silverfox]

Rick in Oregon should be able to tell us of Norma makes brass for Nosler. What say you Rick???

[Darkker]

Norma did make Nosler brass for them. When they bought Silver State that gained them ability to produce cases, just don't know if they changed over yet or not.

[truckerwalt]

nosler brass cost me $92.00 per 100 a year ago. I could buy 100 loaded rounds of hornady for $80.00 at that time.

[Silverfox]

truckerwalt--I know the Nosler brass is quite a bit more expensive than the Norma brass. Back in late 2009, I purchased 150 of the Nosler factory 2nds and 100 of the Nosler firsts. The factory seconds seem to be every bit as good as the firsts (in my humble opinion), but at quite a cost savings. That being said, I will stop buying the Nosler brass and continue to purchase Norma .204 Ruger brass if I ever need more. I purchased 300 Norma .204 Ruger brass casings early in 2012 and I paid $61/100 for that Norma. I checked online a minute ago at Bullets.com and they have .204 Ruger Norma brass for $67.16 per 100 plus $9.95 for shipping. They seem to be every bit as good as the Nosler first brass (again, in my humble opinion) and I think they are less expensive than the Nosler factory seconds.

The Nosler firsts and Nosler seconds I purchased have been used in my Savage Target action right bolt/left port in .204 Ruger. I have fired those casings 3 times each and then I annealed them. In addition to those Nosler casings, I was able to purchase 200 once-fired Nosler first casings for $55.16 per 100 from a friend of mine. I thought that was a pretty good bargain and the seller had gone through the process of measuring and recording the concentricity of the brass and placed them in three different casing holders according to how much they were out of round.

[ClaimJumper]

http://www.grafs.com/retail/catalog/cat ... goryId/614?

Graf's has Nosler Brass 100 for 44$

Norma and Nosler are the best.

[17hm2lover]

I have heard on this site that Hornady .204R brass is not liked very well. I have been reloading .204R for my spring shooting and decided to compare some brass I have. Norma, Remington, and Hornady is what I have right now. After prepping the brass to load, I scaled a 100 or so cases to see the weight difference. Hornady was the heaviest, then Norma, and last was Remington as the lightest. 10 grains difference in weight between Hornady and Remington. Now weight spread within the same brands, Hornady was 4.0 grains high to low, Norma was 1.5-2.0 grains, and Remington was 1.0-1.5 grains. If I am shooting for groups, I want my brass within .5 grains of each other in 100 lots. I have also noticed over the years that Remington brass is a very soft brass, from .223 to 8mm Remington mag. I get more reloads from Remington brass than any other brand. That said, I try to gather enough brass so I don't have to reload during shooting season. A 1000 or so per calber, per rifle will usually do. I have a bolt .204R, bolt .223, a T/C in .222 Remington, and 2 AR's in .223. I reload brass for AR .223's twice and then move them over to the bolt rifle so I have fewer case stretch problems. Bolt guns get neck sized brass and AR's get full length sized. The .223 brass that case necks crack get recycled, cut down and formed into .300 AAC Blackout.

[LanceM]

I've seen a couple people asking about resizing 204 to 300 blackout. There aren't many people that have tried it, and I haven't seen anyone post that they've tried it and shot it, and that it worked. I did it. It worked. I even wrote an article about it, if you want to read how a novice reloader thinks. So, if your 204s or your 223s get case neck cracks, they work just fine for 300aac blackout. When I pay for brass I like to get as much use as I can out of it. Keep sendin it y'all.
https://apocalypticprepping.com/convert ... -blackout/

[Bill K]

Read through your post and attachment. But did not see, after you cut down the 223 or 204 case, where you obtained your forming die/s to size the case into the 308 neck and form the shoulder for the 300 case.