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Posted: 4/24/2004 6:59:12 PM EDT
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Brand new to AR's. Bought an Armalite M15 SPR. I've buzzed through 80rds of Winchester white-box & 20rds of UMC. Ordered 1000rds of Wolf Laquered, 1000rds of Wolf Polymer, and 1000rds of Federal "Lake City" XM193. I may very well reload someday. What's a good brand of ammo for saving brass to reload? What should I expect to pay? Where should I order from? Thanks, Mike |
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Save your Federal brass, it will need to have the crimps removed but is good brass. To buy once fired brass, check the link below, I don't have any personal experience with them but I have heard they are OK. RVO brass |
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The LC will be the WORST brass to reload!!!! It's hot ammo, thus you'll certainly need to trim the case! AND you'll have to fuck with the GOD DAMNED primer crimp!!! UMC is the BEST brass to reload! Not very hot and no primer crimp. When I reload once-fired UMC I don't have to trim the case at all. And it is in spec!! |
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Keep the Winchester White box and the UMC for your reloads. I can't offer advice on the XM193, but the primers will be crimped. Throw all the Wolf brass (steel) in a bucket. You won't touch that again unless you need a paperweight or indian bead necklace or somthing. Good brass: R-P 223 REM - Remington Commercial WINCHESTER 223 REM - Winchester Commercial PMP 223 REM - PMP Commercial HORNADY 223 REM - Hornady Brass Bad Brass: Anything Berdan Primed! - Can't be reloaded Wolf - berdan primer Silver Bear - berdan primer SA surplus (battlepack ammo) - berdan primer FCC 223 REM - Federal Commercial (weak brass) S&B 223 REM - Sellier & Bellot (weak brass) OK Brass: Guatemalean Surplus - Reloadable and quality but you need an extra thin decapper, and a 5/64th drill bit to enlarge the flash hole WCC ## - Good quality but you need to remove primer crimp before repriming. LC ## - Good quality but you need to remove primer crimp before repriming. Black Hills uses LC brass extensively in their Blue Box line. These cases have already been loaded 2 times by the time you get your empties. The primer crimps have likely been removed for you though. Save this OK stuff for a rainy day. The necessary tools to process these cases are cheap but take time and energy. They only need processed once. Remember, ALL brass needs to be FL resized and checked for length before loading the first time. |
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Lake City brass is some of the best brass in the world, as the military requirements for it are very high. Reloaders generally try to get all of the LC brass they can. As others have pointed out, you DO have to deal with the primer crimp in order to reload it, and that is a hassle, unless you buy once-fired, processed brass from someone like River Valley Ordnance or Scharch. Otherwise, the best solution is to pony up the $75-80 and buy a Dillion Super Swage. This is a manual swaging tool that duplicates what the multi-million-dollar arsenal reloading machines do with the primer crimp. It's faster and easier than cutting the crimp out and is technically a better solution as well (no loss of surface area holding the primer). Otherwise, Torf has it right. Remember, the only good Federal rifle brass is the stuff that comes out of Lake City. Anything actually stamped Federal or FC is crap, and possibly dangerous to reload. -Troy |
I can't give that stuff away quick enough! I hate the extra two steps in processing it. It may be good brass, but my headspace guage shows it really stretches from the hotter mil loads. |
Wolf is steel cased with boxer primers in 223. Great throw away cases is you decide to re-load for someone else that will not save their brass, or if you end up shooting in a area that you can not collet your spent cases. You will get only one reloading out of the steel cases, and the poly coating will be worn in spots, so keep the ammo dry or the cases will rust. |
| I ordered brass from Scharch, and I was very happy with it. It was resized, trimmed to length, and the primer crimp removed. The brass was processed Lake city brass with the majority of it 00, 01 headstamp. You could also post this in the reloading section of the General discussions forum for additional info. Goodluck! |
| I bought from River Valley Ordnance and 3500 rds later-it's all good! The brass was extremely cleaned and polished. Trimmed to correct size. No primer seating problems. It was 99.9% Lake City. But,I saw a few odd balls. I would highly recommend them. They're so nice that I don't want to shoot it! |
All the Wolf ammo I ever shot was Berdan primed, steel cased. The newer stuff may be oxer primed like you are saying. I wouldn't reload the steel cases anyway, nor would I advise anyone to do it. Safe handloading practices dictates that Steel cases and Aluminum cases must be seperated from brass before loading. If you have figured out a safe way to reload steel, then more power to you. Apparently some have had sucess in reloading the polymer cased ammo that has recently been discussed. |
I will gladly take any off your hands AND pay shipping!  |
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