Review: GWT Brass - 338LM

I appreciate your info about GWT Lapua brass. Any further updates would be great.

I called GWT yesterday and spoke with them about their brass quality and lathe-turned Predator bullet. They said their 338 GWT brass was getting better results than Lapua (hard to imagine). I'm waiting for them to email a quote for ordering direct, but they said 338 Lapua brass is 90¢ each. I'll place an order next week and do some testing to see how many reloads I get before primer pockets get loose. $90 per 100 for 338 Lapua brass seems too good to be true, but we'll see.

I stumbled upon GWT by accident while looking for Lapua brass.

While cliche, consistency is king, especially in the LR and ELR shooting world.

I'm down the road from you in the Tyler area. Are you familiar with North TX PRC? I've shot with them a few times. Great group of shooters.

I moved my review of GWT 338LM brass to its own thread as it was getting rather large.

https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/go-west-trading-gwt-338lm-brass-test.851739/

dredd said:

Did you ever receive your Brass?

I have heard of NTX PRC, but have not shot with them.

I was shooting on lease property, but they sold it.

I'm trying to get some distance setup in the Mexia area right now.
There is a "roll" in the property that is going to dictate some sort of tower or platform to reach 1,000 yards.

Click to expand...

Mexia? That’s a town I’ve only heard of twice in 15 years. I lived there for four years! I made a solo trip back in 2013 on my motorcycle to visit old family friends and to just explore. It has changed some, but not much.

I’m intrigued to know the numbers after pre-loaded, virgin brass. What is consistency like after loading, firing, loading? How many firings can be expected? (5-20 seems a giant range, even with the caveat “it depends how you treat it”.) Velocity numbers, etc. etc.

While not. 338LM shooter myself, I do have some friends that would likely want to know the answers!

Thanks for doing the testing, y’all!

*************************update 5/20/2019*************************
Updated my original post to reflect the latest testing data. GWT brass is doing good so far.

Gentlemen,
I shot a 338 Lapua Improved chambering for several years in long range BR competition back in late '90s and early 2000's. I have been able to extract some if not all of my data from my old database for my case measurements. I have them posted below for your reference as you test out this GWT brass and give it something to compare to.
All I know is that all of the Lapua brass I have and shot out 2 barrels with it... it is still going with no issues. I have 20+ reloading on some of it. The Norma brass is/was softer. I couldn't shoot full house rounds for the first couple of loads. But after 3 or so firings the brass was work hardened enough to where they wouldn't stretch as bad. You will see for Lot#3 Norma brass that I actually measured all cases before any prep and then after full prep. Notice the difference. Or more accurately said... look at the lack of difference!

One suggestion I would give is rather than try to find entire batches of brass and compare the numbers when going for all out accuracy for LR work is to measure your entire batch of cases and record those weights with a reference number of 1 through 100 (assuming a batch of 100 cases). Then sort the weights in a spreadsheet from lightest to heaviest. You can now renumber is each case with a magic marker from 1-100. Then you can shoot the case in batches of 10 to 15 cases and your case consistency will be really really good. Normally a batch of 10 or 15 cases sorted this way will only vary .3 or .4 gr. But you will need to find what works for you and your shooting/reloading process.
Also I would pay attention to the wall thickness variation down near the case head. Variation here will sometimes show up in neck thickness variation but not always. But it will always show up in banana shaped cases after a couple of firings. i.e. the reason for etching index marks on my case heads and indexing the rounds in the chamber when firing.

Good luck! the 338 is a hoss at LR!
Steve



338 Lapua Cases: Lot# 1 Norma (Qty: 60)
=======================================
334.23 gr = Average weight before prep
333.20 gr = Min weight before prep
335.50 gr = Max weight before prep
0.772623691 = Standard Deviation of weight before prep
0.001 in. = Average OOR before prep
0 in. = Min OOR before prep
0.002 in. = Max OOR before prep
0.000538028 = Standard Deviation of OOR before prep

- Purchased @ Bruno's @$1.13 ea.
- wall thickness OOR was measured 2.325" down inside the case with .004"
engagement of the indicating needle.
- the index mark is the thick side indicator
- the index mark was etched into the case head with a parting disc from the
dremel tool
- flash holes were small enough that my FH deburring tool was tight
and actually gave a light cut and opened up the flash hole to a uniform size.


338 Lapua Cases: Lot # 2 (Qty: 100)
=======================================
324.9830986 gr = Average weight before prep
322.4 gr = Min weight before prep
330 gr = Max weight before prep
1.508261621 = Standard Deviation of weight before prep
0.000964789 gr = Average OOR before prep
0.0005 gr = Min OOR before prep
0.002 gr = Max OOR before prep
0.000425306 = Standard Deviation of OOR before prep

- Purchased from Bruno in June '98
- wall thickness OOR was measured 2.325" down inside the case with .004"
engagement of the indicating needle.
- the index mark is the thick side indicator
- the index mark was etched into the case head with a parting disc from
the dremel tool.


338 Lapua Cases: Lot# 3 Norma (Qty: 100)
=======================================
333.36 gr = Average weight before prep
332.4 gr = Min weight before prep
334.64 gr = Max weight before prep
0.587411807 = Standard Deviation of weight before prep

331.02 gr = Average weight after prep
330 gr = Min weight after prep
332.3 gr = Max weight after prep
0.589022384 = Standard Deviation of weight after prep
** This batch of cases hold 113.1gr of H2O in std Lapua configuration.

- these cases were neck turned to the diameter that my trimmer has been
set to and not changed for all other 338 cases.
- primer pocket were cut to .128" depth with 100% cut on all cases.
- all flash holes were deburred with very little cutting. The flash
holes were tight and the center drill opened them up a couple of thousands.


338 Lapua Cases: Lot # 4 (Qty: 100)
=======================================
342.47 gr = Average weight before prep
340.30 gr = Min weight before prep
344.40 gr = Max weight before prep
0.810027279 = Standard Deviation of weight before prep
0.0012 gr = Average OOR before prep
0.0000 gr = Min OOR before prep
0.0030 gr = Max OOR before prep
0.000685382 = Standard Deviation of OOR before prep