Fiocchi brass...

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I do have some GFL brass, at least in 38Spl and 357 Mag.
I think I have some in 44Mag also.

I'm fairly certain I've reloaded it, but not 100% certain. I know I have some, because I sort after depriming and washing.

Which means, of course, that I didn't have problems with off center flash holes. If problems had occurred, the brass would have been in the recycle bin in a hurry, including all pieces with that headstamp.
 
Have loaded fair amount of Fiocchi 9mm in my cast off brass loads over the years. It is usually the first brass to start splitting, and appears harder/thinner than most others. The 9mm being loaded is full power 115 fmj practice loads.
 
Had some 38sp range pickup brass given to me by my brother-in -law who doesn't reload. This was years ago, maybe circa 2000. All the GFL headstamp had the same off-center flash hole problem that 375 supermag describes. I avoid using that brass and only keep it as a backup stash. I initially thought it was just a bad lot of Fiocchi 38sp brass from that era. All the 9mm GFL brass I have seems fine.
 
I’ve got some GFL in 9 Makarov that is fine. It sounds like it’s a problem with their rimmed revolver calibers while the rimless ones are good. Maybe a difference in the tooling for their US vs Italian production as the European calibers seem better?
 
I have had no noted problems reloading 9mm or 32acp Fiocchi brass. However, CBC brass hates my Federal SPPs.
 
I bought 1000 rounds of Fiocchi 9mm a few years ago and have reloaded all the brass once. I've also had maybe 300 rounds of Fiocchi .38 special that's gone through a couple reloading, no issues with the 9mm or .38 sp. I do have maybe 100 rounds of Fiocchi .357 brass laying around, but have yet to reload any of that yet.
 
I own and have reloaded a good amount of Fiocchi 38 special, 44 special and 44 magnum brass...no issues with any of them.
 
375supermag said:
Hi...
I was wondering if anyone has any experience with reloading Fiocchi brass.
I have had some issues lately with off center flash holes with their .357Mag brass.
I have had to replace one decapping pin on the RCBS die set that I use on my RockChucker and my son has had to replace two if them on the set that we use on the small primer set up LNL.
This is the first Fiocchi brass I have ever had...my son bought 1000 rounds of their .357Mag brass some time ago and we have just recently started to reload it.
I have reloaded thousands of rounds of ammunition since the early '80s and until this batch of Fiocchi brass have never encountered off center flash holes prior to this...never had to replace a decapping pin heretofore.

Wondering if this is common with Fiocchi brass???

Thanks in advance for any comments.
Click to expand...

Currently brass is cheap and readily available. Why use the stuff that gives you issues?
If I have any problems when depriming or resizing any brass, particularly if it requires more force than normal to deprime, that piece gets noted and tossed. When I've seen a trend from a particular manufacturer I stop using that brass.
My notes tell me 357 Fiocchi brass was sorted out and tossed from the mixed headstamp pile some time ago.

It probably pays to note that I'm a slow reloader, sort brass by headstamp, deprime and resize as a separate process and use a turret press, not a progressive press.
 
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kidneyboy said:
Currently brass is cheap and readily available. Why use the stuff that gives you issues?
If I have any problems when depriming or resizing any brass, particularly if it requires more force than normal to deprime, that piece gets noted and tossed. When I've seen a trend from a particular manufacturer I stop using that brass.
My notes tell me 357 Fiocchi brass was sorted out and tossed from the mixed headstamp pile some time ago.

It probably pays to note that I'm a slow reloader, sort brass by headstamp, deprime and resize as a separate process and use a turret press, not a progressive press.
Click to expand...

Hi...
I would throw it out if it were only a few hundred pieces. My son tells me that he bought two 500 hundred rounds batches.
It all got thrown in a bin to be processed with about 3-4 thousand other pieces of .357Mag brass to be used for our generic general purpose bulk shooting reloads.
So far, we have only encountered 3-4 pieces of brass that have had off center flash holes, so I am loath to throw away 1000 pieces of brass because of less than 1% defective flash holes.
Obviously if the defect rate increases, then I will have to scrap the entire lot.

A few decapping pins are cheaper than 1000 pieces of brass, especially since if they decap once they can be reloaded numerous times before they need replacing.
It's simple economics...I just would have preferred to not have had the problem.
 
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tightgroup tiger said:
I don't know why this bothers me, but..,

I'll bet the third gens are the ones that came out with the GFL line.

If I was in the Fiocchi family and my Grandfathers name that started the company and provided me with a very good living, was used on the headstamp of our product, that Ammo would be the best in the class that it was made for. My Grandfathers name on THIS brass, that would bother me a lot. I mean a lot.
If my company was going to make brass and ammo on the quality level as A-merc, it sure wouldn't have name of, or any form of that name, of the original founder on it.
Click to expand...
Their 223 match ammo is very accurate. I had no complaints from the 357, but it's about 10 years old now.
Everything about your family's heritage should be held with respect. This would fix a lot of issues.
 
GFL is my favorite brass in 9mm. No issues, never a failure...yet. Win and Federal have split on me, but 1-2 cases out of thousands...who cares? No problems depriming. CBC and Magtech give me fits depriming. They appear to have much smaller diameter flash holes.
 
markr6754 said:
GFL is my favorite brass in 9mm. No issues, never a failure...yet. Win and Federal have split on me, but 1-2 cases out of thousands...who cares? No problems depriming. CBC and Magtech give me fits depriming. They appear to have much smaller diameter flash holes.
Click to expand...

That's interesting...
I have a lot of Magtech and CBC brass mixed in with my brass used for my generic general purpose reloads.
I have never had an issue with any of it.
In fact, no issues with any brass except recently with the Fiocchi as mentioned in the original post.
 
Look at it this way, revolver brass doesn't get lost so you only have to do this once. Once you get through it you'll have 950+ good pieces of brass.
 
Well I loaded up the last of that box on my bench and shot it this weekend. I’ll post some results on the brass once it’s deprimed.



C1DD733F-3499-4416-A37E-BE113C34FDA2.jpeg
 
Yep, I had some GFL .223 that I think they got the flash hole in the center in 1 or 2 cases out of 20, some were on the edge of the pocket.
I would say if only 70% of yours were off center you must have got a "good" batch;)
Messed up a couple Lee decap pins (my fault, but they need to be tight when dealing with crimped primers in ,223)
 
Here are some pics of what I had
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/gfl-223-brass-bent-decap-pin.748343/

I will say it shot ok after I got it deprimed....
I even marked it and picked up what I could find afterwards just in case some other unsuspecting reloader (brass scrounger type like me)came along and decided to pick it up.
GFL .223 = recycle can for me

3rd one from the top left the edge of the hole was on the edge of the pocket:eek:

It may not all be bad but all the .223 I have found leaves a lot to be desired.
 
I've always thought it was pretty good stuff. Sometimes the pin is singing like a tuning fork on it's way back out, but I havent broken one on them.
GFL is one of my favorites for 9mm Luger. excellent neck tension!

maybe 357 is their problem child....I dont think I have a single one of those by fiocci
 
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