Hornady Brass: The truth will set you free. But first it will piss you off!

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Yep based on the failure of one (1) piece of Brass, out of millions, Hornady brass has been deemed crap, and of no use to anyone. It could not have been anything else.
And here I though the junk brass was Remington, or was it Federal? No it must be ...................?????????????????
I had piece of LC with a case head separate. I avoid it all now,:scrutiny:
It's not just one piece of brass. I've had similar results to the OP. I use Hornady brass for reloading, but refuse to use once fired brass from their factory ammo.
The OP can accurately say Hornady brass from factory ammo is crap. But not all Hornady brass is crap.
 
It's not just one piece of brass. I've had similar results to the OP. I use Hornady brass for reloading, but refuse to use once fired brass from their factory ammo.
The OP can accurately say Hornady brass from factory ammo is crap. But not all Hornady brass is crap.

Somehow I have managed to reload thousands of factory 223 Rem brass that I shot originally from "factory" ammo let alone all the handgun brass
 
I use Hornady brass for reloading, but refuse to use once fired brass from their factory ammo.
The OP can accurately say Hornady brass from factory ammo is crap.

More of the same - far too many folks have reloaded with hundreds of thousands, if not millions of pieces of brass from Hornady factory rounds for this stuff to keep going around. Posting silly stuff like this is nothing more than an open invitation for ten fold as many respondents to refute the negative opinion with their experiences.

I can say, in at least 204 Ruger, 223/5.56, 6.5 Grendel, 6.8 SPC, 6.5 Creed, 7rm, 300wm, 338wm, 45-70, 357mag, 44mag, 45 colt, and 454 casull - and I’m sure a half dozen others I don’t recall from not-so-recent years, I’ve reloaded Hornady factory ammo brass without a hiccup. I’ve even done the weight and volume comparisons for Grendel and Creed to be sure I could integrate once fired factory ammo borne brass with once fired reloader brass - less the standard outliers from each batch, the two batches (over 300 rounds each) were statistically identical, and have lasted the same in firing.
 
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^ I can’t disagree with that either.

I think I am the only guy in the world that reloads ammoload brass...everyone else seems to think it will destroy your pistol, cause you to loose your job and get your daughter pregnant...:)
 
Hodgdon Reloading Data Center indicates 40.0 gr of IMR 4064 is a max load.
 
I’m currently on the fifth round of reloads for Hornady .30-06 “improved” to 8mm-.06. No problems: this was new never fired brass.

I also shot 3 boxes of Hornady .250 savage factory loads. I reloaded these with middle of the road loads—first reload, every neck split.
 
I might be shooting my .303 Lee Enfield too often. Split necks and the tell tale notch in the web while doing the feeler test after the first firing are no big deal. Cracks along the case web after 4-5 firings are commonplace. I've even got accustomed to the total case head separation. Sometimes after 5-6 firings, other times, the case will last a dozen loads.

I check each case with a feeler before I load it. I also only neck size.

Brass is different. I'm sure a lot of you out there have much more experience than me. I'm guessing it is a metallurgical issue. Let Hornady know. Just because. I reckon several others already have.

Be safe and have fun.
 
If the OP has any of the factory loads left I'd be curious to know what the head space comparison is between unfired and after fired. In other words, how much stretch is occurring initially.

Like most problems in life, it's generally never one thing that's causing the result. It could be a stack of tolerances like chamber headspace on the high side + factory brass sized on the low side + brass thickness on the low side = case head separation. Perhaps the Federal brass didn't have those last two variables in play so it didn't fail.

As has been suggested, cut open some cases and see what the cross section looks like
 
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