Am I being too picky?

You must throw away a lot of brass.
Some brass is shorter than that without trimming.

I trim back at least ten thousandth after once fire

I use short brass when it gets trimmed to far, after a few cycles it will grow back into spec again.

As long as you get good enough neck tension on your bullet use them. They will grow again. From the old timers I learned from as long as you had a minimum of one calibers length of bullet to neck contact it should be good. Something that headspaces on the cartridge mouth--- then you have to be pickier.

SAAMI revised their minimum case length from 1.740” down to 1.730” awhile ago. Either way, I wouldn’t fuss about 10 to 20 thousandths under 1.750” for FL sized brass. ymmv

higgite said:

SAAMI revised their minimum case length from 1.740” down to 1.730” awhile ago. Either way, I wouldn’t fuss about 10 to 20 thousandths under 1.750” for FL sized brass. ymmv

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Beat me to it! Plus, you don't have to trim them for quite a few loadings, if at all! My .223 brass gets trimmed to about 1.745", I could go lower, but that's what my trimmer pilot runs at for length.

The only reason I trim rifle brass is if I'm shooting cast bullets (all my calibers get fed cast) to ensure consistent flare and crimp. The off chance of me shooting J bullets in .223 I just grab brass and go.

I have always trimmed to 1.740 because I hate trimming and the idea was to extend the interval (number of times reloaded and fired) before I'd have to trim again. I use the Dillon trimmer motor and dies on the Dillon press, so I can do a bunch at once, but still prefer not to have to do it.

I pick up range brass when I see it and don't keep it separate from the brass I already had, and I also don't keep track of how many times a particular piece of brass has been reloaded. For that reason I run all my .223 brass through my WFT as it takes hardly any time. If they need trimmed it trims them but often I feel no resistance meaning the brass is at or shorter than 1.750 already. It's never caused any problems for me.

1.735" is my minimum, shorter than that and it becomes 300BO.

I separate the Shorties and load them as their own batch. This way I only have to adjust my dies for each batch. If you crimp the Shorties will have less. Blasting ammo doesn't care either way if it matters at all. Some FC brass is 1.740 after one firing.

Load-um-up

As to your question, yes. If this difference in length bugs you just keep the shorties separated and load them as a batch. This is so you can adjust your dies as needed to be sure your crimp is consistent amongst your cases... then load away.



Stay safe.

With only reading the title and no other content, I was 99% certain the answer was, "YES!"

Such is the nature of this hobby

Oh, another point for you. The trimming is more necessary if you do crimp the ammo. I found through trial and error that roll crimping rifle ammo will decrease accuracy in MY guns. I suggest you try it both ways and make your decision on the results. I only crimp for 30-30 and other tube fed rounds.