Just got into .223

I here ya man. I started loading 9mm and .38 Spcl. Piece of cake!

.223 (probably any rifle for that matter) is a pain with all the case prep as you stated. I now have containers with cases in various phases of completion.

1. Dirty Brass
2. Cleaned Brass
3. Deprimed and Sized
4. Ready for loading

Some days I feel like depriming, others I feel like trimming or loading, but mostly I like shooting!

a couple things about trimming. If you're loading for absolute accuracy then you need to trim brass so that each piece is consistent. That's a lot of work, but necessary.

But if you're loading for working rounds or blasting rounds, then you're only looking to keep the brass below the maximum length. If the brass length is under max, you don't have to trim. I use a trimmer that allows me to set my trim length and I only end up trimming around 10% of my brass.

On the other hand, if you use a Lee trimmer system, which wants to trim way on the short side, then you end up trimming pretty much every piece of brass and that increases your work a huge amount.

And finally, trimming the cases, this is lots of fun too.

Click to expand...

I got a bucket full of brass you can play with if ya want. I hate trimmin`...worst part of reloading IMO.

C'mon over and bring that bucket-o-brass!

I use a Dillon trimmer setup on a dedicated RC. I'll size and trim that bucket in an hour or so and give you half of it back to boot.

Scott

No doubt about it, if you buy once-fired military brass (Lake City), be prepared to put in some hours getting it shootable. I'm halfway through prepping 1K pieces of LC, and I still have to trim and chamfer. Still, once it's done, I feel good about having that much quality brass on hand.

hehe. Yep.

After doing some batches of .223, I am looking int RCBS case prep center, a new cordless drill, and a electric powder dropper.

revolver rounds easiest.
...
...
...
bottle neck cartridges.
bottle-neck magnum cases hardest.

I am jsut getting though my first 1500 LC cases for .223. I agree, you sure do learn to appreciate all those high speed rigs others ahve out there. Me and my trutsy wilson case trimmer are about to upgrade I think!

Funny to see this post today. Yesterday I reamed and trimmed 600 or so 223 Lake City and other NATO stuff - and my fingers have the blisters to prove it. My fired brass was ALL over the place. Some took 2 turns with the Lee rotary and were fine, others took 20 turns and brass ribbons everywhere. I chamferred about 1/2 of them but had to stark pounding beers and watch the Vikings beat the Saints. I tried gloves, tape, golf gloves but nothing worked. My hands are killing me. Even tightening the brass into the shell holder to prevent it from twisting got tedious and painful after a while. Trimming for an ammo eater like an AR-15 sucks big time.

You're needing WHAT??? to remove crimped primers???

All I have ever used (on ALL calibers) to remove crimped primers is the standard decapping dies. But, if I see a crimped primer pocket when I go for final reloading I will generally toss them in my brass recycling bucket. I don't ream out pockets and I have far enough regular brass not to concern myself with crimped pockets.

But, I hear ya about trimming. Like most...I HATE that job.

But, if I see a crimped primer pocket when I go for final reloading I will generally toss them in my brass recycling bucket. I don't ream out pockets and I have far enough regular brass not to concern myself with crimped pockets.

If you aren't wanting that crimped .223 will you sell and ship it to me at a little above scrap rates. Plus shipping cost.

Pm me if you want to.

Daniel

Oops~! And I thought I was going too get into loading .223 (Laughing Loudly)

I don't think I got the patience for all the case prep of military brass;
and besides, I load only on a RCBS Rockchucker press~!

Aw, I just go into my "wax on-wax off" mode when processing military brass. Put on some relaxing music, brew up a pot of strong coffee, and settle in...

I trim 223 cases and it's going faster now. I have a manual trimmer (Forster original) that I ordered the power adapter (to use with a hand held drill). It works great, basically I just push the trigger on the drill once or twice and its done. This has made trimming must faster and easier.

I don't mind trimming that much anymore. Now figuring out which stage all the brass in different buckets is at thats a chore!

It's definitely more work than loading pistol but it's not that bad when you get used to it. My method is to go through and size 1,500 to 2,000 cases. Then I will start to tumble them to clean the lube off. Then I will trim the ones that need to be trimmed. Then I ream all of the crimped primer pockets. Then I load them on a auto indexing classic turret press. I am going to try to save the lube cleaning time and tumble them after they are loaded next time.
Rusty

I found that the secret to keeping plenty of .223 loaded for my AR is to have "more than plenty" empty cases. I then:

Clean all cases
Size and Deprime all cases (I use a separate toolhead for my Dillon 650 with Lee Sizing/Depriming die and do ALL I have ready, usually a couple thousand or so)

Swage all military brass primer pockets (Dillon Super Swage Tool)

Sort, measure, and set aside all long cases to be trimmed
Trim, chamfer, and de-burr all long cases (RCBS Trimmer with 3-Way Cutter Head) (Maybe 'Santa' will bring me a Dillon Power Trimmer so I can do this step with the sizing/depriming)

Reload

At any given time I have 2-3 Thousand rounds loaded and another 4-5 Thousand empties in one of the above stages.


M

All of my 223 is for AR-15 semi auto

After 15 years (or more) of loading 223, I don't trim any more. The chambers on all 6 of my rifles have a long leade (the straight part for the neck before the rifling starts) so I simply measure to make sure the brass isn't excessively long. Most of my brass is once-fired, so I hardly ever encounter a long one. I don't think I have trimmed a 223 case in 3 or 4 years.

Please don't stop trimming until you check your rifle chamber and find it to be long and forgiving. This is not a place for guesswork or unwise assumptions. Please make your own decisions carefully, based on real data and a thorough understanding.

JDGray - I still use the single stage for powder charging and bullet seating most bottleneck rifle cartridges. My progressive is set up for rifle, but I generally use it for decapping, sizing, and priming cases in large quantity. That's when I check 223 to make sure they are not excessively long. Larger rifle cartridges get trimmed at that point. Then I stockpile the primed and prepped cases by the thousands until I need them.

I can charge more consistently, visually inspect EVERY powder charge more surely, and seat bullets much more consistently when I use the single stage.

At any given time I have 2-3 Thousand rounds loaded and another 4-5 Thousand empties in one of the above stages.

Click to expand...

You sir are my new hero.

I don't count my brass, I gauge by the containers I have them in. Lately, that's formula cans with a 10 month old. Great containers for storing brass. Man, I've got those things everywhere.

Yep, trimming is a bear. I used a socket head 8/32 machine screw and replaced the crank handle with it. I chuck up my cordless drill onto the socket head and save tons of time. Kinda hokey, not ideal, but oodles faster than by hand.

I don't trim "everything" anymore, just long cases. This alone saves a bunch of work.

Trimming 223 is easy if you use one of these -

http://www.giraudtool.com/prod02.htm

hell I use the Lee trimmer system with a cordless drill and the cutter with the wooden ball on the end for a handle, easy as pie. Plus doing it this way makes you have good fire control at the range since you never forget all the effort that goes into each round of ammo.

case prep is a drag...

but a mans gotta do what a mans gotta do.

look at the bright side. by reloading rifle cartridges, your saving that much more money per round. so the extra work pays off.

Trimming 223 is easy if you use one of these -

http://www.giraudtool.com/prod02.htm

Click to expand...

Heck, if I got one of those, I'd have to get more brass to feed it. Then, I'd have to find the time to process more brass. You can see where this is leading...