Brass plated steel S&B 9mm?

[fatelk]

I was sorting through some brass I picked up and noticed one piece of 9mm that had some rust. The headstamp is S&B 9mm Luger, exactly the same as the other S&B 9mm brass I picked up, as well as boxer primed. It even weighs exactly the same. The difference is that this particular case is magnetic, and I can scrape off the brass plating with a knife blade to reveal the steel underneath.

I threw it away. Anyone seen anything like this?

 

[fatelk]

No comments at all? I went through my other S&B brass with a magnet and didn't find any others. The only other brass plated steel cases I've ever seen is some Russian .223, and it's berdan primed.

I'm a little curious how it would hold up to reloading, but 9mm brass is so cheap and plentiful I just threw it out. One more thing to watch out for when sorting through brass.

 

[CZ57]

I haven't ran into it. Then again, I didn't know that S&B offered steel cased 9mm ammo to the US market, and I haven't used the magnet test. One thing I can tell you is that S&B brass is excellent. Some complain about the tight primer pockets, so be aware if you load on a progressive. Over the years I have found their brass to be very uniform and consistent. The tight primer pocket is a plus for me and after a number of reloadings you'll still get very good primer seal.

 

[wally]

Saw S&B steel cased 9mm for $149/1000 at today's Pasadena gun show. Clearly marked steel case, they also had S&B brass cased for $169/1000. My how prices have gone up!

--wally.

 

[Navy joe]

Found some! I came on here to post about it and searched first. I had about 10 pieces grab the magnet when I was brass fishing so I took some to investigate. I thought it might just be a strong magnet attracting the primer anvil or something, but a spark test on a grinder says it is steel.

Problem is that it looks brass, it is brass plated. No off color, no bi-metal look, looks like boxer primed reloadable brass.

The headstamp does say S&B 9mm LUGER Q. I do not know if the Q is there to indicate steel, I have no brass S&B handy to compare it to.

 

[Walkalong]

There is no Q on the S&B brass brass.

 

[Navy joe]

Q must mean steel then.

 

[SLM]

I don't think it's a "Q". It's on all the S&B brass brass I have also.





The one on the left is one of the steel cases. You can see the different color around the primer pocket. The right one is regular brass. I noticed it cutting the chamfer on the primer pocket. I can't see any difference in headstamps and have read that other than the magnet test, the loaded ammo looks identical.

Just something else to keep an eye out for. By the way, it went through my resizing and depriming die (Redding titanium) just fine. Had I not caught it chamfering the primer pocket I would have just reloaded it and never known it was in there.