how detailed do you get with your pistol brass?

Status
Not open for further replies.
H

Halo

Member
Joined
Apr 20, 2004
Messages
728
Location
Charlotte, NC & part time in the beautiful Blue Ri
I sort my pistol brass by headstamp, and up to now I have also sub-sorted it by the number of firings. It's starting to get a bit tedious having two or three (or more) small batches of the same brass, though. Just a general question for the group, how detailed is your sorting?

This is 9mm and 45 ACP brass, btw.
 
I shoot .45s till they split or I loose them. All are looked at many times during my loading operation. I shoot about 200rds a week.
 
I used to sort my handgun brass by headstamp but gave that up pretty fast. My batches are sorted by approximate number of firings and caliber.

At the distance I shoot handguns the brand of brass doesn't impact accuracy enough to be noticable.

When I buy a new batch of once fired brass I buy single headstamp but after that it is all mixed together.
 
I don't sort mine at all. I shoot the 9mm and .45 until they are split or I lose them. I don't load anything terribly hot for range use, usually only a little above the minimum, so the brass lasts forever.
 
I sort my pistol brass by caliber... that's it. The exception is 44mag, which I check for small splits... but 40 gets used until it fails.
 
Straight-wall pistol is so simple.
I sort by caliber, I sort to remove nickle brass from autopistol calibers (Not revolver), and look out for Berdan brass (scrapped), split or bulged cases or folded/cut case mouths (scrapped) and 9x19 trimmed to 9x18 (also scrapped).

I don't trim pistol bullets, I don't sort by headstamp, I don't separate them by how many times fired. I dump all of one caliber into a big bucket and when I want to load I grab a handful at random. I don't load hot, I don't load for sub-moa accuracy, and I hand inspect them several times in the reloading/cleaning process.

Usually they get lost before anything bad happens, but when they split or get so dinged up I think they might interfere with extraction, they go in the scrap bucket.

I have 1930's headstamped .45 acp military cases still going strong.
 
For 9mm, 38 spcl, and 45acp, I buy 500 new brass for 1 lot. I have more than 1 lot (I wont say how many) going at a time. This way, I have a couple of lots loaded while I shoot another lot completely and then they just move to the next stage

Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble.

Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble
Clean bin, Handload, Fire, Dirty bin, Tumble

I usually lose them before they start to crack.

I have some cases that I have reloaded so many times, it's embarassing

But on my Magnum Pistol Rounds, I treat them like rifle brass.

Cheers...
 
I sort my 357 and 44 brass by brand and aproximate firings.(kind of hard when you get brass at shows and ranges, you never really know) My 40 and 38 brass just gets sorted by aprox firings. By the way how can you tell your 44 brass is ready for retirement. I load for a desert eagle so loads are pretty hot. So far no split cases. Is this all to look for?
 
I used to sort all my brass in some way till I grew lazy and now theyre all in one bucket waiting to be reloaded and fired. Sorting kinda lost its meaning after I found out it makes no difference if I did it or not.
 
Detailed?

Am I supposed to be detailed about it? It's brass. I throw out the bad. I load. I shoot.

I'm not trying to be dense. It's just that I don't shoot Bullseye or National Match type competition. IPSC and practice are all at short range. After 4 decades of doing it, I find no amount of detail work on the brass makes a difference in my pistol shooting. Now, rifle is another matter, but you asked about pistol.
 
With 45acp I separate the Winchesters out, all the other headstamps gets mixed together.
I do this because 75% of the 8000 cases that I have are Winchesters.

Besides cleaning, the only other case preparation I do is uniform the primer pockets which is a one time task.
 
Throw into the tumbler, remove, reload. I load pistol calibers on a Dillon SDB. I try to watch out for and remove any brass that causes trouble in my SDB, usually A-Merc and some Federal marked FC 07...other than that load till they split or lose them!
 
Sort by head stamp and number of firings. Tumble, resize/decap, clean primer pockets and trim (ALL cases out of tolerence). I also maintain a log of each set of 50 (handgun) and 20 (rifle). "If it's worth doing. It's worth doing right". Heard that some place. Can't remember where...
 
Tried it the "hard way" for a while. Couldnt notice any difference, now I throw em out when they split or the head stamp goes smooth
~z
 
Only time I ever sorted was to make a accuracy seeking 9mm load, I picked out a bunch of once fired WCC which is great 9mm brass. Matching brass on a 9mm can yield good results since there is not much internal case volume and headstamps may vary. The load was incredible. Other than that I have some other reloader's .45 cases sprinkled in mine, often the headstamps are older than I am.
 
Sorting for me works kinda like this.

Inspect for failed cases (or A-Merc...same difference)
Discard failed stuff
Reload

Yup that's pretty much it.
 
Mine get sorted by caliber only. Used to try to keep them separated by lots (brand, firings) but I, too, found it makes no difference. After sorting, they get tumbled and put into ammo cans until needed for recycling into ammo.
 
Thanks for all the responses. I'm going to stick with separating by headstamp, because multiple headstamps in the same batch will keep me from sleeping at night :), but I'm not going to continue bothering to sort by number of firings, at least not with pistol rounds.
 
People sort brass??? Actually, there are some calibers that I have noticed a difference in the brass, but I don't think I've ever sorted them other than caliber.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

gonoles_1980
  • Locked
Questions on 9mm brass
2
Replies
44
Views
2K
1SOW
1
L
  • Locked
Sorting 9mm brass by case length
Replies
9
Views
868
subierex
S
Crazy Horse
  • Locked
Lonestar Brass
Replies
5
Views
534
sevt_chevelle
S
K
  • Locked
How much brass do you need and how do you organize it?
2
Replies
47
Views
3K
mstreddy
mstreddy
F
  • Locked
How can you tell your brass is work hardened?
Replies
7
Views
2K
Fat_46
F
Back
Top