Nickle plated cases?

[Wildbillz]

Hi All
I have seen a few post where guys don't seem to be interested in casings if they are the Nickle plated ones. Why is that? Most of the 357mag brass that I have is the Nickle plated type. Some of its worn off a bit but they still seem to work just fine.

WB

 

[longdayjake]

Its harder on your dies and it takes more effort to size. I had some issues with nickel plated cases a while back where they weren't fully resizing. I had to overcam my pistol dies to get the base to properly size. Other than that, they are great.

 

[JohnM]

They work, but they can be hard on steel dies and in my experience the nickle plated cases have a shorter life before neck splits start showing up.
I got probably a 1000 cases stuck away I culled from my plain brass.

 

[ReloaderFred]

There's nothing wrong with nickel plated cases, other than the shorter life span issue. We go through about 10,000 rounds of .38 Special ammunition per year shooting in matches, and I limit nickel cases to handguns, and keep yellow brass cases for our rifles, since a split case will allow the bullet to collapse into the case and lock up a lever action rifle.

Most reloaders these days use carbide sizers for .38/.357 sizing, so wear on the dies isn't an issue. I'm still using one of the first carbide sizing dies Lyman made that I bought back in 1969, and that die probably has over 300,000+ .38 and .357 cases through it, with about half of them being nickel. It got a lot of use when I was shooting PPC on a regular basis back in the 1970's and early 1980's, and now shooting SASS matches.

Just inspect them for neck cracks, and load as usual.

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[ColtPythonElite]

Nickel is no trouble with carbide dies. It's the steel dies that sometimes have problems. The nickel plating sometimes flakes off and gets embedded in the sizer ring and causes scratching.

Nickel plating itself is often called "self-lubricationg", so it should size smoother than brass in theory.

I also find that nickel cases seem to split before plain brass. However, they still take a good number of loadings before they split. I have .38/.357 brass that is over 20 years old that I am still using and seem to only get a split or three every 1k rounds loaded.

 

[Arkansas Paul]

Question. Does nickle in bottleneck rifle cartridges wear out your trimmer any faster? I would think the nickle would dull the cutter quicker, but haven't trimmed enough to know for sure.

 

[cfullgraf]

For the most part, I do not buy nickel plated cases but do use them if I have them. I do not have a specific reason for not using nickel plate cases like ReloaderFred.

Like the others, I find no issues resizing nickel plated cases with carbide dies. I make sure the nickel cases are well lubricated when using steel dies (yes, I have a couple pistol cartridges where carbide dies are not available, and I use a few nickel rifle cases).

I do find nickel cases have a shorter case life than un-plated cases.

I have not purchased any new nickel handgun cases in decades although, I have purchased some loaded ammunition that had nickel plated cases. I keep the nickel cases and reload them. No sense throwing out good usable brass.

I have purchased a small quantity of nickel plated rifle cases when I want the case easily identifiable from other ammunition.

 

[gamestalker]

I use a lot of nickel brass, bottle neck and all others and have not had any issues with dies or life span of brass. And for SD carry or hunting rounds that get carried around for long periods of time in adverse conditions, it's nice to open the action and not have to see a bunch of nasty tarnished ammunition. Last hunting season my Son was carrying some yellow brass in his rifle and we experienced a little bit of rain which caused the brass to tarnish horribly just from the humidity, it didn't get wet.

So far as neck splits, I don't bell the mouths on my handgun brass, so splits are non existent regardless of what I'm loading.

And as far as trimming them, my trimmer cutter hasn't dulled at all. I think the key factor here is carbide, or other harder types available now days.

I've heard about dies getting scratched by nickel, but I've never experienced this problem either. But I'm pretty picky about the condition of the brass prior to resizing too. I tumble it prior to resizing to knock off any grit. So far, so good for 30+ yrs..

So I have to say, I personally like nickel in every aspect.

GS

 

[blarby]

Nickel like the coin, not nickle like a pickle !

While I seriously doubt that a thousandth or so of nickel plated brass has any effect on tool steel or carbide for that matter, but it does make stiffer casings...which will split sooner than non plated cases.

They are also exceptionally handy for preventing verdigris in leather cartridge wallets or belts.

 

[frankt]

I save my nickel cases for shooting in competition. Most are "lost brass" matches and also the nickel cases tend to eject cleaner.
They do not last for as many reloadings but I have no problem shooting them or buying them if the price is right.

 

[MrCountyCop]

I can't comment on rifle cases but I have had more split cases in nickle 45acp than brass cases

 

[DesertFox]

Tons of nickle 10mm brass here and I haven't noticed more split cases myself. Quite a bit of 357 Mag too come to think of it and I wouldn't say it was more prone to splitting. YMMV.

 

[rikman]

In my 2 yrs old hand loading, my one and only case failure was with a nickel 38SPL case...I bought 300 used and one case split completely in the first batch of 100 I shot

 

[icanthitabarn]

I started out reloading and shopping with several hundred used nic R+P .357. They seem to be the only ones that develop split necks.