Picking up range brass

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Herk30

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The company I work for has a small range that is used by the city police, county police, sometimes the Reserves, and whoever else wants to use it. It's nothing special just a big sand berm about 40 yards away.

Anyway.....no one ever cleans up the brass. I went up there today and there is literally a wheel barrow full of pistol, rifle, and shotgun casings let alone everything on the ground. I spent 15 minutes picking up .223 and .40 and have half a Walmart bag full. Granted half of it is probably no good.

The only reason I quit was because I didn't know if it was worth it or not. I'm very new to reloading, is this considered a dangerous practice or is it ok? I figured even the brass I don't use I can clean up and sell or something.
 
All my pistol brass is recovered from the range. Rifle brass? not so much.
The stuff is going for almost $1.75/pound as scrap last I looked, if that motivates you at all.
 
I would reload it after a careful inspection. But you need to know what to look for.

Repeated pistol reloading hammers out the case head-stamp and usually leaves an ejector mark every time. You can sometimes count how many times it has been loaded from that.

The main danger with rifle brass is case stretching, and you can feel down inside with a bent paper-clip for a stretch ring. If it isn't there, it's good to go.

But even then, as noted above, scrap brass is worth a lot of money at the junk yard.

If it wasn't, the druggies wouldn't be stealing brass plaques off of tomb-stones to sell!

rcmodel
 
Grab it! Check it out and reload what's ok.

Most of the brass I have is range pickup stuff, in fact I've never bought a single round of .223 nor have I bought any 223/556 brass. Other than 100 rounds of store-bought ammo I was given, every round through my AR has been reloads made using free pickup brass. I jump on it whenever and wherever I find it, so long as the original owner doesn't mind or has already left.

Just check it out well before using, as rcmodel says. Once you run the nasty-looking, been-sitting-outside-in-the-weather stuff through a tumbler (especially if you throw some brass polish in) you'll be AMAZED at how well most of it cleans up. I throw away any beat-to-hell and strongly tarnished cases, or any that have some unsafe appearing condition (check one or two reloading manuals for explanations and pictures of what you're looking for). Inspect each case and round as you're making them. And above all, enjoy some satisfaction from taking trash someone threw away and making some good ammo with it for cheap!
 
Pick up as much as you can....cases are one of the more expensive components of reloading and free brass is a big savings. Save calibers you don't have and sooner than later you will probably have it. I'm a real brass scrounge and pick it every weekend. The stuff thats unloadable gets recycled for powder and primers.
 
No! Don't use it! Send it all to me! Go back and get all the rest and send it to me!

Yes, range pickup brass is fine. Sort it by headstamp -- if it's new, you'll usually find it's all the same lot, all sold at about the same time.

After sorting, check it for corrosion, cracking, and so on.

Then load and enjoy.
 
*L* You guys are funny. I'm looking forward to cleaning it up and sorting through it.

Another thing I thought I read somewhere was that some of the .223 or 5.56 rounds have a different primer seat or something that needs to be addressed? It seemed like most of the stuff up there was marked LC, which I assume is Lake City. Any pointers on what to look for on this or am I way off?
 
I know a couple of brass whores who would fight you thunder dome style for each case.

Pick up all you can - it does not exactly go bad.
 
pick it up!
if not to keep your club clean
then for scrap value or value of selling it online to other reloaders, or be nice and give it away minus shipping.
or... reload it yourself.
all straight walled casings are easy to reload and require no concern over age as you can fire them many times before they even come close to being need to replacement.
then again, dont pick up the brass, as there will be less for me to get then:banghead:
 
If there are any old timers using that range shooting 357 mag just send it my way you won't have enough to fool with anyway.

You can save all of it or keep half for your stuff and sell the rest or trade for other reloading stuff.
 
There is nothing wrong with scrounged brass as long as it checks out okay. One thing I might add to the above recommendations is run all the bass you have determined okay through a pocket swagger. I found that most of my hiccups on my progressive press were related to military casings where the primer pocket was either not swagged at all or not properly swagged. Since I started routinely swaging all scrounged brass with the Dillon Super Swage I have nearly eliminated all 99% of progressive interruptions.
 
If you're really meticulous, and you have an electronic scale (and you can get them for peanuts these days), you weigh a few cases, then zero the scale at the mean weight and sort your cases into three batches -- heavy, light and intermediate. Then keep the batches separate.
 
I'm jealous. My club sells the brass so scrounging other shooter's brass is bad form.
 
idano said:
One thing I might add to the above recommendations is run all the bass you have determined okay through a pocket swagger. I found that most of my hiccups on my progressive press were related to military casings where the primer pocket was either not swagged at all or not properly swagged. Since I started routinely swaging all scrounged brass with the Dillon Super Swage I have nearly eliminated all 99% of progressive interruptions.
Click to expand...

Great advice. Not only do mil-crimped primer pockets cause grief but some brass manufacturers leave out the chamfer or radius at the mouth of the primer pocket. A quick trip over the swager takes care of this once, for the life of that piece of brass. Good insurance against stoppage of a progressive which we all know is such a pleasant task to adress:cuss:
 
Around where I live, if we-all found out about a range like that, there would be packs of snarling brass-rats slavering and straining at the chains to get there with their knee pads and buckets...

A certain range near me, there will literally be a line of cars in the morning waiting to get in when the range opens for shooting, and another line of cars in the evening waiting down the block for them to close...

I'm usually in both lines somewhere.
 
Pick up everything. Sort it. Load whatever calibers you load for. Sell the bad stuff to the scrap yard. Sell the rest to us reloaders.

/BTW, I call dibs on any reloadable .308 brass you don't want.:D
 
I don't but

The guy who does at my local range says he has o be tested for lead poisoning regularly. I wonderd if he says that to scare others from doing that or if it is for real. I realize he does this at several ranges... so this might be a real hazard if you do a large volume continuaally.
 
45 acp

You could bait a trap with fired 45 acp cases and catch me three times a week. Seems I always come back from the range with more than I carried in the gate.
 
Even if you don't use a particular caliber, grab it, clean it and trade it for something you need. The Reserves are probably shooting LC 5.56 which is desirable to us AR reloaders. There are quite a few people with access to ranges like you that have profitable side business' going selling clean reloadable brass.
 
1K LC 223 goes for 55-65$ a thousand, shipped.
not a bad chunk of change for picking up brass. its a good time buffer for in between mags as well as meters time so as to avoid overconsumption of ammunition:eek:
 
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