How long do you use fired brass. I pick up any brass I find and there is no way to determine how many times they have been loaded. Is there a rule to go by? I know I am cheap

I have to know the history of the brass before I will reload it. Once-fired brass and I know where it came from, I might do. New brass from the store gets first priority. I won't load a shell if I don't know how many times it has been reloaded or to what pressure levels.

I look at brass every time I load it.

on handgun brass...i reload it a ton...no ill effects...just keep an eye out for splits etc.if in doubt..toss it

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SWCA#2208
KK4EMO

The Lyman Handbook 49th edition talks about 8 firings as safe for rimless, 2 or 3 for belled, and rimmed cartridges somewhere in between. That is pretty conservative, but all firings are not equal. For relatively low pressure target and plinking .38 special loads, I try to keep track of firings, but when I have brass that I did not track, I do not throw it out. I just inspect carefully and keep loading. For rifle or magnum pistol loads, I would probably not load them if I did not know exactly how many times they were fired. I think you will find a great range of opinion on this subject though and there is no magic number.

for range ammo i reload it until it splits. i have had rounds i have had to descunge the primer pocket at least once and they are going strong, though I don't heavily load my .38 special. that is of course pistol ammo. for rifle ammo i would be inclined to be more careful due to the pressure involved.

Handgun brass can be loaded until it splits. I have some .38 Special cases that have been reloaded so many times the nickel is worn off in spots. Even my heavy .44 Magnum loads go until the necks will split (I lost count at about 15 or 16 the last time I tried to keep track). I buy a lot of once fired brass in .38, .357, .44 Special and Magnum, 45 ACP and 9mm. I've found range pick-ups of about 1K of .223/5.56 and have no problems if I visually inspect each case...

Like others have said, straight walled handgun brass seems to last about for ever, just keep an eye on splits near the mouth, and splits or burn holes in the case body, and enlarged primer openings.

Bottle necked cartridges are a different story, as case flow resulting in weakened case webbs, and resulting case failure can happen relatively quickly if brass is over re-sized, or the gun being used has excessive headspace. I limit my used rifle brass to picking up what I see other shooters leave after a day of sighting in with factory new loads.

One trick to seeing if used rifle brass is safe is to get a piece of thin wire, and bend a little hook on the end, then run it inside the case of a bottle necked rifle brass, feeling with it along the inside, down to the base. If it catches a little in the area of the case webb, it means a case with insipid case head separation - time to trash it.

Larry

I start off with once fired brass ad keep track of the number of times it has been reloaded. With the high pressure cartridges such as 9mm & 40 S&W I scrap the brass after 4 reloads. With low pressure cartridges such as 38 Special and 45 ACP I tend to load the brass until it appears to start fraying at the neck.

Most brass can be reloaded many times depending on how hot your loads are. If you shoot loads at maximum pressure you won't get many reloads out of your brass before it starts spliting and stretching, reloads of lite target loads will last longer but do need to be checked at each reloading session. Also if you use a heavy crimp the case will split at the mouth of the case much faster. I find that most rimmed revolver brass (.38 spl, .357, .45 colt) are once fired that I find at the range dumped by non-reloaders.

I still have some 38 special and 45acp brass that I started with back in the 70's. Guns and Ammo did a test on 38 years ago and quit after 50 firings. Watch for splits and it may outlast you.

Another cheapskate here. I'm hooked on competition shooting. I'm not terribly good at it, but I have fun. So my reloading involves primarily low to medium power handgun cartridges. Even when you pick up your brass after shooting there is no guarantee that you will get your brass, so it's tough to monitor how many times it has been shot. Like most others I keep going until the brass splits. I polish all my brass and sort, so its usually pretty easy to find any with neck splits. I also load using a Hornady Lock-N-Load progressive press with a case feeder. I find one additional advantage to the case feeder. When the case drops down from the feeder it lands on a metal plate, any case with a split rings quite differently than a case in 100% condition. I have found cases with splits that were not very apparent until you really inspected the case after hearing it land on the metal plate.

I dunno. I have yet to wear one out enough to toss it.

Like others, I run my handgun brass until it gives up. Most of what I have is range pickup. Inspect each case each time! I have lots of 9mm, .38 special and .45 ACP that are on 25+ loads and still look new. I do find that my .40 cal does not last nearly as long as the others.
Dave

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mr mom
Fire Chief, Retired

Pistol brass is easy. If it shows no signs of age or obvious splits, bulges, cracks I use it. The hard one to pick up is incipient head separation. That bears close inspection. I'm going to make a steel wire 'feeler' to check this, especially for rifle rounds.

When I had my .41 Magnum, cases lasted 4-5 firing before the promer pockets got loose, but those were some hot loads with Blue Dot. Never had one to crack or split though.

I've yet to lose any of my .45 ACP cases to cracking except those with CBC headstamps. I don't even bother with them when they get into my range pickups. They go right into the scrap can. A few loose primer pockets have ended case lives. But my reloads are pretty tame so they last many reloads.

Theres honestly no hard fast rule here.
A good tight bolt action rifle might get 8 - 10 cycles with full house loads.
same load in a loose action might make 6 cycles
again in a good tight bolt action ... a light low pressure load can scrooge a case well past 12

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it just needs more voltage

Until the case splits or the primers fall out...as long as you are not loading heavy +P rounds!

Remember reading someone was anle to get 115 cycles out of a piece of 38spl brass.

Ya know, back when I was young, mid last century, I read everything I could find on the subject. I even believed what a lot of folks said. But then I got a little older, realized I was impoverished (married), and started looking for brass everywhere. Practicality required me to dump all my handgun brass together. The idea of tracking brass and reloads was just crazy. And semi-auto brass was worse because you might have fired 50 brand new cases, but you can never find all of them. 2nd time around the 45 or 47 cases dropped again.

If you don't load to peak pressures, your brass really does last longer. If you're made of money it doesn't matter. But loading range ammo is just a lot easier if you find a good load and stick with it. I do find an occasional case where the bullet just doesn't feel right when I seat it. Yes, I use a press that requires me to do a single operation at a time. And the priming is done with either a Lee or my favorite, a Lyman 310 that is good for 38s, 357s and Jets. You feel everything.

So if I've got a thousand empties and toss out 10 or 15, I don't care. There was a time when I felt lucky to have 100 empties to my name. Then the watershed event hit me. The local police were doing their qualifications and it was snowing. They ran me out, as I wasn't allowed to even watch. I wasn't real happy, but the snow picked up during the afternoon and they had a bunch of guys to qualify. So I went home. But the next morning I went back to shoot. By then it had warmed up a bit and turned to rain. When each dumped his revolver empties on the ground, they immediately burrowed into the snow. Some even got stepped on, but the snow cushioned the steps. So instead of shooting, I picked up brass. All was brand spankin' new once fired. Hundreds upon hundreds of empties and they were all mine! Riches beyond my fondest dreams. I'm certain of the 1000 or so wadcutters I've got loaded up, at least half were from that big lottery win of mine!

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Dick Burg

38 spl & 9mm about 6 with known brass.
357 Magnum loads about 3 using Federal brass.

The only range brass I use comes from people shooting factory loads of a name brand. I ask and pick up only that brass -- not bucket brass.

Speaking for 9mm and.45acp, you will most likely lose it before you can't reload it anymore unless you are loading very hot.
RichH

It's pretty easy to tell if brass that has only been fired once vs brass fired mutliple times. How many times is the diff part. For handgun, I use a lot of range brass, no worries, I rarely load max loads. Rifle brass, I am more suspect of anything picked up at the range. Pressures can run 1.5-2x higher in rifles @ even moderate loads.

Failing rifle cases will either be a head sep, most severe & hardest to see, neck or shoulder splits, not a huge issue, or expanded primer pockets. When primers decap & seat too easily, that case is ruined. The other defects are more readily seen. You have to go looking for an incipiant head sep, but they can be cught before they happen w/ careful case inspection.

Handgun brass, loaded to mderate pressure levels, 10x is easy, 20x is not unheard of. Rifle brass, always depends on pressures run & die setup. Minimal sizing = longer case life. Some guns require full length sizing & headspace increases, this shortens case life. So on say 223 or 308 in mil spec rifles, 6-8x reloaded seems about the avg. For bolt guns & neck sizing or partial FL sizing, 10X is quite easy & if you anneal the necks, 15x is not unheard of.

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NRA Cert. Inst. IDPA CSO

I don't keep track. If a case looks wonky I toss it.

Otherwise, it's "once more unto the breach dear friends, once more...*"


*Apologies to King Henry V

Straight wall brass will get loaded until the mouth splits or the pocket becomes so lose that the primer falls out.

With bottle neck brass I have no set number of times. The cartridge itself will determine that.

The hand loaders that have spoken before me on this thread speak the truth. But hear ye this.

Many years ago now, Dr Carl Sagan said that “every atom that ever existed still exists”.
(Or Atoms do not wear out, nor do they ever get tired)

Brass (copper and zinc atoms) has very little oxidation.

When I was reloading many years ago, I was only interested in 38 special and 357 magnum. Very few hot loads. Very few 357.

So, not being an expert in brass flowing, cases lengthening, hardening, or cracking, some opinions were still gleaned.

Like hitting metals between a hammer and anvil - brass gets harder and perhaps thinner each time it is fired. In low pressure cartridges it is minimal.

The mind game is simple and basic. Draw a one inch square on a piece of paper. Now draw a vertical and horizontal line dividing it into 4 equal parts one half inch one each side. Yes in water pipes and gun barrels 1 inch is 4 times bigger than 1/2 inch.

You can move 4 times more water through a 2 inch pipe than a 1 inch pipe. 4 times more through a 50 caliber than a 25 caliber (at similar pressure).

Stay away from the Kinetic Energy (religious cult) where they square the velocity compounding energy with speed. They will draw you in with there evil flat trajectories. Their exploding prairie dogs at 300 yards.
Their brass flows and gets brittle. It is an abomination requiring a sacrificial beer later on. Much annealing and trimming of cases. Excessive worry. Shun them.

Like many others, I don't keep track of pistol brass - I just reload it until it splits and, if I ever get one with a loose primer pocket (hasn't happened yet), I'll trash that as well. My first centerfire handgun, purchases back around 1975 - an original Colt Trooper (not Mark III) - came with a couple hundred Super Vel cases that I still have most of and still reload. The nickel plating has mostly worn off, but the cases themselves are fine. Rifle brass - operating at generally much higher pressures much closer to my face - I'm a good bit more fussy with.

Did he really say that? He should have known better - uranium atoms are destroyed in power plants every day, and every star is in the business of destroying lighter atoms to make new heavier ones.

I have bought 50 rounds of Remington factory 38 special wadcutters, 20 rounds of 222 Rem factory ammo, 20 rounds of 308 Federal 168 grain BTHP match ammo, and 20 rounds of 30-06 165 grain BTHP. That totals 110 pieces of brass.

I have in my possession the following quanties of tumbled brass: 17 gallons of 45 acp, 2 gallons 40 S&W, 3 gallons 38 spl, 2 gallons 357 mag 3 gallons 30-06, 2 gallons 308, 500 pieces 7 mm Rem magnum, and estimating 35,000 rounds of loaded center fire handgun ammo. I have not had any problems with "RANGE BRASS". I don't clean primer pockets, don't sort headstamps just calibers. I do trim to length 357 and 44 mag pistol brass, and all rifle brass. I have ZERO brass stamped AMERC. That is my story and I'm sticking to it.

Over the course of shooting prairie dogs for 10 years (1982 to 1992), I literally shot the rifling out of a stainless steel 25-06 barrel, 222 Rem steel barrels on a S&W M1500 and TC Contender. I don't worry about the pedigree of a brass case. 95% of the brass failures I have seen were in the neck, the other 5% were body cracks from firing in my S&W M52.

Brass last until the necks crack. That might be 3 reloads or 20 reloads.

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S&WHF 366

me too!

Right you are I still have a few of .38 caliber TOOL brass I picked up in the mid 70s. TOOL is the brass that the lathers used for shooting 3/8” studs in the concrete to support the ceiling they were putting up. I got literally thousand of that brass as no one else wanted them. I would stay late after work take a broom and pile them up and then throw into a shopping bag. The foreman caught me one day and asked what I was doing. After I explained he had his guys dump the empties into boxes and saved me from cleaning the floors. This was a big job and I got brass for about 3 months. On the last day the lather crew was working (4 guys) I took them all out to lunch to say thanks!

Those brass other than saying tool are a 100% identical to regular .38 revolver brass and without exaggerating I have gotten over 25 loadings out of most. FWIW I only shoot 158 LSWC bullets with 3.2 bulls eye @ about 850FPS. Been usin that load a loooooong time!

Most people shoot .22 or .25 for concrete anchors but I lucked out.

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14 S&W Revs none with locks!

Not to mention the destruction in supercollider's.
Actually he said all our heavy atoms were made in supernovas.
Apparently he assumed (or I did not hear him say) that only hydrogen was made in the big bang (or something like that someone else said).

Yes Carl Sagan said that every atom in our bodies was made in an exploding star. Every atom that ever existed still exists.

Naturally, for my kids, I changed it to "every atom in our bodies has been run through the bowels of dinosaurs millions of times".

(When I heard this it was Carl Sagan saying it)
(Obviously this includes the brass in our cartridges)

NOVA | The Star In You

"Our planet, our society, and we ourselves are built of star stuff."—Carl Sagan, Cosmos

The Star In You
By Peter Tyson
Posted 12.02.10
NOVA scienceNOW

(First Paragraph)
Here's an amazing fact for your next cocktail party: Every single atom in your body—the calcium in your bones, the carbon in your genes, the iron in your blood, the gold in your filling—was created in a star billions of years ago. All except atoms of hydrogen and one or two of the next lightest elements. They were formed even earlier, shortly after the Big Bang began 13.7 billion years ago.

Carl Sagan did a lot of TV interviews.

I saw him on The Johnnie Carson Show several times.

The quote I recall he might have said:
Every Atom that "now exists", has always existed, since it was made in a star.

Yes, of course. Normal stars build the atoms in the period table up to the atomic weight of iron; supernovae and who knows what else may be out there have the extra energy to go beyond that. My point was that if, for example, you take two hydrogen atoms and make one helium atom (the basic fusion reaction that powers the sun and other stars), those two hydrogen atoms longer exist, which is what makes Sagan's statement incorrect.

(And with that, I'll acknowledge the patience of the mods in allowing this very off-topic discussion; patience which I will not try further.)

Great . . . Now I find out I've been recycled.

Note that virtually all ammo you find at a range is in fact "once fired." Reloaders tend to pick up their own brass, and any in the area as well! What's left is stuff that's been shot just once by non-reloaders.

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USAF, 69-92
Vietnam, 72-73

I was trying to establish that anything we do to atoms in our lifetime, in our homes, will not effect them much. Manufacturing brass shells, using, and reusing brass shells is all about accidentally and intentionally hardening and annealing and such.
(So here is the groveling I must now do)

But - But, But, Mr FlyFish I was trying to sound really scientific about atoms. Now I must wiggle a bit and try to recall what Carl Sagan really said.
(deniability) Johnnie Carson show came on late at night an I had just gotten off shift. It was probably my first year of marriage….

But as we explored this subject I realized that me and my Smith & Wesson revolvers are more different than I imagined. At one time I was contemplating being buried with my favorite handgun. (One lady insisted on being buried in her sports car?)

But now I realize that I am recycled food chain molecules and my precious guns are mined from sterile earth minerals.

So now, if I want to start a cottage industry of burying people with their favorite guns I must fine ways to bring my guns into the food chain. Carbon steel would probably enter the food chain atoms better than stainless. We are all made of topsoil, our guns and other metal tools are not. We are closer kin to the wood stocks than the steel parts.

So, the first out of the ocean was vegetation. For millions of years various grasses and bushes lived and died to make the topsoil for us. Then eventually, when the land was fertile our earliest ancestors emerged from the water and became part of the food chain. If only because we ate vegetation and died becoming part of the complex molecules in topsoil.

I carried my S&W revolver all over the Sierra Nevada Mountain trails studying the geology and the downward conveyor belt action of the 8 or 9 miles of erosion, by weather and vegetation (roots have acids that actually disassemble and absorb the calcium and iron and all other mineral atoms in rocks (we were rocks before we were dust). Even in death the vegetation forms carbonic acids that helps digest and recycle rocks). (Atoms are never changed - they just form into other molecules).

(Okay - now we will get bumped out of here and it is your fault for making it more interesting than it needed to be. And we still have not debated how the heavy gold, in the engraving, on really nice guns, got pushed to the surface of the earth). (Think giant meteors miles across busting through the crust of the earth and metals spurting up cracks).
(In California it seems to be old earthquake faults - obvious in the oldest most eroded mountains).

(The story of us and our S&W firearms goes way way back. If only S&W made a Bowie Knife with hollow handle for fishing hooks and string).

So, some day, in the next 39 years (when I croak at 100) someone will ask my nearest family rep…. why the fired shells all around him.

He is paying for it, and wishes are wishes. Wishes can often be bought. They say he put old guns on his grinder, ground a few of them to dust, and sprinkled them on his flower bed. Those flowers right there are from his garden. They and the topsoil are his guns, and will go where he goes. The shells he wanted left as shells.

He always wanted to mine gold. Read books containing mineral vein maps, earthquake fault maps, plate tectonic maps. At one point wanted to add gold to brass for 38 special shells.

Gold is really tough. It can remain in mountain streams when almost all other minerals have been hammered to dust or oxidized. He wanted to put the gold in the last quarter inch of the 38 special shell, that gets belled out after being sized down. Then crimped down again after bullet inserted.

He was not a geologist but read what he wanted. He said the “black sand” in mountain streams must be nickel iron from meteors. The only thing, other than gold, he felt was tough enough to survive millions of years of mountain erosion.

The Sierra Nevada Mountains are over 200 million years old. One revolution of the Milky Way galaxy. One Milky Way Revolution ago the dinosaurs began. Or so he claimed.

And why did Delos not make a pistol from his beloved black-sand and gold/copper? His wife said he was pretty lazy, unless walking in the mountains or going in some old mine. He loved S&W revolvers and John Muir’s Water Ouzel. A water bird that was the only one that could sing happy notes in a freezing Sierra Nevada blizzard.

Delos died still saving his money to have a Water Ouzel engraved on a six inch stainless steel S&W revolver. Lazy bum never finished anything (they will say).

I have a batch of 44mag that has been fired 16x. After 6-8, it might need trimming.

I only reload handgun ammo.
Some fellow shooters who use factory ammo regularly give me their once-fired brass.
Apart from that I only reload my own brass, of which I know the history.
I reload both 'till they split. In mild loads, such as 148 HBWC .38 Spl stuff, this takes a LOT of time/reloads.

I totally agree with mikld; as I only load for target practice (light/medium loads) if you just do a good job of inspecting each time you should not have any problems re-using until a crack or other deformity shows up.

I reload brass until it shows signs of fatigue. I only load magnum loads in nickel plated brass and only 6 times before I toss them.

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Make mine an N Frame

I have brass in pistol and straight sided rifle cases that I haven't a clue how many reloadings are on them. On the other hand I had a light loaded .38 special split last week with a case that I am sure was a once fired case.

44 rem mag running 19 gr of 2400 I load 8 times then discard.
357 mag running 17 gr of 2400 I load approximately 15 then discard.
45 acp/ar i load until they degrade which is a very long time.
Thanks, Mike

are u on ZeroHedge? I notched NWMEN is in OH?

And I went and left my Universal Translator in my other suit!

I don't keep track on .38 or .357 brass, beyond once fired. I like to save once fired for special purposes. Anytime I find a primer seats too easily, I mark the bottom up with a sharpie and discard that case after that firing. I haven't had very many mouth splits, (single digits) but I have only been reloading for about 4 years. They are harmless when they split at the mouth anyways.

For my AR, I only use any one piece of brass 5 times total, including original firing, and then it goes into the recycling bin. It gets full length resized with a small base die every time, so I don't like to take chances.

I haven't quite decided what I will do with my Glock and the .40 brass. I think I will probably do the same regimen as the AR, because the brass gets chewed up by extractors, ejectors, concrete and the Glock bulge. I do use a Redding G-Rx die also.

When it comes to brass, the phrase "penny-wise, pound-foolish" is at the front of my mind. I don't reuse a piece of suspect brass, or use a piece more times, to save a penny if it risks my five hundred dollar or thousand dollar gun.