Brass prep: What steps do you feel are a waste of time?

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Roddy

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Just curious what people do for brass prep and what people feel is unnecessary, either because you don't have the time or equipment or it doesn't make a difference.

There seems to be a lot of different opinions. For example cleaning primer pockets. I have heard casual shooters say this is important to ensure consistent powder ignition while some bench rest medal holders say it a waste of time.

Myself my steps for rifle brass for precision shooting are:

-tumble in corn cob
-put in a tupperware with lube and shake them up
-full length size and decap
-clean primer pockets
-trim with Lee Quick Trim
-chamfer and deburr as the Lee trimmer leaves an edge
-tumble again to clean off lube
-quick check for cleaning media in flash hole


I do not

-neck turn
-weigh or sort brass
-anneal (yet)
 
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Same steps as yourself except I do feel cleaning primer pockets is worth it, and I also brush the inside for the case neck. I haven't bought a flash hole uniformed yet but I will, and add that step. I don't weight sort but do sort by case head stamp. I don't neck turn or anneal.
 
Not sure any of that is a waste of time, I do all that plus initially I will uniform the primer pocket and debur the flash hole. I have just taken to weighing brass and projectiles for consistency. I also do not neck turn or anneal yet. Having said that, I haven't tested loads without a step to see if there is any difference, but I feel better about it if I do everything I reasonably can. What I have noticed is that the bullet choice, powder choice, and brass quality like Lapua do make a difference in accuracy.
 
I don't clean my brass unless it's looking really filthy, nor do I clean primer pockets. I only trim when absolutely necessary. I haven't found it necessary to neck turn yet! I do sort my brass because I've found big differences just between different lots of the same manufacture.
 
The cleaning is mostly so I don't get grime in my sizing dies. Also I can see dents more easily. Plus they look nice.

I find a lot of people say, and I am one of them, that they perform certain steps because it gives them confidence in their ammo even if there is no proof they have any effect on accuracy.
 
I decap first. Then wet tumble. Then annealling. Then it's time to do some measuring. If needs be, a full length resize then a neck size. Then trim. Easy. If I leave the cases in the wet tumbler long enough, primer pockets come perfectly clean and only need a visual check.

I follow these steps all of the time. FL resize doesn't happen every firing though. Only if needs be after careful measuring. But neck sizing happens every time. The same with trimming. I try to keep my measuring error to +\- .001" or better. Working slowly is better in brass prep.

I do not neck turn any of my brass.
 
I don't bulk lube my cases.
I use sizing wax.

I guess it depends on what you are trying to accomplish.
Are you a production reloader, who just wants cheaper ammo to bang away with?
Or.
Are you a dedicated accuracy junky, looking to wring ever last bit out of your reloads?

Or are you somewhere in between?
 
I do the same as you except I don't clean primer pockets but I do deprime before tumbling so that cleans pockets, and I tumble mostly just to clean my brass in and out, not to polish like new.
 
Lefty #### said:
I don't bulk lube my cases.
I use sizing wax.

I guess it depends on what you are trying to accomplish.
Are you a production reloader, who just wants cheaper ammo to bang away with?
Or.
Are you a dedicated accuracy junky, looking to wring ever last bit out of your reloads?

Or are you somewhere in between?
Click to expand...

Well even if you were extremely accuracy obsessed are there steps that add nothing of value?

Take cleaning primer pockets again. If you loaded a batch of ammo with cleaned primer pockets and a batch without would you see any difference in accuracy? Would it be 1%? 10%?

For all the books and products out there for reloading I am surprised there are not more mythbuster type tests to prove these things one way or the other.
 
While I have always cleaned primer pockets, and like to tumble clean brass, I don't think now that either is necessary.

For many years, I had no tumbler and had no problems with less than shiny reloads.

As for primer pocket cleaning, according to some on You-Tube, it makes little difference.
If you just want to go straight to a turret or progressive press and load a lot of handgun ammunition, it can be skipped to speed things up.

I have heard it said that straight-walled cases don't stretch and don't need case trimming, but I have found that they do, so I do it every 2nd reload at least. I case trim rifle cartridges every time.

I never inside lubricate case mouths and have never noticed any need to.

Never had any reason to anneal.
 
For those that do anneal, after how many shots? Or is there another way to determine its required?

I wash, lube, decap/size, wipe off lube w/rubbing alcohol, trim, chamfer/deburr, clean primer pockets, then load up.

I wash with water, soap, vinegar and a dash of mail Polish remover in a big jug, then shake it. Lube in a old margarine container.
 
Suther said:
For those that do anneal, after how many shots? Or is there another way to determine its required?

...
Click to expand...

I personally anneal when despite the same process I can feel variances in the neck tension when loading bullets. So far, typically I end up wanting to anneal after 4-7 loadings. If they make it to 7 neck sized loadings I'll anneal them just as preventative maintenance to keep my brass from neck splitting. With neck sizing I bet I could get many more reloadings before neck splitting but I don't mind doing it. Once a few start to feel hard to seat I'll anneal the whole batch so they all still have the same number of reloadings. That's what I do with my two rifles that I reload "Match" ammo for anyway. K31, and Mosin.

As I understand it, if you are reloading for a caliber that is historically hard on brass such as .303 Britt you likely want to anneal after 2 or 3 loadings. Full length sizing works the brass much harder as well. Brass is expensive, annealing is cheap.
 
Suther said:
For those that do anneal, after how many shots? Or is there another way to determine its required?

I wash, lube, decap/size, wipe off lube w/rubbing alcohol, trim, chamfer/deburr, clean primer pockets, then load up.

I wash with water, soap, vinegar and a dash of mail Polish remover in a big jug, then shake it. Lube in a old margarine container.
Click to expand...

I'll anneal about every 5 cycles with .223 & .308. But every time with a magnum case.
 
6MT said:
I'll anneal about every 5 cycles with .223 & .308. But every time with a magnum case.
Click to expand...

Same here - .223 and .308 for semi-autos are rarely annealed - every 4-5 firings, assuming that they don't get destroyed by the firing sequence before that (M1A/M14s are pretty tough on brass - especially the commercial stuff). Bolt gun .308 gets annealed every other firing (I have an Annie induction annealer so it's zero setup time) - primarily to ensure consistent neck tension after neck sizing.

.300 Win Mag and .50 BMG get annealed after every firing. I invested in some rather expensive brass, and am willing to put the work in to extend case life.

Forking out some $$$ for a CH4D .50 BMG neck bushing die was an excellent investment - I remove the bushing to deprime the cases before tumbling, and neck sizing is a lot easier in terms of press effort than full-length re-sizing.

I tend to tumble every firing after depriming and for lube removal after full-length sizing - a bit of a pain, but I am happy to run my brass in batches and keep the tumbler rolling along...
 
MuthaFunk said:
I personally anneal when despite the same process I can feel variances in the neck tension when loading bullets. So far, typically
Click to expand...

That's why I got into annealing. Variances here seating bullets after 4x firing ( Lapua/PRVI ) and to experience whether or not it will extend brass life in our rifles. 303br's and 7-08's bolt actions. Can't speak regarding the large volume and semi auto reloaders.

Bullet seating VERY repeatable after the process. Don't know when the variances will show up in the future. (haven't shot the annealed brass enough yet.) Suspect after 3 firings is when this may begin occur again. It's my understanding the frequency of annealing is dependent on how hot the loads may be for your particular rifle and the quality of the brass itself, but we'll see what experience indicates.

Primer pockets reamed and flash holes de-burred once when new to me. Cleanliness of brass not critical to myself however the flash hole de-burring just makes be feel better. I don't have any honest comparable results to indicate if that makes a difference.

Brass after firing is sample audited for case length growth. I have found that as the brass if further work hardened there is less case length increase. I'm interested to see if after annealing the cases will stretch out a bit more and then lessen in case growth again.

Cases cleaned as necessary/required for sizing operations. Body bump sizing and lee collet die here.

Regards
Ronr
 
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