38 nickel cases

Higginson's lists once fired .38 specials at $80/k, and I wouldn't pay that, personally. $60 is probably average. Two years ago I stumbled on a guy selling them for, I seem to recall, $25 /k at a gun show.

Keep in mind these prices are all mixed headstamp, mixed brass/nickel.
 
Are these all once only fired or are they your old stock that was reloaded a bunch of times? If once fired for certain then I would suspect that with today's prices for new brass that you could get $60 to $70 per thousand. But nickel cases don't last that many reloads before splitting so if they are your old stock which was reloaded a bunch of times I'd have a hard time paying more than $20 to $30 per thousand knowing that I'd have to use more time to closely inspect them and that I'd find a good number of split cases during each reloading cycle with them.
 
I don't think I've thrown more than a couple dozen away in 40 yrs of using nickel pated .38 brass. Some of the first 1000 pieces I bought in 1973 have been in the rotation ever since, loaded 30-50 times I'm sure.

As for price, the last I bought (6 yrs ago) was an ice cream barrel full of 8-9000 range brass...$50
 
I must be having the worst luck then. As it happens I sorted my trash bucket full of brass just this afternoon. Out of the .38Spl and .357Mag brass I must have tossed at good dozen splits or cracked lips away out of the probably 1800'ish cases.

These are all brass that I've shot myself and which were loaded by me. Cowboy loads and .38Spl regular power loads for IDPA. Very few magnum power loads. The only interesting note is that for a change the brass to nickel ratio was more like 1:3 instead of the more typical 1:10. This brass all came to me about 5 years back from an older estate. So I don't know how many times it had been loaded before I got it.
 
BCRider said:
I must be having the worst luck then. As it happens I sorted my trash bucket full of brass just this afternoon. Out of the .38Spl and .357Mag brass I must have tossed at good dozen splits or cracked lips away out of the probably 1800'ish cases.

These are all brass that I've shot myself and which were loaded by me. Cowboy loads and .38Spl regular power loads for IDPA. Very few magnum power loads. The only interesting note is that for a change the brass to nickel ratio was more like 1:3 instead of the more typical 1:10. This brass all came to me about 5 years back from an older estate. So I don't know how many times it had been loaded before I got it.
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I have the same experience as you BC Rider, the nickel cases don't last for me either.

Graydog
 
It is puzzling isn't it. My loads are all about the same "cowboy" loads at 700 fps give or take and I load with whatever powder I have available at the time, mostly Titegroup, 7625 or Trail Boss. I can't even attribute it to a tighter chamber here than you may have as I use whatever shells are in my hand for all of our .38's...two different Marlin cowboys, a Uberti short rifle 4 different Uberti pistols and two different Ruger Blackhawks.
 
I don't know where all the splits are coming from, I have a 5 gal pail of Federal +P nickle brass that has been reloaded at least 12-15 times each. Some of them so many times that the nickle is thinning and brass is starting to show through and i don't think I throw out more than a few a year. I'm loading HS-6, Universal and Unique for the most part and using enough to get 900+ FPS so they're not powder puff loads...
 
I think you should tell us what they sold for. You know, you asked for knowledge from the hive, now help us keep up our knowledge with your very empirical findings of their real value in todays market.
 
The fact that they went so fast also suggests that the price was less than what the market would really bear. Or that you just found a hungry buyer.... :d
 
BCRider said:
The fact that they went so fast also suggests that the price was less than what the market would really bear. Or that you just found a hungry buyer.... :d
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I'm a hungry buyer, I'm leaving for Arizona in a couple of weeks and expect to shoot a minimum of 14 days worth of matches, hopefully 17 days in 7 weeks. That's a lot of brass the wife and I will loose. So I seen a chance to replace it early.
 
It's nice to see someone that thinks ahead :d

It must not be cowboy action. The pickers get most of it. What sort of events do you and the missus shoot in?

And I'm officially envious of your holiday plans! ! ! !
 
I had this issue too, and for me what fixed it was backing off my Lee powder through expander die so that the neck wasn't flanged as much after this step. Now my nickle goes about 39 loadings or more which is on par with my brass.
 
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