Not sure what you're doing wrong. Mine are good for at least 10-15 reloads. As others have noted some of my cases have been reloaded so many times much of the nickel has worn off but they're still going strong. Mind you these are light PPC loads (148 WC over 2.8 gr. of Bullseye) but you should definitely be getting more than 1 or 2 loads out of those cases. Silly question but you're reloading nickel cases and not aluminum, right? They can look similar.
38 special nickel case issue
- Thread starter HIGHRPM
- Start date
Nope, they are nickel. After reading all the replies, I am deducing that I should not flare the mouth as I do with the brass, although it's going to cut the lead and remove the powder coat. Like I had mentioned, the bullet seating felt no different from brass to nickel so I would not know that I might be stressing the case. I run light loads for my wife, so the cases should not be that abused, I would assume. Always learning, right !
I load 9mm nickel brass extensively on my Dillon with carbide dies. Many have been reloaded 10 or more times. I use a very slight bell on the case mouth and have used plated, powder coated and cast bullets with only an occasional brass issue. Usual brass issue I have is related to hot loads.
You may not want to go this route as it will cost you a few bucks but I really like the Hornady bullet seater dies because they have a floating sleeve that aligns the bullet with the case before it goes far enough into the case to start to seat. In fact I have purchase several Hornady seater dies in various pistol calibres for that exact reason. Once I switched to those the canted bullet problem which causes shaved lead & scraped off powder coat disappeared (especially with longer bullets like 38 WCs, SWCs and various 44 bullets).
I've been shooting .38 Spl competitively since 1989. I shot over 20,000 rds in IPSC in one year using only nickel cases and I have used them extensively for my wife and I in Cowboy Action since 1997. Like Fingers, I've loaded at least 100,000 rds of .38 spl in nickel cases. I can probably say that I get at least a minimum of 20 reloads before the case splits at the neck. I try to minimize the belling of the mouth and I crimp heavily using a RCBS Taper Crimp die. Because of the cost of bulk, one fired .38 brass is so cheap I have no quams about throwing it in the garbage when the case splits.
I've loaded lots of nickel .38 Special cases. Some might crack after only a couple firings, some keep going after most of the plating is worn away. Getting several firings out of the vast majority is no problem.
I figure that as long as the price is right for once-fired cases, I don't need to care if I have to cull a few a bit early.
I figure that as long as the price is right for once-fired cases, I don't need to care if I have to cull a few a bit early.
