Home made 10 gauge brass

[antiqueguy]

fyi - buffalo arms will ship brass shotshells to Canada no problem. I picked up 125 24 gauge ones to make up into 577Snider and 577/450 MH in the past couple months.

They do not list 10 gauge though....

btw buffalo arms only has magtech and magtech dose not produce 10ga as far as is know only rocky mountain cartridge makes 10ga brass

 

[antiqueguy]

Ha you had the same issue as I did, after the 3rd shot I had shells spilling their contents in the tube, Wish I had a roll crimp. Tried caulking, waterglass, both ended up failing after shot 3. Nice shells BTW.

you can't really roll the edge of a brass hull what you would need to do is get a ch4d die set they mite put a slight crimp on the hull if someone has access to a lathe a die could be made to give a slight crimp. problem with this is then you need to anneal the mouth of the shell after a few firings or it will split. brass hulls are something that is generally used in in single shots and double barrels not pumps/lever guns

 

[ssapach]

brass hulls are something that is generally used in in single shots and double barrels not pumps/lever guns

I sort of suspected that as they don't feed as well as plastic.

Guess I need to find a break action 10 gauge for myself.....

 

[mooncoon]

This should allow me to remove more material from the head of the shell. But in order to do it nice and neat, I need to use a boring bar to eliminate the conical shape left from the spade drill.

It would be easier to make a small end mill out of drill rod and use that to create a flat bottom to the recess. Drill a hole in the center of the drill rod then use a hack saw to divide the end into quarters and a triangular file to create teeth. Heat red hot and quench in water then abrasive to give bright metal and draw the temper to brown

cheers mooncoon

 

[woodchopper]

those look good, gives me an idea.....

I have a hankering for a 4 bore

 

[ssapach]

Thanks for the tip mooncoon. I haven't attempted it yet as I have run into a sort of road block here.

I tried making a shell to accept the rifle primer and I discovered a small issue pretty quickly. I can't just drill a through-hole for the primer, it needs a shoulder to seat against otherwise my firing pin just pushes the primer in and doesn't ignite it. I even tried a couple more shells with smaller holes (couple different sizes) hoping that a tighter fit would prevent it, but it didn't help.

I've never reloaded rifle casings before, so I never realized that they all have that shoulder for the primer to sit against.

While the lower height of the primer allows me to make the head of the shell thinner, it will also require more work in drilling out the primer pocket. It's a toss up, as the shotgun primers worked fine with a straight through hole due to them have a large lip on them, but they require the head of the shell to be thicker.

Making brass shells isn't as straight forward as I had hoped.......

 

[eaglesnester]

careful there my son. U could end up with more work than U can handle and U could quit your day job. Can U say Sharps 45/90 45/110 45/120 Spencer .577? There are a lot of us up here that have these old shooters and can't get brass for em.

 

[Stray03]

you can't really roll the edge of a brass hull what you would need to do is get a ch4d die set they mite put a slight crimp on the hull if someone has access to a lathe a die could be made to give a slight crimp. problem with this is then you need to anneal the mouth of the shell after a few firings or it will split. brass hulls are something that is generally used in in single shots and double barrels not pumps/lever guns

I don't have bras hulls. I was using cut down plastic ones which I water glassed once and caulked once. By the third shot they failed and rather than a boom I got a pop.

 

[ssapach]

careful there my son. U could end up with more work than U can handle and U could quit your day job. Can U say Sharps 45/90 45/110 45/120 Spencer .577? There are a lot of us up here that have these old shooters and can't get brass for em.

I bought some 1" brass to make a bunch more (or attempt to) and it cost me nearly $250 for enough to make about 25-30 shells, depending on waste from cut-offs or screw ups.

I'm pretty sure if someone were cutting out lots of these, they could get more brass at a lower cost. But I'm buying small amounts from a retailer that specializes in selling in whatever length you want.....their prices are generally higher for all material.

 

[catnthehatt]

Ha you had the same issue as I did, after the 3rd shot I had shells spilling their contents in the tube, Wish I had a roll crimp. Tried caulking, waterglass, both ended up failing after shot 3. Nice shells BTW.

I've been shooting black powder cartridge shells in my shotguns for many, many years for hunting.
I use silicone these days, and have never had a problem .
I have never crimped a brass shell.
I get all my brass from Will Bilozir, just did up a bunch of 24 gauge mag tech for my .577 Snider the other day for my carbine.
Cat

 

[antiqueguy]

I don't have bras hulls. I was using cut down plastic ones which I water glassed once and caulked once. By the third shot they failed and rather than a boom I got a pop.

and no roll crimp is because ?????? any shell getting cycled through a gun(pump/lever) should be crimped. roll crimpers are cheap and it will save you lots of headaches they only need a drill to be used

 

[tiriaq]

If you want to cut pockets for LR or LP primers, it is a good idea to make a tool like a little end mill to do the job in one step.

 

[Stray03]

and no roll crimp is because ?????? any shell getting cycled through a gun(pump/lever) should be crimped. roll crimpers are cheap and it will save you lots of headaches they only need a drill to be used

Cause I haven't bought/ made one yet. Would like to find one of the old hand cranked ones, but finding a 10gauge one is a PITA

 

[ssapach]

If you want to cut pockets for LR or LP primers, it is a good idea to make a tool like a little end mill to do the job in one step.

I thought about getting the proper sized countersinking bit. My biggest issue is that the shells need to be turned around and put into the lathe chuck with the head sticking out, so I might have to make a tight fitting insert for the shells so that I can tighten them in the chuck without squashing them.

 

[trevj]

Making brass shells isn't as straight forward as I had hoped.......

That right there is the number one lesson learned, by every guy hat ever went down that road!

Nice work, by the way.

Hit the web and look for non-ferrous metal suppliers and see what prices they will quote you on full stick Qty's.

Metal Supermarket is OK for buying small pieces, or fishing their scrap and cut-offs bins for 'the right one', but their prices are like 7-11's. Grossly out of proportion. But they are up front about being about convenience, rather than competitive pricing!

Cheers
Trev

 

[Brassman66]

Very nice and interesting work.
Recently I started reloading (still experimenting) 12 Ga Brass Shells which where apparently made by Sedgewick in Alberta. They use a regular Shotgun primer which I prefer. I load them with smokeless Powder and also use plastic wads withy homemade oversize overpowder cards because the plastic Wads don't seal well in all Brass cases. As a overshot card I use homecut thin transparent hard plastic which I glue in with Lepage wood Glue. The transparent overshot card is nice because one sees at once what size of shot is in the shell. I shoot these shells only out of a double Barrel shotgun which is lots of fun.

Cheers

 

[ssapach]

So, because I'm determined and/or stubborn, I have gone and done this.....

I made a tool, for counter sinking around the primer pocket on the inside of my brass shells. Now I'm not professional tool maker, and I just used a piece of an axle shaft from a 1988 Toyota 4 Runner, so it looks a little crude.

But it seems to work, even after I broke a tooth off.

25/32" outside and 1/2" centre hole. I could probably go with something smaller, like 0.400" centre and still have quite a bit of material left around the primer.

The head of the shell (well, stubby practice piece) ended up being about 0.110" thick.

Then out of curiosity I made a tool that could do this to the end of a bass shell:

Is it safe to close brass shells this way instead of using glue to hold everything in??? My understanding is that they won't last as long as they will start to crack from being formed and reformed over and over again.

Unfortunately my tool also caused this (I was just messing around and using a bench vise):

Just for the record, it was a scrap shell. Didn't waste a good one to try this out.



I broke my priming tool a while ago. Then fixed it by welding it, and it broke again....

So I made my own, industrial strength!

Seems to work, could use some refinement. But for how many 10 gauge shells I reload each month, my slow process of priming and loading seems to work fine.

I'm open to input here. Is it even a good idea to countersink my shells like this? As in, the powder will have to burn back, but it seems that the old 10 gauge brass were made like this. I mostly wanted to do it so that the shells will fire-form more evenly. The ones I've tried that had a thicker head, they would bulge out noticeably where the material was thinner and leave a band unformed around the rim.

 

[Knuckles Muldoon]

and a 4 post in the back, seriously jealous!

 

[ssapach]

and a 4 post in the back, seriously jealous!

Not my shop, I just work in it. In exchange, when my dad needs something fixed I'm usually the one fixing it......or at least helping. Not a bad exchange really.

The lathe and shaper are both mine though.

 

[antiqueguy]

crimping the brass will shorten its life but if you anneal the mouth of the case when its made and every few firings after that it should help a bit