Lake City Brass

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sig72

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I recently purchased a case of Lake City 7.62/nato ammo to fire in a Savage 10TR & then use the brass for reloading .
I use federal large rifle primers but it seems like the primer pockets are a bit of the tight side. Has anyone else noticed this?
Are there any other brands of primer that fit better or do you have to enlarge the primer pocket?
Thanks for your help.
 
i have taken the crimp out of LC brass my .223 and have found that the pockets are a little tight, using CCI small rifle. While it take some care seating the primer no real issues. The brass is great stuff. I was shocked when I weighed a batch of 50 rounds and found the variation to be 1.1 grains. Maybe I got lucky, but will be looking for any orphaned cases left on the range for when this stuff finally packs it in.
 
Hi Ganderite,

on this note, just a question as I always value your opinion on reloading.

I know in general, military brass does require reduced charge. However, have you ever tested(either actual pressure[don't know how], or velocity as indicator) L.C brass vs commercial to be sure it has to be reduced that much?

I am asking is because I have been doing lots of load tests lately with different brasses in 223 and 308. I am using the same rifle, same bullet, powder, OAL, and primer, only swap out brass. Then I use labradar to measure the velocity as I think that would be a good indicator for the pressure. I also compared with the measured velocity from hornady factory ammo and documented velocity from hornady and hodgdon manual. What I found was that, with 223rem, LC and R.P brass actually gave out less velocity than Federal & PSD. Aguila has higher velocity(about 50fps out of 26gr CFE 223 from my x95). On 308WIN, I only tested Hornady, Lapua and Hirtenberger(Military brass) so far, (LC is to-be-tested). The interesting thing is that Hirtenberger uses pretty much the same charge as Hornady and Lapua, and gave out a little less velocity compared to Lapua.

So, military brass is not necessary to hold less charge than commercial it seems, but only to start low enough just to be same. Does that make sense?

Ganderite said:
When you reload, remember it is heavy military brass and you must reduced powder charges compared to commercial brass. I reduce about 2.0 gr.
Click to expand...
 
Military Lake City 7.62 brass is thicker in the base than commercial .308 cases and this Lake City 7.62 brass has 1 to 2 grains "LESS" case capacity.

Lake City 5.56 cases are "NOT" thicker like 7.62 cases because it would cut down too much on its case capacity so they made 5.56 cases harder in the base.

Below you will see the Lake City 5.56 cases have the most case capacity, and the majority of 5.56 and .223 cases are close in capacity.

LjAQ7L9.jpg


You can also see that Lake City cases are more uniform than Remington and Winchester cases. And far cheaper than Lapua and why I buy bulk once fired Lake City 5.56 and 7.62 cases.

PExmCCk.jpg


How Hard is Your Brass? 5.56 and .223 Rem Base Hardness Tests
http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2014/05/how-hard-is-your-brass-5-56-and-223-rem-base-hardness-tests/

Bottom line, military Lake City 7.62 cases are thicker in the base to better withstand being fired in larger diameter machine gun chambers. And why machine gun brass is harder to resize.

NOTE, I have the 1992 Hodgdon's manual (book) and it list loads for Winchester .308 cases and also using 7.62 military cases and the max loads are 2 grains less than the .308 cases. And if you Google the subject you will find postings where they checked capacity and the military cases vary between 1 and 2 grains less case capacity. So just work up your loads checking for excessive pressure signs.

Cartridge Case Capacities (shows 2 grains less capacity with military .7.62 cases)
http://kwk.us/cases.html

Old School .308 Winchester Match Loads
http://www.provenreloads-handloads.com/articles/2016/9/18/old-school-308-winchester-match-loads

From link above
Caveats:
Unless otherwise noted, the following loads assume that you’re utilizing Lake City Arsenal (LC) or Frankford Arsenal (FA) Military Match brass. Any of the FA or LC Match brass is great for use in these loads. The most consistent and, therefore, most desirable of the "old school" brass would be FA 63 Match, FA 64 Match, LC 64 Match, LC 64 NM, LC 66 Match, LC 66 NM, LC 72 Match or LC 77 Match.
 
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Hi bigedp51, thanks for the detailed info. I think I saw these two charts below. two things.

1. do you have similar chart for 308? just to be clear, my question for LC was just a question, not to challenge the comment on the reduced load as I haven't done my testing yet. and yes, as first safety rule, always start low and work my way up. thanks for the reminder. never hurt to hear that. :)
2. in the first chart, in my own testing, the weight has been always the opposite of the volume, the heavier, the less volume, but in your first chart, the WCC99 and Federal were the exceptions. I don't have WCC99, but my Federals measured between 91.35-92.46gr(10 cases) which follows the pattern in my own testings.

bigedp51 said:
Military Lake City 7.62 brass is thicker in the base than commercial .308 cases and this Lake City 7.62 brass has 1 to 2 grains "LESS" case capacity.

Lake City 5.56 cases are "NOT" thicker like 7.62 cases because it would cut down too much on its case capacity so they made 5.56 cases harder in the base.

Below you will see the Lake City 5.56 cases have the most case capacity, and the majority of 5.56 and .223 cases are close in capacity.

LjAQ7L9.jpg


You can also see that Lake City cases are more uniform than Remington and Winchester cases. And far cheaper than Lapua and why I buy bulk once fired Lake City 5.56 and 7.62 cases.

PExmCCk.jpg


How Hard is Your Brass? 5.56 and .223 Rem Base Hardness Tests
http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2014/05/how-hard-is-your-brass-5-56-and-223-rem-base-hardness-tests/

Bottom line, military Lake City 7.62 cases are thicker in the base to better withstand being fired in larger diameter machine gun chambers. And why machine gun brass is harder to resize.

NOTE, I have the 1992 Hodgdon's manual (book) and it list loads for Winchester .308 cases and also using 7.62 military cases and the max loads are 2 grains less than the .308 cases. And if you Google the subject you will find postings where they checked capacity and the military cases vary between 1 and 2 grains less case capacity. So just work up your loads checking for excessive pressure signs.

Cartridge Case Capacities (shows 2 grains less capacity with military .7.62 cases)
http://kwk.us/cases.html

Old School .308 Winchester Match Loads
http://www.provenreloads-handloads.com/articles/2016/9/18/old-school-308-winchester-match-loads
Click to expand...
 
7.62 NATO brass is quite a but thicker/heavier then commercial brass. I use IVI which is the Canadian equivalent of Lake City brass and it was 30-35gr heavier (18% or so heavier) then commercial brass.
Hirtenberger isn't NATO spec, and the cases are the same weight or lighter then commercial brass I weighed. It's also a bit soft...reminds me of commercial Fed brass.
 
I see. good to know. I love Hirtenberger brass, with cheap hornady bthp, it gives me half moa @ 200 yards with my little ruger american predator.

Hitzy said:
7.62 NATO brass is quite a but thicker/heavier then commercial brass. I use IVI which is the Canadian equivalent of Lake City brass and it was 30-35gr heavier (18% or so heavier) then commercial brass.
Hirtenberger isn't NATO spec, and the cases are the same weight or lighter then commercial brass I weighed. It's also a bit soft...reminds me of commercial Fed brass.
Click to expand...
 
I was thinking 7.62 when I made the comment. The proof is in the case weight. Make a note in your log book what your various brands of commercial cases weigh. I have seem military cases 100 gr heavier than commercial.

EDIt: Not 100 gr heavier. My commercial cases run around 168 gr. I have military cases at 200 gr. These have less capacity and I load about 2 gr less powder.
 
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Lucky

I do not have any detailed info on .308/7.62 cases like the .223/5.56 cases above, sorry. The .223/5.56 images came from the Accurate Shooter website.
http://www.accurateshooter.com/cartridge-guides/223rem/

The .308 link does not have case capacities or case weights but does list loads using different brands of brass.
http://www.accurateshooter.com/cartridge-guides/308win/

My first batch of 500 bulk once fired Lake City 7.62 cases I wanted to convert to .243 but the case necks became thicker and not as uniform. And I didn't feel like neck turning 500 cases so I went out and bought a Savage Hog Hunter and ordered a 1000 more Lake City cases. (who needs a good reason to buy a new gun) ;) I sorted these cases by neck thickness variations and then sorted by weight and used the best cases. What surprised me was there was not that much weight variation with cases with the same date and over 75% of these cases were the same head stamp date.

Bottom line, Lake City brass in my opinion is better than new Remington or Winchester cases. And the Lake City 7.62 cases are made Ford Truck Tough. :stirthepot2:

PISS_ON_CHEVY033008062506.gif
 
Thanks bigedp51 & Ganderite. I am in the process of doing just that. On my load data spreadsheet, I have columns for brass brand and weight(weight at least 10 cases each and take the average). so far for the cases I have, both 223 & 762/308 are following the weight vs volume/charge rule while the heavier the case, the hotter the load with the same charge. The 3 brasses I tested so far(Hornady/Lapua/Hirtenberger) are all good to me. still more to test, including LC, Federal, Winchester, PPU etc. It has been a slow, but fun experiment.
 
sig72 said:
I recently purchased a case of Lake City 7.62/nato ammo to fire in a Savage 10TR & then use the brass for reloading .
I use federal large rifle primers but it seems like the primer pockets are a bit of the tight side. Has anyone else noticed this?
Are there any other brands of primer that fit better or do you have to enlarge the primer pocket?
Thanks for your help.
Click to expand...

Where abouts do you live?
 
bigedp51 said:
Is Hitzy going to turn into a toad for answering a question about military brass?

Why is where to buy Canadian made military IVI brass off limits, or where to buy any type brass off limits for that matter?
Click to expand...

There are EE (Equipment Exchange) limitations on advertising IVI brass for sale, available only to business members. The mods/admin don't want to get in the middle of any potentially shady dealings as I understand it.

I haven't seen anybody getting chastised for discussing IVI brass in the reloading topics.
Advertising items for sale is supposed to go under the EE, not in the topics.

If anything I have mentioned above is incorrect, misleading or otherwise not quite the case, I'm sure a mod can set things straight.

bigedp51: I've always found your posts very informative. Keep it up!

OD
 
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