Depends all on the cartridge,brass, sizing die, and how hot you load it. My 44 mag with super hot loads have to be trimmed every other time. My plinking 44mag loads, you might not have to trim ever 5 shots. Some cartridgesquit growing.

The reasoning they gave for disgarding brass after 3 trimmings is that the case neck thickness will be getting pretty thin by then. I would have to check again but I think I read this in my Lyman's 48 edition.

You can check that believe it or not. But I too like to just toss most magnum loads after 5 firings. And standard rifle loads like 7. After a person has a ruptured case, they think twice before pushing thier brass to the distance.

If you don't knock back the headspace, you will not have case wall thinning like you will if you FL size everytime. Thats the reason I generally try to use collet dies or bushing dies.

Exactly. This is all I'm saying SJA. Trimming brass after every firing is total silliness.

You know at one time, I loved it. Thats been about a decade or more. It was theropudic, (not sure of spelling). But I too loathe the task. I have considered a motor for my trimmer.

Well, here goes! I like to shoot competition, in those guns I use for matches consistancy is everything to me. I have a trimmer for each comp. gun and trim after every firing. Sometimes I don't believe I'm even taking off .0005" But at least I know everything is exactly the same. I wont have one case that is .002 longer than another and I'll also know each one is sqared off to the best of my ability. Does it make a difference? Probably not one that you will see in a 100 yards and maybe not one you'll see in a 1000 yards. But this way I know I have done everthing possible for consistancy.

Hunting rifles, different story. Just so they are within specs I'm satisfied. I don't believe the gun is accurate enough to spend the time in case prep you do for a Custom rig.

I was at a match last summer and one of the other guys said ".001 here and .0005 there and one little puff of wind and its all out the window" How true it is!

Yea, I don't trim mine everytime either. I only trim mine when they are out of spec and that usually takes about 3-5 firings for mine and I am shooting a magnum so I am not getting much more out them anyway than 5 loadings.

BC, I built up a wildcat ages ago based on a 1 1/2" case. Trimming down the brass to make the cases for that broke me of EVER enjoying using a case trimmer again. I used to crank on that SOB till my fingers bled. Thank the Lord RCBS invented File Trim dies.

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Gunner - I can appreciate fully all the case trimming and diddling benchrest shooters do. But as you point out, it doesn't have much place in the real world of shooters and hunters.

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SJ - I think you and I are on the same page of music here.

That case trimmer is the most hated thing on my bench. That being said, I still trim right after I size the cases. For rifles. Shoot, size, trim and tumble.

I can't remember the last time I trimmed a straight walled revolver case....

There's no doubt if I was a competing bench rest shooter I would trim each case, each time. I wouldn't want the thoughts of different sized anything maybe flinging a shot even 1/4" off alwaysgnawing at my confidense. That way when everything mechanical is the same all you have to worry about is yourself, so trimming each case exactly the same each time in bench shooting makes a lot of sense to me.