I had my 300 RUM rebarreled with a Douglas XX Premium. Upon initial load development the old brass (twice fired) used in the old chamber was very sticky. I full length sized and chambering was not a problem. I thought the chamber was too tight so I had it touched up a bit. The new chamber is well withing specs. New brass does not exhibit the same problem so I do not think the chamber is out of round. New brass it very accurate and after firing one time does not exhibit the same problem either. Is the brass from the other chamber weak and stretching too much? I cannot find any external dimensional differences between the brass that sticks and the brass that doesn't yet I know there must be something. The old chamber was larger, I know that. Is the brass just getting weak after only two firings?

Unless the heads are starting to separate, I doubt that the cases are weak. However, if the chamber they were fired in the first two times is sufficiently oversize compared to the new one, it is possible that when fired in the new chamber, they don't "shrink back" to the full-length sizing dimensions they were at when they were sized & then reloaded. This would indicate that the older cases lost some of the "springiness" the new ones have, so the old ones tend to remain a little larger after being fired. I believe this is due to work-hardening that resulted from firing and resizing them more times. But I do NOT believe the old cases are actually "weak" or dangerous to use. Just a PITA to extract! I would relegate the old ones to range use only!

I think you are right. I apologize for forgetting that I posted the same question some time ago. Had lots of suggestions and help in that thread. I was just hoping again to solve the issue with the brass being so stinking expensive. I'm just going to stick to hunting with the new brass. With the brass only being fired twice and partial length sized the first time around i doubt it is work hardened. I guess its just one of those anomalies that comes with the game. After I shoot the older brass in my new chamber it does seem to solve the problem though for the next time it is sized and loaded. Maybe I'll just use it at the range as you said and hope to get one more cycle out of it.

I was thinking the same thing. I have never done it. Been reading some. Do you guys use the temp. crayon method or just eyeball it?