Wayspr

I am new to reloading as I just ordered the RCBS Rockchucker supreme kit from Midway. I will be loading .30'06, .270, .280 and 7-08. I have been scrounging brass at the range as well as saving my own. Will mismatched brass cause me fits or should I start with new brass? Thanks in advance.

thommon

Go with new brass. For all the cartridges you mentioned the cost won't be much and will save you a lot of headaches. Wall thickness will come into play when mixing and matching from brand to brand.
The only time I scrounge brass at the range is when I see someone show up with nice boxes of factory ammo that they then shoot up and then neatly put the fired rounds back in the box and set them in the trash can.

T

Wayspr

Are their any advantages to getting nickel plated brass?

driftrider

Other than it looks nice, not really by my estimation. Nickel brass is harder because of the nickel plating, but I've had the nickel flake of after several firings. It theoretically would be harder on your dies because nickel is a LOT harder than brass. It costs a lot more, and the necks get brittle faster and split easier, and I'm note sure if you can anneal nickel brass. The only advantage I can think of is that it might extract a little easier if your chamber is rough or dirty.

I'd stick with plain brass cases. I prefer Winchester brass for my bottleneck rifle cartridges, and Starline brass for straight-walled cases. If you want to spend a little more to buy really great brass (rather than going with nickel plated), check out Lapua and Norma brass. That's the good stuff.

But if you have a lot of brass from scavenging the range, you could always sort the brass by headstamp. Then take, say, the Win brass, deprime, clean, FL resize and trim the necks to an even length. Now that you know that they are all of consistant dimension, weight sort them to within +/- 2 to 3 grains. Just be sure to inspect each case for bulges, shiny bands, etc... that might show fatigue and possibly lead to head separation, split necks and such. This is the other advantage of buying new brass. You know that it's all virgin brass and you'll always know exactly how it's been loaded and cared for.

Mike

stubblejumper

Never mix brass,the differing volumes will cause variations in pressure.Don't waste your money on plated brass,after a few loadings,it will usually begin to flake off anyways.

[email protected]

On bottleneck cases it's a great idea to purchase new brass and keep it segregated as you go thru the loading fireing and reloading cycle. I'm a fan of Lapua brass and find it fully the equal of Norma at a much better price.
I have been told that Hornady and Nosler both produce match grade brass but as I haven't used it I can't comment on the quality, although they are a little price'y.
Picking up range brass is a great idea and I do it myself whenever I get a chance, no matter what caliber or brand. I box it up and save it for a time when the $hi!! hits the fan, I may be proud to have it one day. We don't know what waits around the corner in this age we're living in.
If you were to ask me about straight wall brass like 45/70 I'd say it's not nearly as fussy as the bottleneck'ed variety, I generally mix Federal and Winchester without any noticeable changein group size.

thommon

I use Nickel Plated Remington brass in my 308 and 06. Never had any flaking problems.
I neck size only and reload them quite a bit.
The flaking problem could be due to the use of cheap dies.

T

driftrider

I've had nickel plated brass flake, and I use nothing but Redding dies for rifle cartridges. Do you think they're too cheap?

Mike

Remnard

I use brass of different manufacture. I just segregate them by maker and load accordingly. I would hesitate to load max loads in federal and then use the same load in winchester brass though.

I have loaded several calibers in nickel brass and never had any flaking, yet.