Military Surplus: M2 Ball
 

Hey Guys,
I'm sure it's been covered, I did a forum search and didn't find it. Can a guy reload M2 Ball surplus brass? I've acquired an M1 Garand and a few hundred rounds of surplus M2 Ball ammo. I seem to remember that de-priming the spent round was the issue. Or is it best to just use 30.06 brass?

The reloading setup I was using was an old RCBS setup, and it was on loan. After having it for a couple years the owner asked for it back. So I will be getting a new reloading setup. Any thoughts on whats on the market now? I have no complaints with the RCBS, but open to other brands if they are better.

Thanks,
R

You can use the brass and yes the primer is the issue. I have never bothered and gave my M2 brass away, perhaps another can comment on how do deprime. If I recall correctly a standard depriming pin won't work. Then, you'll need a special tool to round out the primer pocket.

Remember that you cannot interchange loads worked up in military and commercial brass. The military brass is thicker. Also, make sure you read up on how to properly reload for the Garand, especially regarding proper sizing and powder selection. That is one gun you can get into trouble with if you do not do it right. You have to have the right pressure at the gas vent or you can bend the operating rod and shatter the stock.

The m2 brass can definitely be reloaded. I have reloaded thousands of those cases.
Most deprime pins were not up to the task of depriming the crimped-in primers. I sold it years ago, but I had a manual deprimer that consisted of a base and a deprime rod which was inserted and tapped with a hammer to remove the primer. I believe mine was made by CH.

There were, and I suppose still are, primer pocket swagers. This tool was driven into the pocket in order to properly size it for a new boxer primer. There were also primer pocket reamers which were used to remove the crimp. They worked similarly to a manual shell trimmer.

One thing I noticed was that some lots of ammo had very light primer crimps and could be deprimed with an ordinary resize/deprime die. These also could be reprimed with no reworking of the primer pocket.

i've used M2 military brass for the past 50 years. Never had a problem de-priming the cases with my reloading. Sure, a de-capping pin breaks once in awhile but i just install a new one. The crimp is easily removed using a case de-burring tool chucked into a drill press: Takes about 5 seconds per case.

Or you can use a primer pocket swaging too from RCBS that will remove the crimp.