Likely a Stupid Question

[hogpatrol]

Where's our expert on this matter?

Annealed all the 308 brass this morning and FL sized them all. I randomly checked 20 of the brass by chambering and closing the bolt; EVERYONE I checked allowed the bolt to close WITHOUT effort. Now, since I shoot mostly cast in these cases, I shouldn't have to full length size again, right? I have a neck die to use for subsequent reloads. My other brass that I shoot jacketed in probably won't need FL sizing for several reloads since I tend to load on the lower end of the "hot rod" scale.
Thanks to everyone who helped.
BTW, prior to annealing the brass I ran a few through the FL die mounted in the RockChucker and held the ram up for 15 seconds. They chambered alright as well.

Save yourself further grief and full length resize every time.

 

[DeadEyeDick45]

Sounds like good advice.

 

[Bugs]

If you ever get any military brass that is a very dark, burnished bronze color, throw the darn stuff away. It is machine gun brass that is dead soft and will make sako extractors disappear. . . after you've used a rubber mallet to get the bolt open. . . . . ask me how I know.

 

[vmaxpro]

I would anneal it.

X2

 

[vmaxpro]

I prob should of read all the posts sorry :/

 

[Dusty Stevens]

Lake City 308 brass is IMO the very best brass that money can buy. It is made to be very hard, to be fired in an M-60 machine gun without failing. Having fired an M-60 I have seen those barrel get red hot and keep on firing, then flip the wing nuts, slide out the hot barrel and slide in a cooler barrel and be back in business within 90 seconds. As usual uncles Sam buys the best and then gives it away. Its nobody's money anyway, right?

Brass that can withstand those conditions is not ordinary brass. You have to think TOUGH and EXTREME. When you resize a normal piece of brass, like Lapua , Norma, etc..., a normal 2-3 second of dwell time is adequate for it to retain the resized dimensions. That won't work with LC brass, because it will have a tendency to spring back. Just try it. Resize a few pieces, push the shoulder back .002 and squeeze the neck down with .306 bushing. Measure them after you've finished and write each one's numbers down. Put them aside and next evening measure them again. They will all have sprung back to various degrees. That is why many beginners have all kinds of problems with LC brass.

Annealing will minimize spring back, so that is highly recommended, but you also have to increase the dwell time to 6-7 seconds minimum. When I used it, I gave it 10 seconds. Its a pain, but IMO its well worth it. You can push LC brass much harder than other brass and retain its integrity. Once, using my first custom 308, I wanted to find out where the abyss was and I just kept inching up my charges till I was pushing 180 grain JLK at 3050fps. The first 2 rounds I got gas leaks around the primer, the third round the primer blew right out. I stopped right there and never went back to that neighborhood. When I got home I cleaned the primer pockets of those 3 cases and just for kicks I tried seating nEditew primers. Guess what??? Yep, the primer seated just fine, I re-used those cases at least 5 or 6 times and were still working fine when I retired them. You can't do that with any other type of brass.

Depending on your chamber specs you may likely benefit from a small base die. It may help and will not hurt anything. At the risk of sounding trite, I assume you have a reliable shoulder bump gauge and calipers to measure head space.

Regards,

Joe

We should have some lc brass tested like the lapua test

 

[DeadEyeDick45]

Lake City 308 brass is IMO the very best brass that money can buy. It is made to be very hard, to be fired in an M-60 machine gun without failing. Having fired an M-60 I have seen those barrel get red hot and keep on firing, then flip the wing nuts, slide out the hot barrel and slide in a cooler barrel and be back in business within 90 seconds. As usual uncles Sam buys the best and then gives it away. Its nobody's money anyway, right?

Brass that can withstand those conditions is not ordinary brass. You have to think TOUGH and EXTREME. When you resize a normal piece of brass, like Lapua , Norma, etc..., a normal 2-3 second of dwell time is adequate for it to retain the resized dimensions. That won't work with LC brass, because it will have a tendency to spring back. Just try it. Resize a few pieces, push the shoulder back .002 and squeeze the neck down with .306 bushing. Measure them after you've finished and write each one's numbers down. Put them aside and next evening measure them again. They will all have sprung back to various degrees. That is why many beginners have all kinds of problems with LC brass.

Annealing will minimize spring back, so that is highly recommended, but you also have to increase the dwell time to 6-7 seconds minimum. When I used it, I gave it 10 seconds. Its a pain, but IMO its well worth it. You can push LC brass much harder than other brass and retain its integrity. Once, using my first custom 308, I wanted to find out where the abyss was and I just kept inching up my charges till I was pushing 180 grain JLK at 3050fps. The first 2 rounds I got gas leaks around the primer, the third round the primer blew right out. I stopped right there and never went back to that neighborhood. When I got home I cleaned the primer pockets of those 3 cases and just for kicks I tried seating nEditew primers. Guess what??? Yep, the primer seated just fine, I re-used those cases at least 5 or 6 times and were still working fine when I retired them. You can't do that with any other type of brass.

Depending on your chamber specs you may likely benefit from a small base die. It may help and will not hurt anything. At the risk of sounding trite, I assume you have a reliable shoulder bump gauge and calipers to measure head space.

Regards,

Joe

I have a Hornady head space setup and two sets of calipers. Thanks for the info Joe, I continue to learn. BTW, I will test the annealed brass again tomorrow.