Sorting Brass

[Area Man]

I am the proud owner of 100 brand new Lapua 243 Win Brass. I'm in no hurry to put them into use, but would like to sort them into the best 25, 2nd best 25, etc. I've read that neck thickness sorting is important, but also that some will weight sort. My questions:

Would you fire-form them all first, as is, then go into trimming to uniform length, and neck thickness measuring?

I am interested in reading what you "one-holers" do to a new batch of brass.

 

[jpretle]

It is Lapua. Load it and shoot it.

 

[CatShooter]

It is Lapua. Load it and shoot it.

What he said...

 

[Geronimo Jim]

I second.........er third that.

 

[finnaddict]

Why would you want to prep brand new LAPUA brass?

Requires no initial prep. Flash holes don't even require it.

 

[Area Man]

Why would you want to prep brand new LAPUA brass?

I was under the impression that all those case measurement tools had a purpose, but come to find out all one needs to do is buy Lapua brass.

 

[AusFclass]

Depends on what sort of rifle your running it in and how far away you want to shoot stuff! ;D

if you want to get long range custom rifle type serious. Inspect all the flash holes and remove any burrs with a pin drill that is the correct size (yes even lapua). Ideally using a dedicated neck expanding mandrel die run the mandrel through all the necks to make them perfectly round and to reduce some of the neck tension. Then using a sharp VLD chamfering tool chamfer the inside on the necks. Check you havent created a burr inside the neck by running a q tip in and out the neck. Weigh them and sort them in increasing weight order.

Put them in your ammo box in weight order . . . Load them in weight order . . . And shoot them in weight order.

A lot of guys batch them in weight groups and its a good idea for cheap brass but for good brass weighed in consecutive order the most variation youll have shot to shot is .1gr.

Or you could just load and shoot them!!! Haha hunting rifles it doesnt seem to make ANY difference and I cant even tell you indisputably if it makes any difference in a match rifle but if it makes you more confident then do it.

 

[Immike]

You will probably do the most good by making all the necks the same thickness with a skim turn. There is almost always a flawed piece of brass in every batch of brass I have ever used so sorting and finding it is first on my list.

 

[johara1]

If your going to shoot them out a 1000 yd. gun prep. them and turn necks,but if it's a factory gun shoot them..... jim

 

[Shynloco]

I am interested in reading what you "one-holers" do to a new batch of brass.

Personally, since you are talking a desire for precision, even Lapua requires uniformity in every detail, included deburring the flashholes. I too am chasing the "oneholers" and have learned over the years that as good as Lapua is (which is pretty much all I use except for ALSO using Lake City Match in my .308) that I've even found small shavings from the inside of Lapua flashholes when prepping it before every shooting it. Now there is mo added advantage in resizing Lapua brass before fireforming, but I clean the insides of the flashholes and champfer prior to first load. After that, no more messing with flashholes, but checking lengths after resizing and trim is necessary to make them all uniform, champfer, clean primer pockets and load. Turning necks is up to you and what you've found works best in your particular chamber. I turn necks on some calibers, and not in others depending on testing I've found in each particular rifle I own. Just what I do and get darn reliable and accurate results. Ain't no shortcuts in the "max accuracy" game in my book.

Alex

 

[amlevin]

Why would you want to prep brand new LAPUA brass?

I was under the impression that all those case measurement tools had a purpose, but come to find out all one needs to do is buy Lapua brass.

Unless you use some of those tools and find that Lapua Brass is subject to the same variations as other mfr's brass. Lapua may be more consistent in material quality, sturdier, and perform pretty well out of the box but then the fun begins. Necks do have thickness variations, their cases do form donuts, and heaven forbid, have excessive case neck run-out after a few firings and formings. Did I mention weight variations?

The good news is that all those "flaws" are less prevalent in Lapua Brass than other brands and best of all, it will last long enough to justify the extra expense.

If you are a "good enough" loader then no need for all the extra steps with Lapua. If you are someone who likes to "Pick Fly Poop out of Ground Pepper" then those tools will still come in handy 8) 8)

 

[mikecr]

The brand huggers declaring that Lapua negates measure, have apparently never measured it.

The advantage of Lapua brass is it's harder, and 'problem' departures in measure are fewer -depending on cartridge & lot.
With this, you can still find every variance in Lapua seen with any other brand.

 

[artbosco]

Why would you want to prep brand new LAPUA brass?

I was under the impression that all those case measurement tools had a purpose, but come to find out all one needs to do is buy Lapua brass.

Not necessarily. It all depends ... Even if you shoot Lapua exclusively as I do, there are a few things you want to do depending on the type of rifle, purpose, and conditions you're shooting under. It's not a totally do-nothing-with brass. And, it depends on your priorities and what YOU feel is important.

 

[Area Man]

Not necessarily. It all depends ... Even if you shoot Lapua exclusively as I do, there are a few things you want to do depending on the type of rifle, purpose, and conditions you're shooting under. It's not a totally do-nothing-with brass. And, it depends on your priorities and what YOU feel is important.

Outdoorsman (and amlevin) I was being facetious in response to the first few replies that said "just shoot it". This is not my first batch of Lapua brass and I know it varies some. I have found that it has helped me (or at least, I thought it did) to shave the necks a little, and I always debur flash-holes and trim to a constant length.

So how about this plan:
1) debur flashholes
2) Run the Sinclair neck trimmer mandrel in and out of the neck to round it out.
3) Check mouth camfer
4) Load and fire
5) Clean, deprime, and resize
6) Trim to uniform length
7) Check neck thickness and shave the thick side
8) Weigh and sort by weight.

If you are someone who likes to "Pick Fly Poop out of Ground Pepper" then those tools will still come in handy

Would like to.

 

[Riesel]

I think that is a good plan and a real confidence builder. If your shooting goes awry, you know it's not the brass

 

[wc872]

I think that one should do all the operations to the brass that you wish. Once all the operations are done & the cases are physically the same then you can weight sort them as fine as you wish. Keep them in lots & just shoot one lot per match. As others have said before Lapua brand brass is good stuff. I feel that we only sort/weigh to what level we are comfortable with to find the odd balls. If you weight sort to + or - 1.5 grains I think that you will find you have a large number of cases in your lot. If the guy next door decides that he needs to weight sort to + or - .10 grains then his lots will be smaller.
In the end I strive to feed my rifles better ammo than they are capable of. If I am shooting a 1/2 MOA rifle I try to feed it 1/4 MOA ammo.
Semper Fi

 

[mikecr]

You said wanted to sort the best 25.
Standard preps, with any brass, won't do this.

Couple prep items from your list.
You dont check chamfer, you set it
You should check thickness up front, so that you're not wasting efforts prepping departures in the lot.
Case weight is only meaningful in a loose sense to show gross problems. It's not the same as capacity measurement/sorting.

A good book about case preps and actual sorting:
http://www.amazon.com/Handloading-Competition-Making-Target-Bigger/dp/096269259X

 

[johara1]

Weighing cases is a waist of time....... rim thickness, extractor groove, flash hole size,primer pocket depth and neck thickness should be addressed first. You would be better served by separating by volume. Better than that, uniform the flash holes and the primer pockets and skim the necks and shoot them. You will need a gun that can group in a tenth to realize any benefit, your reloading skills will give you the biggest benefit and worry about the cases last..... jim

 

[Area Man]

You dont check chamfer, you set it

I hit the inside and outside of the neck with the camfer tool and try to do it where the cases feel and look the same. Any more you can do, that's worthwhile?

 

[johara1]

Ok, yes i would trim and chamfer that's a given..... jim