Weight Sorting Brass Variation

[Chedward]

This might be a repeated post, but I have searched different key words trying to find an answer to my question and cannot find a clear answer. I am new to F class shooting and plan on weight sorting my brass, yes I know people have different opinions on how effective it is, but for the people who do weight sort, what variations are you getting? I plan on weight sorting peterson 284 win brass and maybe some 6.5 creedmoor brass. I have 400 pieces of brand new 284 brass I plan to sort into four 100 piece batches. What should I expect in terms of weight variation? 1 grn per 100? .5 grn? .1 grn?

Forum Boss: Suggest you sort AFTER fire-forming and trimming to length. We like to keep necks long as possible. After fire-forming we may find 2 or 3 with short necks. Save those for sighters, then trim rest to consistent length. Then sort THOSE.

 

[NZ_Fclass]

Buy Lapua. Dont need to sort.
Seriously, " new to F Class" , I would not worry until you need more "x's Many more things to learn/practice before case capacity bevomes a deciding factor.

 

[Ned Ludd]

I sort Lapua brass by weight and I feel it is very necessary. Although I agree that there are many other more important issues for a new F-Class shooter, there is nothing wrong with incorporating sorting techniques into the reloading regimen, even at an early stage in the game.

My suggestion would simply be to weigh 50 to 100 cases, record the weights, determine the total range (extreme spread), and identify the average and median case weight values. Those should answer all of your questions with a minimum of effort. As you weigh each case and record the weight value, put them in order into reloading blocks so that you know the case weight associated with each case. Once you have finished weighing cases, you can select five or ten (each) of the lightest and heaviest cases. Load and fire them, recording velocity for each. Then determine the actual water volume of each [fired] case. By doing this once with the extreme high/low case weights from a sample batch, you will readily be able to correlate case weight, internal volume, and the potential effect (if any) on velocity, and then decide for yourself whether sorting cases by weight is worth the effort.

Although there is certainly some effort involved in this process, the loading/firing part you'd be doing anyway, and the overall effort is really not that significant in the bigger picture. By choosing high/low case weight groups for comparison, you are minimizing the total number of cases to be processed/analyzed. But the information gained is useful because you can be certain that the results for the majority of other cases in the Lot of brass will fall somewhere in between your high/low sets, even though you didn't directly test them. Also, if you have some feel for the high/low extremes in this particular Lot of brass, those values can help you come up with some idea of how many weight groups into which you wish to sort the brass, if you still feel that sorting brass by weight is a useful exercise at that point. All in all, it is a very good learning exercise with respect to sorting procedures in general, especially for someone just getting into the F-Class game.

 

[Chedward]

I sort Lapua brass by weight and I feel it is very necessary. Although I agree that there are many other more important issues for a new F-Class shooter, there is nothing wrong with incorporating sorting techniques into the reloading regimen, even at an early stage in the game.

My suggestion would simply be to weigh 50 to 100 cases, record the weights, determine the total range (extreme spread), and identify the average and median case weight values. Those should answer all of your questions with a minimum of effort. As you weigh each case and record the weight value, put them in order into reloading blocks so that you know the case weight associated with each case. Once you have finished weighing cases, you can select five or ten (each) of the lightest and heaviest cases. Load and fire them, recording velocity for each. Then determine the actual water volume of each [fired] case. By doing this once with the extreme high/low case weights from a sample batch, you will readily be able to correlate case weight, internal volume, and the potential effect (if any) on velocity, and then decide for yourself whether sorting cases by weight is worth the effort.

Although there is certainly some effort involved in this process, the loading/firing part you'd be doing anyway, and the overall effort is really not that significant in the bigger picture. By choosing high/low case weight groups for comparison, you are minimizing the total number of cases to be processed/analyzed. But the information gained is useful because you can be certain that the results for the majority of other cases in the Lot of brass will fall somewhere in between your high/low sets, even though you didn't directly test them. Also, if you have some feel for the high/low extremes in this particular Lot of brass, those values can help you come up with some idea of how many weight groups into which you wish to sort the brass, if you still feel that sorting brass by weight is a useful exercise at that point. All in all, it is a very good learning exercise with respect to sorting procedures in general, especially for someone just getting into the F-Class game.

Thank you. I agree with everything you have said. I agree that there are definitely more pressing issues for F-class shooters. However, I already have all the brass for my gun, yet the gun is not built yet. So I have some time to sort and organize. I will start by weighing them all and organizing them into 100 round batches and then go from there and see If I see any major velocity changes.

 

[Chedward]

Buy Lapua. Dont need to sort.
Seriously, " new to F Class" , I would not worry until you need more "x's Many more things to learn/practice before case capacity bevomes a deciding factor.

"New to F-class" in relation to the people I shoot with. I bought a used savage 6.5 creedmoor from a buddy that I have been shooting midrange with over the past couple months. I have my current gun shooting consistent 199's and the occasional 200. Averaging between 7 and 11 x's. (savage target action with a brux barrel). Just looking to get everything out of my new build that I possibly can.

 

[dstoenner]

Buy Lapua. Dont need to sort.
Seriously, " new to F Class" , I would not worry until you need more "x's Many more things to learn/practice before case capacity bevomes a deciding factor.

I agree buy lapua or peterson. Then weigh all the cases. My experience is that a few will weigh outside of the rest. I set those aside to make dummy loads to set up the press. I find that for lapua they will weigh about 1 gn to 1.25 in distribution. From then on i keep them as a matched set.

David

 

[mgunderson]

I sort my brass and it keeps me from thinking about it at a match. Having sorted a few thousand of various brands in the last year it depends. If all of the brass is from the same lot..... you can expect to see 2 to 3 grains grain spread. Often there are a few light and heavy cases that can be be used for set up or testing. A very good weight lot could be less. One brand may have a good lot and then a great lot. Don't think one brand is always better than another.

 

[Dusty Stevens]

Sort em if you have time. Put em out on top of notebook paper spread out on a table and see what you got. Itll never hurt and itll give you confidence

 

[jackson1]

Leave no stone unturned or it ill rattle around in your head at worst possible time.

 

[ronemus]

I did an experiment several years ago to determine just how much effect brass weight has on .223 loads. I used WW brass (sized, trimmed and deburred, primer pockets uniformed, flash holes deburred, and neck turned) , WSR primers, charges of RL-15 or N-550 powder weighed to 0.1 gr, and 75 gr A-Max bullets. Using the lightest and heaviest cases (sorted from 1000 once-fired I had on hand), I had two lots of 10 cases with a 3 gr difference in weight. The average muzzle velocity difference was 16 fps, just a bit more than the 12 fps due to 0.1 gr of powder. I choose to sort 0.5 gr lots of .223 brass for my long range loads, but the effect will only matter at 800-1000 yards - the vertical displacement on the target from such a small velocity change is negligible at shorter distances. Unless you control all other sources of variation, the effect of brass weight is negligible.

I also shoot .284, and because the brass is twice as heavy I batch in 1 gr lots. My .338 Lapua brass weighs ~300 gr, so I sort in 1.5 gr batches; for ELR I may sort into 1 gr batches. My rule of thumb is that the batch weight range should be 0.5% of the average. If you're shooting 1000 yard benchrest or F-class, you may need to tighten that a bit and at 600 you may need to sort.

 

[Chiquita]

When you sort them by weight, do you just keep the batches together in their own box or you somehow mark the case so you don't have to weigh again?

 

[Chedward]

When you sort them by weight, do you just keep the batches together in their own box or you somehow mark the case so you don't have to weigh again?

From the people I have asked about this and what I plan on doing is, I have 400 pieces of brass from the same batch. I will sort them into 4 100 round batches and they will stay in those boxes so they don’t get mixed up. So I’m theory, I won’t have the heaviest pieces with the lightest. So I will have some variation in the 100 round groups, but not as much as I might have if I just randomly put them into groups.

 

[ronemus]

When you sort them by weight, do you just keep the batches together in their own box or you somehow mark the case so you don't have to weigh again?

I keep each batch in its own box(es) and don't mix them up. When I end up with a few leftovers, I shoot them in practice so I can keep the number of firings/reloads the same for the entire batch.

 

[Chiquita]

It does not seem right to me but I wonder if the cases can marked with an electric pencil. Do you think that will weaken the integrity of the case?

 

[Chedward]

I’ll put a sharpie marks on certain pieces if I don’t think they are up to the standard of the rest of the batch and shoot them during blow off’s. I wouldn’t etch anything in the brass. But I’m not an expert by any means.

 

[spclark]

It does not seem right to me but I wonder if the cases can marked with an electric pencil. Do you think that will weaken the integrity of the case?

Even if it can't be proven to do that, it'd sure bug the heck out of me if something went awry during a match.

Years ago I used a jewelers saw to make a Very Small notch in the rim of a batch of cases according to how many times they'd been fired.

Came to realize it's vastly easier to segregate batches into boxes with labels that can be updated as they progress through their anticipated lifespan, save worrying about whether those notches, as they accumulate, would eventually come back to bite me.

 

[JFrank]

This might be a repeated post, but I have searched different key words trying to find an answer to my question and cannot find a clear answer. I am new to F class shooting and plan on weight sorting my brass, yes I know people have different opinions on how effective it is, but for the people who do weight sort, what variations are you getting? I plan on weight sorting peterson 284 win brass and maybe some 6.5 creedmoor brass. I have 400 pieces of brand new 284 brass I plan to sort into four 100 piece batches. What should I expect in terms of weight variation? 1 grn per 100? .5 grn? .1 grn?

Forum Boss: Suggest you sort AFTER fire-forming and trimming to length. We like to keep necks long as possible. After fire-forming we may find 2 or 3 with short necks. Save those for sighters, then trim rest to consistent length. Then sort THOSE.

There is a member here that sorts brass with a chronograph setting aside those cases with unexplained FPS variations..

 

[JMayo]

I start weighing and write little #'s on tiny bits of paper. They start being lined up from low too high. After I've got eng all weighed I decide the grouping and put them in a tackle box thing, labeling the weight in each compartment.
Done.

One is an in box one is an out box that way I shoot em all before anneling and starting over. Shot count is on the in box (or either box)

 

[quest450]

Recently sorted 400 pieces of hydroformed Lapua Dasher brass , ended up with three 100ea batches within 0.5 grain the fourth batch was buncha outlayers for sightand foulers, I’ll sort them again after 2nd firing, neck turning and trimming

 

[pemo]

Case weight is a good proxy for case volume. I have tested for five different cartridges here:
https://forum.accurateshooter.com/t...y-variance-in-5-different-cartridges.3999238/

My RCBS 1500 powder dispenser has a +/- 0.1grs accuracy and a +/-1grs case weight difference had the same effect on V0 in 243Win. So now I sort my brass in batches with 2grs spread e.g. 165-167, 167-169grs etc.

243Win: brass, brands, weights and velocities.

Greetings from Denmark :) After reloading for my rifles for ~5yrs I recently reached a stage where I wanted to make a small test if I could see systematic differences in precision and muzzle velocities depending on brass brand and weight. I had a selection of different brass for my Schultz &...

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