Military brass- sub or super?

[Sasquatch]

I've got a lot of military brass for 308. At this point, the primer pockets are reamed/swaged, they're sized, etc.

Most loads have you reduce for military brass because the thicker walls mean less case capacity (and a corresponding higher pressure).

Knowing I have this stuff- and will for a while (I neck size), I need to keep my loads consistent.

I'm thinking of making my subsonics loads either military or non-mil brass- the corresponding supersonics the other.

Any advice on which way to go- or do I forget the mil stuff for serious loads and just use it for plinking?

 

[GymB]

You’ll want to sort it by headstamp if you’re gonna get serious, not just by mil vs commercial.

Since you’re working up loads I can’t see why it would matter which brass you start with as long as you do the full prep and don’t apply loads from one headstamp/batch to another headstamp/batch.

I know very little about this, one of the rifle guys will either correct me or add critical details shortly.

 

[Charlie]

I am not sure what you mean by serious. What do you want the serious loads to do? Also, where did you get the brass? Is it once-fired from machine guns, virgin military brass, or fired out of your firearms? Out of what types of rifles are you going to shoot the loads?

 

[Sasquatch]

Serious being full power- the choices were for sub/super. My military brass was from a ammo can I had from decades ago when I was in the Navy. Once fired, most likely machine gun. It is IVI (Canadian) brass.

I just watched this video which was pretty interesting. This guy took fireformed brass, both 308 and 7.62 brass, and did water capacity tests and found no correlation that military brass had lower capacity.


The advice of sorting brass by headstamp is sound.

I guess what I was after was which brass can handle supersonic loads better? I had a lot of cracked necks in Winchester brass lately- I've added annealing as part of my brass prep, hoping that'll help.

 

[Charlie]

Both can handle full power loads. That should not be a problem with either all else being equal. Is, however, everything else equal? Perhaps. Perhaps not.

I have used lots of commercial and military brass in 6 different rifles, 4 autoloaders, one lever action, and one bolt action. I have had relatively few brass-related problems with either commercial or military. I had a case head separation with a range pickup commercial case that evidently had been loaded one too many times. I checked all the rest of that batch and found several that had significant thinning near the base. The whole batch was discarded. I picked up at the range some PMC cases that had been fired in a fluted chamber. They loaded very nicely, chambered easily, fired with no problems, but would not extract from my Ruger bolt action. I have not quite figured that one out yet. I have used other PMC cases with no problems. It must be something about the fluted chamber. The whole lot of them was discarded.

I am getting more and more shy about picking up range brass for rifles unless I know the history of the brass.

I would not be afraid of either commercial or military cases as long as I know their history and treat them with the same care. It is wise council to work up loads whenever a component is changed.

 

[Toprudder]

I don't buy into the "milspec is thicker" story. I measured some 223/556 cases, and the heaviest weight and lowest volume cases were Starline. Sort by headstamp and measure for yourself.

Which headstamp you end up using may best be determined by your intended usage. If you are going after precision loads, and low volume shooting, then get the best brass you can afford, buy new, track their history, inspect often, etc. If you are going to be plinking and shooting in large volume, see what headstamps are the most plentiful (range pickup), work some loads up and see if some are more accurate than others, and go with that. Toss them after X number of loads. (X is determined by your own experience).

 

[Combat Diver]

If your going to get serious for accuracy then after separation head stamps, weigh them and then separate again.

CD

 

[backwoodsshooter]

Loading for precision- Yea group by head stamp. Further breakdown by groups of COAL, neck thickness, etc etc. you want to be consistent on everything.

Loading for blasting, plinking, SHTF- dude just prep and load.

That is what I do.

For either, unless you are needing to max out the load, don’t worry about mil brass vs commerciaL. Plus if there is any pressure increase with mil brass, it is minimal

 

[Sasquatch]

Yeah, I did get serious- I bought a bunch of Lapua for precision work. From the comments above- mil or not doesn't matter if I'm sorting/weighing.

 

[11B CIB]

I group by headstamps, that’s it. Weighing cases seems far too time consuming for me

 

[BowWow]

I group by headstamps, that’s it. Weighing cases seems far too time consuming for me

I used to think the same way..... but if you are going for super accuracy at longer ranges...… there's some truth to it. Inside 400 yards or so.... you probably won't notice any difference.

 

[11B CIB]

I used to think the same way..... but if you are going for super accuracy at longer ranges...… there's some truth to it. Inside 400 yards or so.... you probably won't notice any difference.

Then we probably wouldn’t be talking about mil vs commercial and range pickups

We’d probably be talking about individually purchased lots of brass