brass

[MarkB]

Hi All,

Newly getting into reloading and wanted to get opinions on Winchester vs Lapua brass for an AR10.

Thanks,

Mark

[MikedaddyH]

Winchester brass works great for me ! Cant afford to shoot Lapua brass. Get any/all types that are avalible to you, try them for yourself then use what you like best. LC , Fed, Win, Hornady and Remington are what I use.

[ghorn]

Mark,

Can not afford Lapua brass, so I as a common man will use the following: Winchester, Federal, Remington, and Lake City. 

[NoFail]

Hi Mark, and welcome to the forum.

I have only used Winchester, Hornady Match & Nosler Custom which is more expensive than Lapua. The Nosler I save for I special time I guess, this weekend was special and I lost 3 of them in grass in mountains, UGGG!!! that is truly upsetting to lose your cherished brass, it was only once fired. The winchester gets most the punishment. On the more hotter charges around book max for my powders some get stretched primer pockets and I have to toss them. For Winchester, the last time I bought from Midway some weeks ago it was 18.49 a 50 count bag. I bought 3 bags and I should have bought twice that much. Now they on back order. Hornady Match is pretty good and cheaper than Nos & Lapua. You can find large quantity for very cheap, nice once fired Lake City, use your browser. I really should do that too.

[Dusty44]

Just starting on reloading,  some practice and experience is probably more important than trying to pick sterling components. 

I have been reloading in a desultory manner for a long time.  I get about the same result with my own loads as I do with any factory except my own loads are not quite as hot as factory.  That means the group sizes are about the same but the POI of mine is an inch or two lower at 100 yds than factory.  That's 308 Win when it could be done.

My rifle brass is once-fired from new factory ammo;  or twice fired (?) from one of the big "remanufacturers."  You are likely to find that until you have worked out specific bullets and powders that work well in your rifle and for you that the brass is not a big item.  Yeah,  I am full of heresy like this.  Unless you are shooting a high-dollar competition rifle,  reloading is just about having fun doing the actual reloading.  Maybe,  only maybe,  you can save some cash on the cost of ammo,  too.

When you can tell the difference between the powders and the bullets,  then get into weighing cases and doing 'water-weight' measurements and all that.

I have been forced to stop shooting 308 Win.  I can shoot smaller calibers and have gotten pretty deep into 223 Rem.  I compulsively reload and have found that the military casings,  Lake City and some others,  have primer crimps that are very hard on my tools.  Broken decappers,  primer pocket crimp swagers getting beaten up,  priming tool having troubles even after extensive case prep and primer pocket efforts.  Case mouth expander does not expand these cases very well and if it were not that the boat tail bullets will slide (can be forced!!) into place with little prep,  there would be big trouble.

Do some reloading for a while.  Get comfortable with it.  Then decide how serious you want to get with it.  Reloading is as much art as science & ingredients.  Mostly,  have fun!  :)