.45 brass for Perryshooter

geeguy

Karl, in one of your posts you discuss "thin wall" brass. For match ammo I generally use R-P or Starline due to the thin wall and the tight chambers (shooting Clarks). Since the barrels are not ramped I don't see the crimp as an issue (Using Lee final crimp die after std Dillion, about .468 dia). However, I note that alot of the Hi-Masters do use the heavier W-W or WCC brass.

Why the heavier wall brass?

As always, I value your opinion.

perry shooter

Hello sometimes I lack in ability in expressing myself about the point I am trying to make . The quality of certain brands of brass are one point but is separate from the case being thin walled or Thick walled. As I was saying about me using Wcc Match brass This being one of the thicker ones if your sizing die is toward the small size "I use a Star Progressive reloader and you could order dies to your Spec.I have both small sizer die and all my other sizer dies are.001 larger". With the small die and with thick brass used together it MAY give you a loaded round that looks like a coke bottle. This ammo will shoot OK but looks funny. and with a thin case TZZ or Remington. the ammo will look Ok and shoot OK .However due to the fact that I have about 20,000 PLUS rounds of WCC Match brass and only 5,000 or so TZZ and a like amount of Remington The problem comes in using a normal sizing die & thin walled brass Then you can run the risk of the case not gripping the bullet tight enough. The loaded round will look OK but will in fact have a bullet that will set back further into the case when the bullet hits the feed ramp [V][xx(]This is a dangerous condition It can and does cause high pressure and it is not fun having the grips blown off the gun during shooting[:0][:I]at least not for me.
Most 230 grain Ball bullets are .450 or maybe .451 Not the .452 of 200 grain lead bullets that I had loaded and shot for years . When the CMP stopped Issure Ammo on the line at Camp Perry and started allowing you to reload I thought all I had to do was change bullet to 230 grain Ball and adjust for OAL. Imagine my surprise when I had my first Kaboom after loading over 300,000 rounds of wad-cutter lead loads . I loaded up some test ammo and changed to once fired Remington brass thinking the ofter reloaded Wcc brass was at fault. Then noticed that the OAL of loaded ball ammo was all over the place as I was comparing a long round with a short round to my surprise the long round just setting there got shorter the .469 taper crimp was just barely holding the bullet you could take all the test ammo with the 230 grain bullets in the Rem cases and with just slight pressure with one finger press the bullet into the case until it touched the powder in the case. I concluded that the combination of slightly smaller bullet and slightly thinner case could cause problems I took my loaded Ball ammo in the WCC cases and found about one in every 20 would change the seating depth when hitting the feed ramp during loading by cycling 50 rounds through my pistol without firing them.I measured the ball bullets and they were only .450 in Diameter. Sorry about long story but just wanted to explain why I felt one needed to have dies that resulted with the inside of the sized case matching the out side diameter of the bullet you were loading with the bullet large enough to give it a good grip BEFORE Any attempt to taper crimp.. I now load all ball ammo with the slightly smaller Sizing die. Cheers Karl.

geeguy

Thanks for the education. I am only loading 200 gr. SWC .452" dia., so I was not seeing the problem. Since I only shoot hardball twice per year (so my team mates can get leg points) I am only shooting factory ammo. The 230 gr. FMJ bullet makes perfect sense to use the WCC or W-W brass.

I will pass that information to a few fellow team mates since they have started to load their own hardball ammo.

As always, thanks for the experience shared.