BRASS ???

[NORMAN]

Does anybody have an idea or source of where to find some 9mm new brass ?? I'm beginning to think it does not exist !! I'm affraid to buy "once fired" brass because who knows if it really is once fired or not. What about range brass ?? how do you tell if its ok ??

[tfrazier]

I don't have a source for you, but visual inspection is best. If it has cracks, toss it. If primers don't seat, toss it.

If it isn't cracked or deformed to the point the dies can't straighten it out, and a primer and bullet seat in it, put it in your gun and shoot it.

Don't over-think it. If it looks good, it most likely is good.

[CWOOD]

Hi, NORMAN,

Brass is the main point that most reloaders save money, assuming you are not casting your own bullets. When I first got into loading, my hang-up in not being able to see the savings was my inability to properly calculate the savings on the brass portion of the equation.

Buying new brass in totally unnecessary. Save your money. Even once fired brass is not critical, however it is a good, fast way to start accumulating a reasonable quantity to get started in reloading. Range brass is normally going to be just fine. Unless you are regularly loading your ammo to maximum charges, your brass will be OK to reload many times. With 45ACP I hear of people relaoding lighter loads as many as 25 times. Even for 9mm which has higher pressures 10-15 times is not unheard of. You can see that if you use free range brass or even pay $30-50 per 1000 for once fired brass, the re-use of it is a major savings. If you buy 1000 cases for$40, reuse it 10 times and lose 5% of them on each use, it is easy to see that the cost for brass is less than a 1 cent/round...almost nothing.

Things to look for are cracks around the circumference of the base of the case or splits along the sides. Also bulges might be avoided as well as cases which may have stepped on and squashed. You might even avoid cases packed with dried clay. There is usually so much 9mm brass laying around on ranges that you can afford to be selective. Once you use a tumbler to polish it up, it will look almost like new.

I would suggest to you something I tried for myself. In order to see if I would be willing to pickup required amount of brass at the range to keep the process going I just started doing it and accumulating brass long before I invested in reloading equipment. At the time I was shooting aluminum Blazer ammo so each trip to the range was a net gain in free brass and I just reused my old Blazer ammo boxes to hold my "new" cases. I later used the boxes and plastic trays to hold my newly reloaded ammo. I did this for several months while I was shopping for and waiting for delivery of my equipment. I did this for my .45ACP. Now I am getting set up to reload 9mm for my daughters and have been doing the same thing for 9mm cases. Last Sunday at an IDPA match I picked up nearly 150 9mm cases in addition to recovering my 45 ACP cases. Just get in the habit.

I shoot a Glock with a stock barrel so I used jacketed bullets and pay 11 cents per round for 45ACP and about 8 cents for 9mm.. If I had a weapon which did well with lead, I could get that down to maybe 4 cents per round. FYI powder runs about a penny per round and primers average about 3 cents. That means my 45ACP reloads for about 15 cents per round compared to 32 for Blazer or 40 for Winchester White Box Value paks. I'll pay for ALL of my reloading equipment in under 2000 rounds.

Before you get much further get and read thoroughly "The ABC's of Reloading" and a standard reloading manual like Speer, Lee, Hornady, etc. It will answer a lot of your questions. Then you can ask some more which will come up. Ongoing process.

I hope this helps.
Carl

[CompVest]

For what it is worth, we have been reloading range brass for years. Some of the brass has probably been reloaded 30 times. For major competitions we use once fired brass and have not any issues to date. Range brass reloads are for practice and local IDPA matches. We buy Hornady Tap for our personal protection ammo.

The best place to get range brass is at a local range where new shooters are shooting. Most of their brass is factory and gives you a great starting supply of brass.

[NORMAN]

Thanks guys it makes me feel better about all the range brass i have been picking up !! Does anybody know anything about starline brass ??
Also what about a good source for FMJ 9mm bullets for target practice ?

[CWOOD]

Starline Brass is excellent brass. My recommendation however is that you forgo buying the new brass, especially for practice rounds, and go to gunbroker.com or some other site and get 1000 once fired cases and continue you range pickup. With the money you save you can buy a decent tumbler kit (which includes dry media and polish and a media seperator) from Cabelas for about $60. You will be amazed at how shiny and bright and clean that range brass will become after 3-4 hours in your tumbler. It is impressive.

Just one example of once fired brass here for $32.50.1000. There are many more. Google it to start.

http://www.seminolebrassandbullet.com/shop/showcart.asp" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



As for FMJ bullets, the best prices I have found is from Precision Delta at the following web address.

http://precisiondelta.com/products_new.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Like any place these days call before you place your order and see what delivery time frame you can expect. I orderd 1000 230FMJ for my 45ACP and got them in 6 days. My second order was for another 1000 of those and 1000 of 115gr 9mm. That took four weeks. It depends when in their manufactuing cycle you call. Nice folks and don't charge your card till they ship. Their price quotes all include freight on components. Except for 230 gr bullents you need to order 2000 at a time. You can mix and match. Just ask.

Right now 9mm delivered prices/1000 are:
115gr FMJ $68
124gr FMJ $72
147gr FMJ $84

Hope this helps. Good luck.