weighing brass

[BHJ]

I bought a bag of new Winchester 25-06 brass a while back and got ready to load em up. Just for giggles I got out the beams and started weighing em. Well now I've got them sorted and their is as much as 7/10 of a gram (roughly 10 grains) of difference in the cases. Seems like an awful lot. Hopefully it'll pay off down range. Is anybody else doing this? Which brands have you found to be most consistent. Any other differences you've noticed inconsistent length etc? I've always had good luck and very good accuracy as well as long life with the Winchester brass in my .30-06 and I wonder how much difference it'll make if I sort those?
Thanks BHJ

 

[SpeedyR]

i know that Nosler and lapua weigh the brass before they send them to you, and are already "prepped" and ready to load. I've heard a lot of people say to resize, trim to length and chamfer new rifle brass before you use them. I had always hoped that buying new brass would negate that need to do all the case prep work but I guess I was wrong.

 

[Chuckdog]

Brass like any other product varies from batch to batch. I prefer Winchester components for much of my loading, but I've got some less than stellar batches from them as well as others. Lapua is likely the most consistent from one batch to the next that I've used. I only use it for my precision bolt rifles. I full length size, trim, and on my target stuff weigh all my new brass. I don't bother weighing my regular hunting rounds. I've had excellent results with most Remington brass too. I use Lake City for most of my self loaders, with the exception of the 6.8. I use mostly Silver State for it now.

 

[Outsydlooknin]

Bet that you wont notice the difference. It only really adds to the reloading process and for hunting or tactical shooting, its not worth it to me.

 

[loadnplenty]

BHJ, are you loading for deer or varmits? Most 25's shoot such a tight group I don't know if weighing the brass would make that much of a difference unless you get an occasional flyer you could blame it on.

 

[Junior_357]

I personally don't think the brass weight will have a great impact on accuracy. I've weighed batches of 38spl brass and found similar differences. The ammo made with the brass was superbly accurate. IMO...bullet weight would be much more crucial to sort than brass...but that's just my take on it.

 

[Bear44]

Brass weight does make a difference in accuracy., but accuracy is a relative term. For most hunting applications you will never need to worry about it. If you are shooting very long range (400 plus yards) or at very small targets then it becomes more important. I have found that Winchester brass consistently has a wide weight range within their manufacturing lots. The same is true of Federal and Hornady. Winchester also has a great amount of variation in length and most of the time to trim it to a consistent length it is necessary to make it shorter than the recommended minimum. Norma, Lapua, Nosler and Remington are very different. The weight range and length of these have a strong tendency to be very consistent. For cost effectiveness that makes the Remington my brass of choice most of the time. Unlike the other three it still needs to be chamfered, debured and occasionally a few pieces of new brass will need some trimming, but that's not to bad when you consider how much less it costs to start with. As far as I'm concerned the two things that Remington does exceedingly well are the Model 700 rifle and brass.

 

[dawgm]

I'd be way more concerned with uniform thickness in the case neck. Neck turning will help hold the projectile with uniform tension. I don't little extra brass at the case head making any difference at all, but an uneven neck could.

 

[coadydepeche101]

Brass weight does make a difference in accuracy., but accuracy is a relative term. For most hunting applications you will never need to worry about it. If you are shooting very long range (400 plus yards) or at very small targets then it becomes more important. I have found that Winchester brass consistently has a wide weight range within their manufacturing lots. The same is true of Federal and Hornady. Winchester also has a great amount of variation in length and most of the time to trim it to a consistent length it is necessary to make it shorter than the recommended minimum. Norma, Lapua, Nosler and Remington are very different. The weight range and length of these have a strong tendency to be very consistent. For cost effectiveness that makes the Remington my brass of choice most of the time. Unlike the other three it still needs to be chamfered, debured and occasionally a few pieces of new brass will need some trimming, but that's not to bad when you consider how much less it costs to start with. As far as I'm concerned the two things that Remington does exceedingly well are the Model 700 rifle and brass.

well said.. i would always turn my necks before i weighed them, but using the rem. brass.. i found no need to weigh them. case neck thickness is even consistant.

 

[roperdoc]

It would be interesting to see if fully prepping brass (size trim chamfer) would improve consistency. This should demonstrate whether differences are due to dimensional variation such as case wall thickness, length, etc or variations in material. I would think variations from length etc would be reduced by prepping to uniform dimensions.