Sorting Bulk Pistol Brass By OAL

[bearstatearmory.com]

I do my best to pull the 380 headstamp brass out of my 9mm brass by hand before I throw it in the loader, but lately I've had some brass stamped 9mm be as short as 380 which caused all sorts of issues. Is there a relatively quick and easy way to sort by OAL without putting calipers on every case, that would take for ever when buying in bulk.

[Bigtls1]

You might have run into a 9mm brc, which is basically a .380.

How much brass do you have to sort through?

[Tommy Gun]

If I was that worried about finding hundreds of 380 in my bulk 9mm I'd build a jig so you can put 500 or a thousand 9mm cases and size them up picking out the short cases. If all you are doing is a couple hundred cases you could size the jig down. Lucky for me I basically single stage so you can tell in the sizing die when you get a smaller or shorter case.

[kevin c]

Get yourself some of the 50 round trays that Federal factory 40 S&W ammo comes in (the larger forty trays are better than the 9mm). Set a tray into a bin of brass and pour handfuls of cases over the top. Cases fall in pretty easily. When full, look across the top at an angle: the shorter .380's show up easily and you can pick them out with bent tipped tweezers or pliers.

Since most cases fall in case mouth up, and the rest can be flipped with the tweezers, this can also be used to check for damaged mouths, to quickly and accurately count cases, and, if flipped into a shallower tray for easier pickup, for sorting by headstamp. If you do a fair amount of brass, 400 at a time can be done by fitting 8 trays into the bottom of a reinforced large flat rate box. Dumping in brass and shaking the box will quickly fill most holes, and hand sweeping brass across the top will get the rest.


you can tell them apart by size, and the facts that the 9mm trays have scalloped ends versus the straight ends of the 40's and that a 40 round just fits into the 9mm tray, and a .45 round just fits into the 40).

[bumpo628]

I do exactly what Kevin C described above too. If you use another tray to flip them over so the headstamp is up and look at them from an angle, then the short ones are easier to see.

[Gryff]

I just visually inspect the brass. If a .380 sneaks through, I'll see it at the bullet seating stage on my Dillon. At that point, I just pull it out, dump the powder, and eventually de-prime it and re-use the primer. I don't encounter enough of them to make the time necessary to sort them out in advance worthwhile.

Now, .38 Super is another story...

[bearstatearmory.com]

[Corbin Dallas]

I do my best to pull the 380 headstamp brass out of my 9mm brass by hand before I throw it in the loader, but lately I've had some brass stamped 9mm be as short as 380 which caused all sorts of issues. Is there a relatively quick and easy way to sort by OAL without putting calipers on every case, that would take for ever when buying in bulk.

Yes, there is.

[thoughtpolice59]

Kevin C has it down !