223 Seperation....

[ar15barrels]

Is there a way to tell if the brass is worn out before this happens inside the chamber?

You could take a paperclip and probe inside each and every case.
In extreme cases, there might be a stretch mark on the outside from the previous firing.
Once you clean the brass before you resize it, you would not see the mark anymore.

[Johan]

It's too tight headspace for sure. I had this happen on a .50 cal last week. Using weak brass certianly doesn't help matters.

[xrMike]

I thought seperations usually happened farther down on the brass, in the "web" area?

[ar15barrels]

I thought seperations usually happened farther down on the brass, in the "web" area?

I thought so too, but I have had several just like the pictures above and never one down below.
All have been in 223.
Perhaps that is where the 223 case is getting worked the most...

[Triple R Munitions]

i talked to a belt fed guy who deals with the movie theaters, and they shoot full auto 223 blanks, 50, etc.... anyways on the live fire shoots, they have seen a problem (back in the day) with weak brass, and seen this happen with new stuff.... of course new brass in a poor chamber (machine-gun) will basically do the same thing.

one thing he did say that the rifle it was shot in must have poor head-space. and when i re-sized it, it worked the brass to the point of rupture.... that to me makes the most sense. so i am going to scrap all of it....

[bohoki]

was it trimmed? what is your case length on same lot

[ejor]

they are breaking at the point or right below where the annealing usually stops, brittle brass?, too much heat on anealing maybe?
Also, Could that be the results of cleaning the cases with ammonia at some point in thier life? I heard it makes them brittle, too.

[Triple R Munitions]

they are all WCC-08. not trimmed. once fired.

used dillion 209 polish

[Sunwolf]

OAL too short for the chamber.

[Triple R Munitions]

Well just got back from the range today and did lots of testing. i used the same load in many different cases to see if the load was so hot that it was breaking th brass. well i have concluded that the brass is bad. i used PMC, Lc-09 and 08, R-P, IMI, Commercial WCC..... they all had flat primers, but no case separation. the load is 25.2gr h335 W/ 62gr.... i DID have a problem with WCC-99... WAY TO HOT OF A LOAD! out of 50rds i have 4 primers blow out and had major pressure signs... so that batch of brass needs to be used somewhere else.. or scrap it. i will lower the laod to 25.0gr and finish the 7-10k rounds i need to do.