Crimped brass?

[TadyMan]

got about 2 thousand pieces of .223 brass and there all crimped. what are the differences in reloading compared to non crimped brass? i heard its a pain in the *** to reload. i dont really want to throw them away. thanks for the help guys. im going to be shooting it out of an AR-15.

[What Just Happened?]

I believe the only issue is that you have to uncrimp the primer pocket. If you're not using a power tool for it, then you might be in for a bit of time.

[jandmtv]

dont trow them away, send them to me for proper disposal

[What Just Happened?]

Never throw away brass (unless it's in my direction). You can just sell it or trade it for some brass that you can use. I just pick up any brass I find at the range and sort it at home. 38 super, np, I can trade that to some people. 38 special, np, I know some guys who need it. Every caliber is being reloaded by someone.

[rksimple]

If you have a chamfer tool and can chuck it in a drill, you can make short work of the crimps.

[Pryde]

Its much better to swage them than to cut them with a chamfer tool.
If you cut them with a drill, you have a chance of cutting too deep and loosening the primer pocket, which will lead to popped primers with higher pressured loads. (Think federal brass)

The best ways to remove the crimp are to either get the Dillon Super swage, or the RCBS pocket swager mounted on an RCBS press works pretty well too.

[rksimple]

With half a brain and a smidge of ability, you don't need to worry about cutting too deep with a chamfer tool. If someone can't accomplish that small feat, then maybe reloading isn't for them.

I have the Gracey tool which cuts to the base of the pocket to also uniform them. Works well.

[ar15barrels]

With half a brain and a smidge of ability, you don't need to worry about cutting too deep with a chamfer tool. If someone can't accomplish that small feat, then maybe reloading isn't for them.

I agree.
Before I had a Dillon 1050 or a Dillon swager, I used to use my RCBS chamfer and deburr tool to remove the crimps from primer pockets.
It works great and it cuts slow enough that you are NOT going to somehow chamfer the whole pocket away without really trying to screw up the case.

[Rule .308]

I have done them both ways and I prefer cutting the crimp out. My main problem with swageing them out of there is that to look at the primer pocket you cannot really tell that anything has been done to them. You may think "so what" until your brass gets mixed up with some once fired stuff that has not been crimped. If you cut the crimps out you can plainly see which ones have been addressed.

Not that I have a great problem with it but slightly chamfering the primer pockets makes the primers feed into the pocket just that much better.

Now as far as the RCBS prep station with the rotating heads goes, it is a nice tool but it rotates way too slow for me. I prefer to put the chamfer tool into a regular drill motor and get the RPMs up on that sucker.

I have to disagree with the guy that says that a drill motor will make short work out of a couple of thousand cases. I say that a couple of thousand cases will make short work out of your hand. Because you are working the primer pockets that mouth of the case bears right against your hand and will work just like a cookie cutter if you let it. I use two things when doing large quantities of this kind of stuff, one is a leather glove with the fingers cut out of it and two is a wooden file handle (anything will work) with a hole bored into it that will support the cartridge when I am pushing it onto the chamfer tool.

[weezil_boi]

dillon swage tool. Buy it , use it, and from that point on, no swaginging is needed again ( one time deal). So just sell the swage tool off, you'll get nearly what you paid for it. In the end... it will add about $30-40 and a couple hours to your 2k of brass.

[rayra]

Dillon super swage. Easy to set up and use. Works beautifully. Beats all hell out of a fingertip tool or wood-handled primer pocket reamer. Well worth the money.

[jandmtv]

Dillon super swage. Easy to set up and use. Works beautifully. Beats all hell out of a fingertip tool or wood-handled primer pocket reamer. Well worth the money.

+1, no reloading bench is complete without one.

[Sunwolf]

No doubt about it

Dillon super swage......mine just kinda sits there all alone because all it`s work is done.

[Pryde]

With half a brain and a smidge of ability, you don't need to worry about cutting too deep with a chamfer tool. If someone can't accomplish that small feat, then maybe reloading isn't for them.

I have the Gracey tool which cuts to the base of the pocket to also uniform them. Works well.

I don't cut, I swage.

My low opinion of cutting comes from my experiences using commercial reloads that have had the crimps cut out. After trying to reload them again, the primer was very loose in the pocket.

YMMV