Thick 45ACP Brass

[DougMurray]

Ran into an interesting situation at the range yesterday where a number of my reloads wouldn't go into battery. I threw the offending rounds into my case and checked them over when I got home. The rounds measured 0.476" and up to 0.478 around the bullet (LSWC bullet measured 0.451"). Thinking it was my reloading mistake, I disassembled the rounds and checked my reloads after each step. After resizing, all the cases chambered. However, once they were completely reloaded, none of them would pass the plunk test. Frustrated, I measured the case wall thicknesses and came up with 0.013" up to 0.015" (varied by case). I also discovered the cases I had issues with were all marked A-MERC. In fact, every A-MERC case ran at least 0.013".

Once I realized this, I reloaded a batch of 150 (without using A-MERC cases) and they all passed the plunk test.

I think these were part of the range pick-up cases I have since I can't recall buying anything with that name. Has anybody run into this before? What are these cases? Some special use???

[Bainter1212]

Sounds to me like your crimp was insufficient. Either that or your case length is excessive......but I would guess it is the crimp.

[nahpungnome]

Yeah AMERC brass has issues... if you google AMERC brass, you'll get a ton of hits with people complaining about it. I'd put them in the scrap bin.

[DougMurray]

Case lengths were measured against other cases and were for all intents, the same. The original crimp was set per Hornady's instructions and took the bell out of the cases as desired with no remaining sharp edges at the mouth.

I tried adjusting the crimp down another two turns (I'm using a Hornady Taper Crimp die) and the case mouth came down as expected but it flared out again as you moved down the case. It chambered a little further but still wouldn't go in.

A question on your suggestion: i'm not averse to crimping further but if I do, don't I run the risk of significantly reshaping the bullet in order to allow for the extra 0.006" or more of case? The largest I can go and still chamber is 0.473".

[DougMurray]

Thanks for the suggestion about Googling AMERC brass, Nahpungnome. I was astounded at some of the comments I found and will do as you suggest - trash the stuff. It isn't worth the effort to set up just for this brass and compromise a good reloading setup for everything else.

I guess I should have tried Google but never gave it a thought. I did search this forum and didn't find anything so did the post. Won't make that mistake again :-).

[Bainter1212]

It sounds like this AMERC brass might actually be the problem. I have never seen the stuff even though I do load random range pickup brass.
Will the rounds truly "not chamber" or will a palm smack to the back of the slide push them into battery?
Sometimes I get a round or two in a batch that wants to hang up and a smack to the back of the slide pushes it into battery. I have seen many other competitors at IDPA shoots do the same, so I imagine it is somewhat common.

[DougMurray]

Most wouldn't chamber much past the case mouth. A few went in further but jammed to the point I had a heck of a time clearing the chamber. Not fun at all. Stay away from these cases if you find any.

[Spyguy]

One must wonder how this brass was factory loaded to begin with in order to maintain reliability. Undersized bullets perhaps?

[Fishslayer]

Yeah AMERC brass has issues... if you google AMERC brass, you'll get a ton of hits with people complaining about it. I'd put them in the scrap bin.

I hand sort all my brass. AMERC goes straight to the scrap can.