How many reloads?

For .45 ACP, reload until it cracks.

Bullseye shooters often mark their brass to identify it, not to track the number of loadings.

 

I don't keep track. I discard all cases that are dented, cracked or appear to have expanded further than they should.

 

I tried keeping track for a short while.
An exercise in frustration with little or no tangible benefit that was quickly abandoned.
Maybe some value for high-intensity rifle or Camp Perry level competition but for mere mortals like me it just made no sense.
As I shoot mostly 45 or 9mm, shoot them until I lose them.
Once in a blue moon a case splits.

 

Too much work for not enough return. I used to keep a bag sort brass just shot that and would log it in each time I went to the range, never used that bag until all other brass in that caliber was shot. Could not really figure a better way and got tired of it.

 

Agreed, I did the two bucket method, one bucket clean, one bucket dirty.

Now I just load it until it cracks.

 

Load till they split.

 

I don't load rifle, so have no clue as to need/concern for amount of load cycles

Don't load anything particularly hot to speak of either, so I've long since stopped trying to count load cycles .

I shoot it til i lose it or it looks too worn/damaged like case rim mangled/chewed up and of course case mouth splits

I'm more cautious when on the rare occasion I load hot rnds though ..in particular with high pressure rnds like 10mm
I only use new Starline brass when pushing the envelope beyond max

in 45 for regular range fodder, I don't think about load cycles


..L.T.A.

 

There isn't any way to keep track of (pistol) brass unless you assemble a batch of unfired brass (or fired by you from new factory ammo), keep it together, not add any to it, and isolate it from any other batches for its entire life. If you do that, a single index card will work fine

Like others have said . . . I wouldn't bother for pistol brass, but that's exactly what I do for rifle brass. I also treat (223) plinking brass as if it were pistol brass.

 

A lot of competitive shooters are meticulous about keeping records on batch #s and times reloaded brass for rifle. pistol I don't know. Hell, with a .45 your lucky to find half the brass unless you're shooting indoors!

 

Pistol: Load 'til it splits.
Rifle: Load until the primer pocket is too loose.

 

This with the exception of my long range rifles that consistently will hold under 1/2" @ 100yds and my 50 yard Bullseye brass. The BE brass gets segregated but number of firings is unknown. I know the best accuracy comes with the first & second firing of the brass, but all of mine has seen 10-50+ loadings so it's a moot point.

Most of my factory rifles, most not all, aren't worth a lot of brass prep as they're deer rifles that have to hold the heart/lung vital area and may get shot 5 times a year(2 or 3 to check zero and 1-2 for the hunt). That brass is going to wind up buried in the snow or grass & the likelihood of finding it is remote. The brass for my prairie dog rifles & long range rifles get treated to a lot more attention as that brass is gun specific.

Al

 

I don't keep any sort of log or separation of my range pick-up brass, but do run them thru several quick inspections, and as a final check, run them thru a case gage, which picks up the occasional split or about to crack case.

For all my rifle, incl 5.56, after they are cleaned, and before reloaded, I use a Sharpie, one of the extra permanent markers, to make a little ring around the case near the rim. The extra permanent ones leave a mark that does not shine or wear off. I usually toss them after 3-5 reloads.

I absolutely don't want to have to deal with a case separation in any of my rifles.

 

I'm not sure there's a point to trying to keep track of the number of loadings.

It sounds like something a Washington Burrocrat would think of in order to create a solution looking for a problem.

 

I was just curious, it looked an almost impossible situation. The question came after reading an earlier thread on reloading records; which someone mention keeping track of the time the brass had been fired. I'm good with using it until it doesn't work anymore.

 

None. Like the other guys I reload until it is not good and then move on

 

Amen!

 

I actually track but really only care about it for my rifle brass. Basically I have two 5 gallon tubs for each caliber. Tub 1 might be marked "6" and as it gets cleaned and fired it goes into tub 2 marked "7". When tub 1 gets empty I relabel as "8".

As mentioned, I'm primarily tracking to see how many firings I can get out of my .308 and x39 brass. The .223 and pistol brass is so plentiful I'm mostly just curious to see how far it will go.

 

I don't for handgun and 223 brass. I batch load rifle cases and write on the container the history of the cases. I am especially careful with belted magnum cases and brass used in autoloading military rifles.

I do reload cases that are dented a bit but never cases that are split.

 

I assume my 9mm range brass was only fired once but do inspect each case for anomalies. I separate by headstamp and use plastic food bags to keep the number of firings separate. Once I have a preponderance of 2X brass I begin to reload those. Since I've only started reloading last spring I'm only up to 3X in my stash. I'm not sure if it makes any difference but I do it to satisfy my anal character. IMHO you must inspect the brass after cleaning resized cases, expanding and seating/crimping. I've only found 1 cracked case out of 2000+ and that was a Winchester after expanding a primed case. Now I expand before priming to ensure I discard no primers. I only collect Blazer, Remington, Federal and Winchester.

 

0.0005% Failure Rate

IMHO you must inspect the brass after cleaning resized cases, expanding and seating/crimping. I've only found 1 cracked case out of 2000+ and that was a Winchester after expanding a primed case. Now I expand before priming to ensure I discard no primers.

That's a lot of work to save a primer.:scratch: IMHO, my time is too valuable to be looking for the 1 split case in 2000.

YMMV-

 

I shoot, clean, reload as a group & never add to or change that process.
I just broke out my last lot of 619 once fired R-P nickel cases. I load only
a few boxes at a time & then shoot as time allows. The 1st re-loading, 2nd
firing resulted in losing 1o cases, starting again with 609 cases to go through
the same process.

 

Although the 'load 'em and reload 'em until they split 22 years later' philosophy works well for .45 ACP users, I'd advise .40 S&W users to be a tad more cautious. A friend who used the same batch of 1000 rounds of .40 brass for about a 2 year period (perhaps 10-15 firing cycles at Major PF/USPSA?) began experiencing a few mysterious case head separations in 3 different .40 pistols; once he mentioned it was a constantly used/reused collection of brass, we figured it out.

We finally decided to simply pitch the stuff after 8-10 loadings to be safe...; as it was, one of the case head separations cost a friend a regional match. (USPSA officials still frown on dropped/loaded pistols, despite his best excuses of not being able to hang on to it due to the hot gases escaping a Glock's trigger guard area...)

 

I used to do it.

But invariably when at the range. Different batches would get mixed together. So I stopped doing it. I rely on inspection to weed out rejects.

 

When I was new to reloading I kept meticulous records on a batch of Winchester 45acp brass that I first fired as factory ammo, and then thru subsequent reloadings. When I got up to 20 reloads from each piece of brass, (that is, the pieces that didn't get lost) I stopped counting. I figures 20+ reloads was good enough. Although I can't prove it, my belief is that I get about 20-30 reloads from each brass case (in 45acp) if I don't lose it first.

 

I document it in my loading log book and on the label on the box of ammo that tells what the load is.

 

I did an experiment back in the 80's when my wife and I were shooting about 10K rounds per month. After 50 reloads of a particular batch of brass, I quit counting and shot them until they split. Must have gone about 60x?
Split cases are easy to find by taking a handful and shaking them. If you hear a KLANK you have a split case in that batch and easy to find. We were shooting at the highest levels and I never saw any particular degradation of our scores that could be traced to old brass. Was shooting that same stuff when I made it into the 2600 club. YMMV
Semper Fi
RK

 

I take the time because I have it. Just sayin".

 

Good question and as a new reloader I really appreciate the time everyone took to reply to the OPs question.

For those of you who reuse the same brass 25+ times, how often to you typically have to trim the case on 9mm recycled brass?

Best regards,

Keith

 

Pistol brass generally shrinks versus stretching so I'd bet very few people trim 9mm brass.