Is brass weight useful?

[TimberHunter]

So recently purchased my first batch of quality brass to hopefully reduce the 40 ES I was seeing with Hornady brass. Iwon’t say who because I don’t want to bad mouth in case this batch of 50 is just out of spec (called and left a message with customer support).This company is often regarded as having high quality brass but I found that the case weight out of the box ranges from approx 165 to 169 grains (see attached picture).

Brass was sorted within the whole grain (for example 167 has brass that ranges from 167.0-167.9)

From a weight standpoint, to me, this brass seems just like my Hornady brass that is often regarded as not being very good/consistent.

Is brass weighing not a good indicator of internal volume/consistency?

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[BBob]

Waste of time!!!

 

[sndmn11]

Waste of time!!!

agreed

 

[TimberHunter]

I was leaning that way as well and didn’t plan on sorting by brass weight when it comes to loading but I was expecting most if not all the cases to fall within a grain of other after reading review on the brass

But if it doesn’t indicate brass consistency, I’ll forget about it haha


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[TaperPin]

I was leaning that way as well and didn’t plan on sorting by brass weight when it comes to loading but I was expecting most if not all the cases to fall within a grain of other after reading review on the brass

But if it doesn’t indicate brass consistency, I’ll forget about it haha


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You could always shoot 5 of the lighter and 5 of the heavier onto the same target and see what the velocity and hits on paper looks like. It might take a pretty accurate gun to show a difference through the noise.

 

[JFK]

Weight sorting is a waste of time but 4 grains on a case of that size is a very big variance. Top shelf stuff normally is within about .5 grain. Mid grade brass is typically within 2ish grains. May not make a damn bit of difference but that spread is not normal.

 

[TimberHunter]

To follow up I did hear back from the manufacture and they said their internal volumes are held to an extremely tight tolerance. He didn’t seem concerned with the 4 grain spread. He was very knowledge and helpful so I took his word for it


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[Fujicon]

Similar to those above, my first thought was brass weight would not be relevant to accuracy. But then I thought, where is all that extra weight going? Like JFK said, four grains is fairly substantial. Because brass length and circumference dimensions would still need to be in spec, logically the weight must be in wall thickness. If that logic holds then there may be cause to double-check neck tension to ensure it is not adversely impacted.

 

[sdupontjr]

Similar to those above, my first thought was brass weight would not be relevant to accuracy. But then I thought, where is all that extra weight going? Like JFK said, four grains is fairly substantial. Because brass length and circumference dimensions would still need to be in spec, logically the weight must be in wall thickness. If that logic holds then there may be cause to double-check neck tension to ensure it is not adversely impacted.

This along with flash hole. I had some brass where there was a small flap attached to the flash hole inside. Not much, but a few still had it attached. Once I cleaned that up, all was ok. how much did it weigh, don't know, but it was a chunk of brass just hanging out. So I decided to go through all my brass just to double check. All were good except for those 4 or 5 out of 200.

 

[JF_Idaho]

Try taking 1 from each group and measuring the internal volume. Possibly re-weigh them. The FA scale is ok, I have one, but it's not known as having exceptional accuracy. New battery? Only a couple outliers in the heaviest category.

 

[wind gypsy]

Does it matter? probably not. But I wouldn't expect lapua brass to have that much variance (assuming this is Alpha).

Unless most of that variance is all in the case head/web that doesn't expand with firing to fit the chamber, "Internal volumes" when the case is fired and fitted to a chamber will be less consistent with cases that have more weight variance. Just measuring neck thickness on the sample of 1 alpha 6 creedmoor brass tells me "internal volume" likely isn't that consistent because neck thickness isn't that consistent. Doubt it's enough to make a difference in me hitting things though.

 

[TimberHunter]

Try taking 1 from each group and measuring the internal volume. Possibly re-weigh them. The FA scale is ok, I have one, but it's not known as having exceptional accuracy. New battery? Only a couple outliers in the heaviest category.

I agree 100% on the FA, I just use it for rough measurements because I no longer use it for powder weights. That’s mainly why I put them in whole grain groups assuming the FA is not the most consistent. But when weighing Hornaday 147s, they are +- a couple grains

I have Lapua 6.5SRP coming in today that I will weigh to compare


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[MThuntr]

Probably isn't that big of a deal for hunting though that big of a spread would bother me for no other reason than I don't like it.

You could prime with once-fired primers and measure the internal volume by filling with water and weighing. It may be more consistent that way.

 

[Mike D Texas]

I sort by internal volume by weighing internal capacity if H2O. But to be honest even that hasn’t made a tremendous amount of difference.


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[TimberHunter]

Lapua 6.5cm SRP came in today. Picked 50 random pieces and 45 pieces were within a grain of each other (within 165.0-165.9), 4 pieces were in the low 166’s one at 164.7. Guess this proves why Lapua is regarded as top tier stuff

Not saying these are better cases and they will shoot better but it is nice to know Lapua has tight weight tolerances


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