Nickle plated brass reloading

[Zachthewack257]

Hey anyone have any experience reloading nickle plated brass? I was always told it would mess up my reloading dies so I’ve never tried it. Never been able to find a straight answer on this

 

[waspocrew]

I’ve used it quite a bit for my 300 BLK and have never had any issues with it.

 

[JFK]

I’ve reloaded a little bit with it and it didn’t behave any differently than non-plated brass.

 

[bigunit]

You wont get as many firings on it and the plating will begin to flake. It can be a bit hard on dies and especially cutters. It does clean up nicely though.

 

[35WhelenAI]

Agree with what has been said. It's tougher to trim, ergo harder on cutters. And cleans up easier than straight brass. As well, the difference between brass and nickel malleability causes splits in the case neck in a shorter time.

 

[Zachthewack257]

Thanks

You wont get as many firings on it and the plating will begin to flake. It can be a bit hard on dies and especially cutters. It does clean up nicely though.

!

 

[Luked]

It looks pretty...thats about it.
I personally dont care for it. and will avoid it if I can

 

[jfk69]

I won’t use it. Many moons ago I had a neck flake and scratch the hell out of a sizing die. Once was enough.

 

[OverInfinite]

I have reloaded nickel plated federal for a while for 7RM. it lasted longer than my Hornady brass with no collet sizing, no annealing. 60 pieces of same lot ammo reloaded. I am on my 6th firing on it. I am starting to see stretch marks right above the belt now. I may make it one more round before tossing it.

 

[TaperPin]

I used to shoot a lot of nickel plated Federal brass and never had anything bad happen. It’s just a very thin layer over normal brass, so case life was identical to the non plated stuff, but harder to tell visually if a separation ring is forming. Sharp cutters cut it about as fast, just have a different sound. I could see it dulling a soft cutter faster. I never tracked it, but when using the handheld Lee trimmer it seemed to dull somewhat quickly with brass or nickel cases. I may have had an unusually soft one.

The risk of flaking nickel causing scratches could be an issue with soft dies, but I’ve never experienced it myself. The Mohs hardness scale of nickel and mild steel are both about 4, while hardened steel goes way up in hardness. It does make me wonder how hard the neck areas of normal dies are.