Home Forums Reloading Varmint Rifles 223rem/5.56 Lake City brass

As newbie to reloading, I bought some once fired LC brass for my 223rem.

What's the feedback on them? LC seem to get good reviews.

Should I sort them by their of manufacture?

I guess I'll have to swage the primer pockets? I need to buy deswager then.

Do you feel the extra effort to trim up, deprime and swage worth the savings you get on this brass?

Also about how many reloading do you get from LC? I'm using a bolt action.

Thank you for feedback!

It's good brass. I sort by year of manufacture if I'm developing a load. The biggest problem I've had was splitting necks because I wasn't annealing them. If you anneal every fourth loading or so and neck size as much as you can they will last a long time.
Last week I used some '67 LC brass to shoot some of the best groups I've ever shot. I've lost track how many times they've been loaded.

Lake City is my preferred 223 brass, in ratings recently done on 6mmBR they were rated quite well.

I do sort them by year of manufacture, whether it makes that much difference or not I am unsure but it makes me feel better.

You will have to remove the crimp on the primer pocket. I use a small countersink and a hand drill, it takes a few pieces to get a feel for it but it is very fast and works just fine.

Extra effort? - the effort is minimal, you will not find any other brass that good for such a low price.

I neck size mine until and do not full length resize until they start becoming hard to chamber, I have some with over 15 loadings on them, they are cheap enough that it really isn't a concern. I have some with 73 year stamp and I really have no idea how many times they have been reloaded and they are still cooking along just fine.

drover

Same here.

For years I've used one of these to remove the crimp (if there is one) in both 5.56 and 7.62.

http://www.midwayusa.com/product/78...ol-17-to-45-caliber?cm_vc=ProductFinding

$55 for 500 pcs. prepped WCC brass, shipped, no CC charge, is worth it to me.

I use LC brass almost exclusively.If once fired I swage the primer pockets with a Dillon Swager. I don't feel right cutting out metal with a chamfering tool. Most times I buy LC brass that is once fired sized, swaged, tumbled and primed from Top Brass in Salida Colorado. I have some with 10 or more loadings that I run in my NM AR. I full length size with a Redding S die to .004 neck tension. I get no bullet set back in rapid fire strings. I never neck size as it leaves to much bullet runout because the case is not tight in the neck die.

LC is good stuff.
You have two basic options for a sort.
I go for blocks of 100, so I can track loadings and annealings. If I end up with more than 100 of a year, sometimes I will also sort for weight, just to get the "outliers" gone. But those are pretty few.
But there is one big batch of 325 or so that I sorted by average weight only. I annealed them all at the same time, sized and uniformed them and that has worked out well through about five loadings for that batch.
Either way, you can't really go "wrong" with LC.

Thank you to everyone who replied!

I was wonder how good LC brass was because it is dang cheap!

Sorting a 1,000 pieces of brass by year is going to take some time, lol!