chuck em when the side crack extends below the top crimp when loaded.
and, if one of the 8 point crimps just overlaps and fingernails, instead of being a fold.
After somewhere around 300,000 reloads and pushing them to several reloads after this description, I've finally decided that the tape, wax, and shot falling out of the weak crimps isn't worth it, so I now throw my beloved old style AAs when they meet this description. I've also realized that I'll never shoot the thousands of once fired old style AAs that I've saved from my Trap and Skeet competition days.
I had that issue with Winchester AA-HS 12 gauge hulls and had to discard them until I replaced the crimp forming die for my Hornady 366 made specifically for the AA-HS hulls and the problem of bulging side cracks went away.
I've been using Pacific/Hornady 366 loaders (I have one for each gauge) since the early '80s. I've never had any problems loading any of the old style AAs, but the primers wouldn't fully seat in the new HS hulls until I bought a spring loaded primer seating rod from Hornady. I've never had any problems with the original crimp forming dies.
