Home Forums Reloading Varmint Rifles Lake City 5.56 brass questions

I bought once-fired Lake City 5.56 brass that's been cleaned, deprimed, and swage. Should I sort the Lake city brass by year? Would separating it by year make for more consistent reloads? Rifle to be used in CZ 527 American. Thank for the feedback!

I use 223 LC brass almost exclusively and I separate by years because it makes me feel better about the consistency, but my main reason for sorting by year is that I have five 223's and I segregate different years brass for different rifles.

I have done some testing on paper and have found that I get a little tighter groups out of the brass separated by year but it is not really enough difference to have any effect on shooting from a field position.

Short answer - unless you are separating by weight, truing up necks, etc. I doubt that you will ever notice the difference.

drover

I don't sort the LC by year. It is close enough in weight from year to year. It is excellent brass overall. I do some of my best shooting with it.

What'd you end up paying per case? I just bought new Federal for $.20 IIRC.

Got some once-fired LC .308 for $.15, but had to decrimp it myself. Good stuff though.

Hello Pappy348,

I paid $97 per thousand for cleaned, deprimed, and swaged. Plus free s/h on my Lake City only 5.56 brass.


They also sell 308/7.62 Lake City Long Range brass, cleaned only for $149 per 500 plus free s/h. Unfortunately they're often sold out of it.


Looks like they are currently having sell on their 5.56 brass

http://brassbombers.com/223-556-Cleaned-Deprimed-Swaged-LC-Only-1000-Pieces-5LC-S0100.htm

dover,

I too am also thinking of sorting my Lake city 5.56brass by year but I've put it in bulk thus I now have a few K worth of brass and now I cringe at thought of sorting all that brass by year, lol!

I like how I can pick all Lake City, or all WCC, or all TAA once-fired brass. So at least it's all on brand and not mixed head stamp to sort as well.

HuntnShoot,

I don't know if I'll get that technical to sort my cases by weight. All I have is the rcbs balance scale that came with my rcbs starter kit. If I had small cheap digital scale I might be tempted to sort by case weight, lol! So perhaps you are right, no need to sort LC by year, just load and shoot.

Unless you have a reason like I do, multiple 223's, I would not bother sorting it by year. Just load and shoot.
If you decide that you want to build some accuracy loads then sort out some by year.

On the other hand winters here can be long sometimes and it gave me something to do to stave off cabin fever.

drove

I have a crappy little digital scale that I use to weigh brass (usually comparing brands, but not sorting) and cast bullets, which I sometimes sort by weight.

HuntnShoot,


May I ask what digital scale you use? I haven't gotten into cast bullets.............yet!

I don't recall. It was less than 10 bucks, purchased at a Cabelas maybe 8 years ago, for less than 10 bucks. It's battery powered. I've only changed the battery once. It is remarkably consistent. I don't use it all the time, and I don't use it to weigh powder charges, but for what I use it for, it is perfect.

I would start by sorting it by year. You won't ever regret having it sorted, but the reverse might not be true.

I



True. I would bet though, that lots are not run year by year, and brass made during January next year is more like that made this December, than that made last January.

I never sort my my brass

I just sorted my 1000 order from BrassBombers. Mostly 08 and 11. Only had one 99 and an 06. Ramirez and Mcloud.

Was cleaning out some stuff the other day, and came across some Lake City brass that I had purchased long ago,
in 223.. it was From Schrach or something like that... thru Cabelas...

Cleaned, tumbled, deprimed and primer pocket swaged...

$35 per thousand...shipped...

on the invoice, said I had purchased 3000 pieces at the time...

I'm still shooting some of that stuff and probably have most of it still
around the closet in containers...

One bag of 100, I had shot 20 plus times.. Blue Dot loads...

back when shooting was real cheap...

also found a box of Speer 105 grain 6mm Bullets.....sticker price was $5.95 per 100..

guess I've had those for quite a while also...

I went ahead and sorted all 5,000 pieces of lake city brass! Wow! What a job. A lot, a lot of 2013! Good number of , 2015, 2012 and 2011as well. Recall smaller lots of 2005, 2006, 2008. Very small amount of 2009.. Think I also had decent number of 2007. For some reason, no 2014 present. Strange. Will have to refresh my memory when I get home.


Learned that I did not do a very good job swaging the crimped pocket with my RCBS swager. Hope never have to swage another piece of brass, lol!


Between the lake city 5.56 brass and 9mm brass I think I'm started to despise military brass with crimped primer or berdan primers, lo! Plus my old(er) eyes don't like working with such small brass

sweet jezux, seafire! How long ago did you buy your components, lol!

I paid $75 for 500 .308s from Evergreen. Got more than 500 good ones, mostly LC10 and 12. One loaded round!!

One case had a rock inside whose presence can't be explained by the Laws of Physics, only magic!

I sorted by year, and processed some, but have so much, mainly older WW, commercial brass, it'll be a while before I do any more. I picked this batch up mainly for "just in case".

Can't tell you exactly when, but it was before Obungo occupied the White House...