I bought a bunch of reloading equipment from a benchrest shooters wife after he passed away. he had 2 different adjustable tools to uniform and put a small taper on the inside of flash holes in any size brass. I just wondered if many reloaders have done this.i'm just a hunter but I guess it wouldn't hurt to do it.

I don't. All I do with new brass is hold it up to the light and look through the flash hole to make sure it's not obstructed.

Years ago I ran a bunch of tests on prepping brass and found, for myself anyway, that uniforming flash holes in brass used in hunting rifles gives results way out of proportion to the effort needed. I also found that uniforming primer pockets in hunting rifle brass to be a waste of time.

That's really interesting, and not what I would have expected. Care to elaborate a bit?

This has been discussed before, and it should be common knowledge by now that there isn’t any benefit to that process, short of competitive bench rest shooting.

I do out of habit as I prep all brass when new. I can't say it makes a difference except for some brass like military or some lots of Privy Partisan and even Lapua. It makes seating primers easier with a hand tool and more uniform in seating pressure. Flash holes I think MichaganScott is onto something but I have not carefully tested this. I have seen everything from burred to non existent flash holes on some brass so easier to just uniform than doing a visual inspection on each. I also feel that it makes the case capacity more uniform but probably not enough to notice except in benchrest guns. Not only is the seating easier the de-capping is much easier when beveled and uniform. I don't think I have broken a de-capping pin since I started uniforming flash holes. I also catch the way off center ones and discard those.

If you really get anal then this is a needed step before weight sorting (which I don't do) as well as trimming so you are weighing a finished and uniform case not the extra brass.

I figured it may not be worth doing

I'm guessing he meant the opposite of how it sounded.

Used to do it religiously, now I just do it if I remember. Might have some value doing it, but that depends on the rifle/load/brass quality. Some of my brass had ridiculous amounts of flash. Once uniformed, they shot better. Just make sure your cases are consistent lengths, and you should be ok.

Old70

As a general rule no.

But when doing match ammo it might make some difference.

I do know that some brass has a large lot of brass flash after punching the hole.

Even Hornaday 6.5 creedmore brass.

nope.........don't even clean pockets after firing........

P/dogs never know the difference

Good heavens.....ha.

but I do walnut media polish after every firing.....

bushing neck size only

these are dog guns

I go through new brass completely when I buy it. Early on I had many experiences while developing loads where there were "flyers". Some guy posting here had a note on his sig "build it like you were building for NASA." Made sense to me. I've seen flash holes that are so rough they look like a volcano and the brass coming out of there makes a difference in case volume, all of which affects accuracy. Might as well eliminate ANY questions or doubts about your brass. Brass is the foundation for any load and if you know it's right, you can more easily track loads for maximum accuracy. Through the years I've run into some strange things with new brass. I've had lots where I've had to cull almost half, and others where they are almost perfect, and it holds true for most manufacturers. I had one lot of Norma 308 brass I had to dump almost half of it, and don't even talk about Bell or Bertram brass! Neither worth buying. Things happen in production and you have no guarantees so you may as well check and at least start with uniform brass.

With weapons that don't have the capability to reach past 300 yards, no, everything else gets it.

I get the burrs off the inside of flash hole, but that’s it.

Years ago I did but now, huge waste of time as far as I'm concerned..

When I have the time I do it. I just pick an inch longer cigar from the humidor before I go out to the shop.

I don't. Sometimes I clean primer pockets. So, I agree with those who claim it's a waste of time.

Deer, pronghorn, coyotes, paper & steel targets can’t tell the difference either.

Me neither.

My experience exactly.

Same here but the only reason I do that is it gives more accurate measurements of case neck concentricity. The Sinclair tool used for that has a pin that goes through the flash hole to keep the case centered and those burrs seem to make the needle indicator jump around more than it should. At least that unexplained jumping stops after deburring the flash holes.

To me it depends on what brass you may use. This is from my experience doing different kinds of brass. Lapua and nosler, I wouldn't bother. I have found a few rough ones in my 6.5 Grendel Hornady brass. If you are using Winchester and Remington brass I definitely would. I was amazed how rough the winchester flash holes were.

I was referring to debuting only.

I have both the flash hole tool and a primer pocket tool and use both, do they make much of a difference in how the brass shoots who knows. Neither removes that much brass, on some cases seems like nothing at all. Making them all uniform is probably not a bad thing, doesn't take that long to do and is a one time job.

discard them my way, off centered flash holes have no effect on accuracy at all, I tested this and couldnt prove either way.

Or clean brass until it is really bad and I need to trim.

Same

if you don't have a benchrest rifle....why bother?

There was an article years ago in “Handloader” or “Rifle” and the author tried all the tricks and and he found found that flash hole uniforming gave the best bang for the buck.

All that aside, sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t. It depends on the capabilities of the individual rifle and its intended use.

Before I share my experience, I will admit that anything that gives you more confidence in your ammo will probably help you shoot better. Doubts always seem to effect your ability to relax and shoot your best groups. All the effort helps you understand the physics of your ammo better, and it's just plain fun.

I have had brass that the holes were visibly not uniform and I felt compelled to dress them up. I've seen brass with the knockout still hinged on the side of the hole. Or off centered or burred flash holes. I'm sure they would still go bang, but I cant tolerate that much visible error. I still pull out the tools for those reasons.

Today, I open a bag of brass, inspect every piece for anything obvious, and move on.

However, I did spend a few years feeding this accuracy fetish. I used to spend several hours a week at the range, Trying every little trick I heard of to shrink group size.

As for running the tool through every piece of brass that looks fine ... I never could produce a measurable advantage to uniforming the flash holes.

I have uniformed primer pockets. Although I think it can help produce a more uniform seating depth, I can't say I have seen smaller group sizes as a result.

Even neck turning had really been of debatable improvement. I've weighed brass and bullets, checked for run-out, measured case wall thickness, and confirmed case volume with water weight, etc. etc.

My only real comparative test effort has been to load 20 rounds with every detail paid, and another as they came out of the bag. Altering shot groups, cold and warm barrels ... I have found, one batch is as likely to produce the smallest group as the other. I've tried this with a number of different cartridges, brands of brass, and rifles.

For true bench rest shooters, maybe all this effort consistently makes their half inch group a quarter inch group. But for field use, I can't find a consistent advantage. A small gust of wind is more apt to have an effect than the hours spent on all those details.

I feel fully confident that I have never missed what I was aiming at, where it was the ammo's fault. No, I haven't stopped and said "Boy, I sure wish I would have uniformed those flash holes". The error has been all of my own.

But isn't it fun trying?

I use Lapua, Norma, Nosler, RWS when I can get it, Winchester if I can't then Remington. I find Federal in most calibers is too soft. I am going to try some Sig Sauer in my .243, I hear its made nice too. We'll see.

This is what I do

I prefer buying Lapua brass as it has all the prep already completed. When it isn't available, I'll run through the resizing, trimming, neck turning and flash hole duburring once for the batch then after that I'll just keep the cases trimmed and anneal the necks once in a while.

Me too.

Lapua brass in my 20-222 purty much ready to go..........