Lake City 308 Brass

4318 Views 16 Replies 10 Participants Last post by Caleb C, Apr 19, 2010

Caleb C

Discussion Starter · Apr 13, 2010

I recently purchased 100 rounds of supposedly once fired 308 brass at a gun show. The brass is all marked "LC 06". I sized it all in a Hornady sizing die and trimmed it all to length. Upon trimming the brass I notice that it all seemed a little long for once fired brass. Some of it was up to 25 mils too long. Anywho.........after the cases were all preped I loaded them with the same powder charge (46.5 gr H380) as my previous loads and capped them off with 150gr Hornady SSTs (the same load I've been shooting for months). When I got to the bench I noticed that NONE of the Lake City cases would chamber in my rifle. They seem to go into the chamber well enough but I can't lock the bolt. I've inspected all of the brass by measuring length and diameter but, I can't seem to find any differences between the Lake City and the Frontier brass that I've been using.

Do you have any idea what the problem my be? Have you heard of anyone else having problems with Lake City brass?

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Doug Bowser

· #2 · Apr 13, 2010

This could be brass that has been fired in a M60 machine gun. The brass can stretch lengthwise and expand at the base when fired in a machine gun. . Measure the head diameter and check that with the head diameter of the cases you have been using. If you buy USGI brass in the future, try to determine wether the brass has been fired in a rifle or machine gun.

Another item you might want to acquire is a cartridge headspace gauge. Wilson makes these. It measures the headspace of the cartridge case.

Doug

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Doug Bowser

· #6 · Apr 13, 2010

Caleb C said:
That's correct. I used a full length size die. I even resized a few empty cases for a second time and tried them in my rifle (just to make sure I didn't do something stupid like forget to size them the first time). The empty cases showed the same problem as the loaded ammo.

Thanks for the info, Doug. I was completely unaware that machine gun fired brass could be so dimensionally different. Should the seller of the brass be able to account for what gun it was fired from? If so, are they likely to be honest about it?

THAT DEPENDS ON THE SELLER

I'm assuming that if the heads are stretched then that would render this brass useless. Is that a correct assumption?

YES

Doug

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