I've been fireforming brass for an assortment of wildcats dating back to the early 80s. The worst I have seen during that time frame has been the Hirtenberger 5.6x50R -- that is, until the latest batch of Winchester 25-35 that I used.

The case I sectioned was exceedingly thin (and inconsistent in thickness) from just above the web to just below the shoulder. Surprisingly, the necks were just fine. 14 of the first 30 split, and some had as many as three splits. Even varying the powder charges up and down -- from within 10 percent of max to utterly anemic -- made no difference to this poorly-manufactured product.

I would throw the rest away and never buy winchester brass again!Thats bad!

Bobby: write Winchester a letter explaining what happened. I bet they will replace the brass and pay for shipping....they did for me.

olarmy-

I have sent them a detailed note and even included the photo.

I'll post the results -- if any.

Thanks!
Bobby

Bobby-

Looks like you got a bad batch. Every brass firm turns them out once in a while. (That's not to excuse it, just to note that you may never see another such Winchester batch in your lifetime, while the very next batch you buy of some other brand COULD be just as bad.)

Without examining the brass, my first guess would be that the brass you have was extruded from sheet stock which had a small fold in it when it was initially rolled. Rolling would flatten the fold to invisibility, but of course it would still be there as a weak seam. Then, when the sheet stock was "coined", making the small round slugs which are used in the extruders to form the cartridge cases, any coins taken from along that seam would have an inherent flaw.

Too bad it wasn't caught at some inspection step in the rolling or coining processes, but no production line is perfect, not even Rolls Royce.

I suspect Winchester would love to have a few of those back, both fired and unfired, for determining exactly what did happen. Also bet the NRA technical division would like to have a couple of the fired (& split) ones.

Good photos and stats, BTW. Very effective presentation you made.

It would be interesting to weight the unfired Winchester brass and compare it to Remington brass just to see if there is a substantial weight difference, cut some in half and see if the case walls measure much thinner that the Remington brass.

There is no equivalent Remington brass to compare it to.

Also, some of the thinnest, "cheapest" brass is used in ammo loaded by S&B. I had some of their 117 grain FP loads on hand, and even this stuff fireformed just fine.

This morning, I sent an e-mail to Winchester along with some photos. Within minutes, I received confirmation acknowledging my question had been received, and about an hour later I got the 2nd note below that:

FIRST NOTE:

"Thank you for submitting your question to Winchester. You will receive a response within one or two business days.

---Do not reply to this email as it is auto generated---

--------------------

SECOND NOTE

"Thank you very much for taking the time to contact us here at
> Winchester Ammunition. We are always glad to hear from our many
> friends and customers who share in the shooting sport."
>
> Thank you again for contacting us here at Winchester Ammunition.
> If you
> should require additional information, do not hesitate to contact us.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Winchester Technical Department
------

I sure hope I hear more from them than this!

I fire formed 20 Remington .303 British case in a M95 Dutch Mannlicher in 6.5X53R. One split with a zig zag similar to yours. Strange thing was the split stopped about 1/4 below the shoulder where the case had to stretch the most.

Several of mine did the exact same thing as your .303 brass. It makes no sense. The chamber is of minimum tolerances (it's a custom Contender barrel by MGM) and the only real area needing to fireform was from the shoulder up.

There is a line from the neck down to where the split starts. There is a burn going toward the base of the shell along the split. It looks like it may have been cut by the gasses coming from the neck going toward the base. Is it possible that the neck did not seal and the gasses heated the case to the point of failure?
I have seen a few "J" splits like this before from metal fatigue but they never exhibited the kind of burn that I see on this case. The soot and burn markings look odd to me.

I had a box of factory Winchester 300WM failsafe ammo that was the most unaccurate box of ammo I ever saw.Some of the cases looked just like that after firing.After firing them I went straight to a gunstore and bought a box of Remington core-locts in the same grain that I had before and knew were really accurate.I went back to the range,shot a tight group instead of shots spread a foot apart.Someone who knows cases well can tell you exactly whats wrong with them.

quote:

Originally posted by Bobby Tomek:
Several of mine did the exact same thing as your .303 brass. It makes no sense. The chamber is of minimum tolerances (it's a custom Contender barrel by MGM) and the only real area needing to fireform was from the shoulder up.

You might section some of your brass, both dead and surviving and see if there is an internal drawing defect. I have a batch of Frontier .303 cases that have performed well but one has a visible drawing defect on the outside. I have never seen such a defect on the outside of a case before. I guess I need to section it or shoot it to see what happens.

To make this clearer...

In the "old days", when quality control of new cartridge cases was not as thorough as it is today, this kind of problem was seen more often, and was the object of much investigation by manufacturers, the military, and the NRA.

It was almost always found to be a problem of brass stock quality, if the lengthwise split originated toward the base end of the case. If the split originated at the neck end of the case, it usually turned out to be improper annealing during the forming processes.

As almost all brass expands to some extent when first fired (because almost all chambers have clearances to allow sure chambering of loaded ammo. and sure extraction of fired brass) seams can cause such splits in either normal firing, or in fireforming to new shapes. When and if it happens depends on the extent of expansion and the seriousness of the brass fault.

Such seams in new brass are still fairly common in the manufacturing process. The difference is that these days the quality control programs at the various factories usually find and reject faulty lots of brass before it is sold.

quote:

Originally posted by Bobby Tomek:
...I sure hope I hear more from them than this!

Hey Bobby, I sure hope you do too. Seems like a very strange reply that you have gotten so far.

Many years ago I got a box of Remington 22Hornet Factory Loads which began splitting on me. I spoke to them on the phone and they told me to return them and gave me a Return Authorization Number.

I was expecting a letter saying what was wrong and a new box of Factory Ammo, but they replaced them two-for-one.
-----

Seems like a Pre-Set Message you got without the Body of the Text. Strange indeed.

Ive sent sp;it brass back to WW also and they sent back a bag of new brass. For the most part Ive had good experience with WW brass.

I suspect you just got a bad batch.

Im not familliar with useing 25-30-30, Curious why to use 25-35 brass instead of 30-30 brass

GSP7 wrote: "Im not familliar with useing 25-30-30, Curious why to use 25-35 brass instead of 30-30 brass"

Because I could...

In all seriousness, I didn't want to wait on dies to arrive, and with 25-35 brass, it's just load & shoot.

If you note in the first post, the other 50 cases were made using 30-30 brass.

I think that every manufacturer has these problems. I ordered a bag of Remington 375 H&H magnum brass (50 count) and over 20 of them were unusable and all of them looked old and spotted. This is the picture that I sent to Remington showing the problem with the brass.

Your .375 case reminds me of 6 Remington .375 H&H once fired cases I got in a lot from a dealer in Arkansas. Since Remington ammo is also manufactured in Arkansas is is not much of a stretch to think it came from Remington's plant.
The 6 cases had been fired in a copper crusher pressure gun. The pressure had not been high enough to perforate the case at the copper crusher location but it left the brass raised about .010 in a circle about 3/16 in dia.

I think you will find that all of the brass companies will have their "bad batch", the last I got was from Starline, some looked just like yours on the first firing.

NO WORD from Winchester as of this morning...

As an aside and for purposes of comparison, I was able to scrounge up 5 pieces of older, once-fired 25-35 brass.

I sized, loaded and fired these 5 pieces just as I did the new WW brass.

All five formed PERFECTLY and with no problems.

Bobby, that's the same kind of email reply I got recently from The UPS Store. (not to be confused with United Parcel Service) They have big signs in front of their cash registers saying they will not ship any manner of guns. I asked what their reasoning was and was told each franchise is locally owned. Best to ask on their website...I got the same type of reply as you did from Winchester. So don't hold your breath waiting for more from Winchester. Both our concerns have been dumped in the dead email waste basket. I haven't decided yet whether to pursue it with a 42 cent stamped letter.

Chances are they are afraid that if they acknowledge anything the next mail they receive will contain pics of shredded fingers and a letter from a lawyer. In fact, Canadian experience is that dealing straight-up with problems solves more lawsuits than it creates. If somebody really did get hurt they are going to hear about it no matter what.

In going through some stuff in my gun room today, I found the old delivery confirmation ticket for the brass I sent to Winchester -- more than 7 years ago.

Within the first year, I did call them a few times to check for an update and was always given some generic answer -- something along the lines of "we are getting to it." I basically gave up on it after that and figured it wasn't worth my time anymore.

They never acknowledged an issue and never bothered to reimburse me for the brass I sent them or even had the courtesy to send back my "bad batch" of brass.

Now that's customer service at its finest...

Bobby , did you by any chance link this thread to your letters ?

This has been the case from the beginning of time and Winchester has known it from the beginning..They still use the same 25-35 brass that they used when they made the change to smokeless powder..

If you want to make 25-35s then use 30-30 or 32 special brass, run them thru a trim die, then inside neck ream, then run them thru your full length die..

Never use 5.6x50R European brass in Lever action Winchester or Savage rifles as specs vari and case seperations occur with regularity, not dangerous just costly..and reloading them is an exercise in futility.

Again, this is not a new discovery, its been in print for eons, just not lately perhaps, and only a few of us old curmudgeons even know what a 25-35 is and if you own one better buy, steal, kill for, every round you can. I have a large supply of loaded ammo and brass and will still buy all I can find.

quote:

Originally posted by Bobby Tomek:
In going through some stuff in my gun room today, I found the old delivery confirmation ticket for the brass I sent to Winchester -- more than 7 years ago.

Within the first year, I did call them a few times to check for an update and was always given some generic answer -- something along the lines of "we are getting to it." I basically gave up on it after that and figured it wasn't worth my time anymore.

They never acknowledged an issue and never bothered to reimburse me for the brass I sent them or even had the courtesy to send back my "bad batch" of brass.

Now that's customer service at its finest...

Thanks for the update....it speaks poorly of Winchester and I'm sure it will effect my purchases at some time in the future.....

Maybe it is just me and I haven't been at this as long as you and Ray - only 20 years or so for me- but on another note these new Winchester cases have a more distinct "yellow-er" color than any of my older Winchester brass. I pretty much use Winchester brass across the board.

I wonder if Winchester has changed its cartridge brass specifications is why I am stating this.

" Cartridge Brass "is 70 Cu-30 Zn. Winchester had IIRC a minor modification of that. 70-30 is the most ductile of the brasses.
If your new and old brass is different in color you might have a significantly different alloy which is not the most ductile.
Could this be another "made in China " problem ?
Their materials and methods have left a long trail of poor products in many industries.Othe off-shore companies do similar thingsa.

That is my understanding too - that Winchester had their own spec for the Cartridge Brass.

There is a distinct color difference in the newer bags (the red and black Winchester bags of brass) than the older blue bags.

I thought about sending couple of pieces for testing just to see the difference. The newer brass looks a lot like Hornady to me.

Winchester and Remington for the most part will not be producing brass for the next three or more years, with perhaps some runs in .270 and 30-06, they are vague to say the least. At that time they intend to reasses the situation..It seems they show more profit making loaded ammo an only in popular calibers...They have both sold us down the tube..I refuse to ever buy either again...

I see you are still messing with those cheap junker guns, send them to me (I'll pay shipping) and I'll send you a Savage or two.

Steve........