First Happy New Year to one and all.
I have a bunch of .308 brass that I am doing case prep on. Most of my books say max case length of 2.013 and trim to 2.005. The problem is I have a bunch of military brass that is once fired that is 2.035 to 2.040 I also have some LC match that is 2.001to 2.003 I am trimming it all to 2.000 to true the mouths and make it all uniform.
I am wondering if any one had run into this wide of range in 308 brass?
Also as an aside I picked up some MTM CASEGARD boxes the other day at Cabellas the interesting thing I noted when I got home and opened one was they have changed the hinge. Yes it has been a long time since I bought case boxes. I just thought it was a great improvement over the old style hinge. You can take the top off the box now if you want. I have to go look on line as the only ones with the new hinges were the 50-count medium and 50 count large rifle. It’s the small things that keep us old timers happy and amused
Bill

Was the Military brass that long before or after you resized it?

A possible explanation would be that if that's the sized length it could be due to the fact that it was shot in a fat chamber and had to be heavily resized and this caused more than normal length growth - the resized brass has to move somewhere! It's interesting to check your case length before and after sizing in any case.........................DJ

I`ve never paid much attention to fired unsized brass length in bottleneck cartridges but my straight walled pistol such as the 45acp brass will shrink a .010" from expansion during firing and gain it almost all back when resized.
The only length that really matters is the sized and ready to load AOL.

quote:

Originally posted by Ol` Joe:
The only length that really matters is the sized and ready to load AOL.

In one sense yes, in another no. How much your brass stretches during sizing can tell you a lot about your chamber....................DJ

I would have to trim them back to minimum just once and be done with it.

Case length HAS mattered in a couple of my 308s. The chambers were cut just a couple thousandths above listed maximum. When I let the cases get above max length, the chamber acted as a "crimp" and I got erratic pressure ans velocity. When I trimmed back, all was good again. I know it really matters in my 5.6-06AI.

quote:

Originally posted by djpaintles:
Was the Military brass that long before or after you resized it?...DJ

I don't know how long it was before it was resized. I was afraid when I first noticed it that it was machine gun brass. They are notorious for loose chambers and stretching brass. I looked several over and found no evidence of excess stretching or insipient head separation as I have seen with machine gun brass. I even sectioned one to look at wall thickness. I didn’t see a problem.
djpaintles,
Yes I agree.
I was glad I had a chance to borrow a power trimmer it really helps with this time consuming job. The trimmer I am using http://www.matchprep.com/trimmer.htm
It locates off the shoulder of the case so it will only work on bottleneck cases. It does save time as it trims debures and chamfers the inside in one operation.
I think I was/am just amazed at how long the brass was 2.035 to 2.040 when the trim to length is 2.005 with a max of 2.013
Bill

quote:

Originally posted by Bill Cooley:
First Happy New Year to one and all.
I have a bunch of .308 brass that I am doing case prep on. Most of my books say max case length of 2.013 and trim to 2.005.

The books i have (Speer 14th, loadbooks USA, etc.) show max case length at 2.015 and i trim to 2.010 for my Sako and never have a problem. However alot of manuals recommend trimming 10% below max length.