I just ordered and received 300 Remington .22-250 and 300 Remington 6mm pieces of brass. Naturally I specified that all the .22-250 brass be from the same lot number, and did the same for the 6mm brass.

I then decided to take some measurements.

I plucked 50 of each size and started playing with my calipers and micrometers...

Here is what I found:

The OAL of the 50 .22-250 cases varied only 0.002".
The OAL of the .22-250 cases was smack-dab in the middle of the "trim to" and the "max" lengths.
The OAL of the 50 6mm cases caried only 0.002".
The OAL of the 6mm cases was smack-dab in the middle of the "trim to" and the "max" lengths.
Casewall thickness on all 100 cases was 0.015".
The primer pocket depth was the same on all 100 cases.
The primer pocket diameter was the same on all 100 cases.
Yes, I had to de-burr the inside of the flasholes of all 600 cases.
And I did trim all the .22-250 cases to the same length, as well as trimming all the 6mm cases to the same length (although I really don't think that step was necessary!)
And I also chamfered inside and outside case mouths.

Considering the bad-mouthing I have been reading recently about Remington and Winchester brass, and all the glory-hounding of Norma brass...I just gotta ask...

When you can buy Remington brass with this type of quality and consistency for $17.05 per 100, why pay $60.62 per hundred for Norma?

Steve -
I've always had pretty good luck with R-P brass over the years. Occasionally, some weird things have turned up (like the time a 270 case popped up in a bag of 30-06's), but, on balance, you can't beat their stuff for the price.

Unfortunately, sometimes the caliber is just not offered by R-P, and then you have to grit your teeth and fork over the $$$. I just got 100 Lapua 9.3x62's for around $55.00, if memory serves.

R-WEST

R-WEST

I almost always use R-P brass, and I've always been pleased with it. I have also found a few bags that had one or two of the wrong size brass though.

I prefer WW brass just because it's probably what John Wayne used. But truth be known R-P would be my second choice for brass. I've used a ton of it in different calibers and never had any trouble.

On the other hand, you couldn't run fast enought to give me Norma brass. All of it I have ever use, the case life has been PITIFUL.

No Norma for me!

Of the Remington cases I've sectioned, or seen sectioned, the web tends to be heavier than other brands, and the capacity just a little less. Overall, I haven't noticed any real difference in Remington, Winchester, Federal, or Hornady.

It's been 35 years since I used any Norma brass. At that time, it was substantially softer in the the head area than American brass and would show extractor marks with the same loads that appeared mild in other brass. I understand it is different today, but I don't think it's 300% different.

A couple of gun shows ago, I bought a couple of bags of Winchester brand.358 Win. cases. This was new brass bagged by Winchester. While preping the brass, ie, straighting out dented case necks, eight rounds would not go into the shell holder. They did go into a 30-30 shell holder though. I now am the proud owner of eight rounds of .356 Winchester brass stamped .358 Win. So much for quality control. Woned ir they'll ever attain some kind of collector value?
Paul B.

I guess my preference for brass would be as follows:

1. Norma
2. Winchester
3. Remington

I haven't experienced short case life with Norma like Pecos45 has. Also, each time I've bought 100 pieces of Norma brass, I get 100 usable cases. When buying Win. or Rem. brass I always have to cull a few cases due to various defects.

In the end, however, I'd be pretty happy with any of these three.

Well, if I were to really sit and count my brass (which I'm not about to do) I would estimate that 92% of my rifle brass is Remington and the remainder Winchester. Counting the Winchester brass would be easy, since it is used in .264 Win., .30-30 Win., and .300 Win. Mag. All the rest is Remington.

I've never had a problem with Remington, guess that is why I have been married to it for so long. Never had to toss any for manufacturing defects right out of the bag. (I have had a couple of cases go downstream after 5 or 6 loadings, but I also have a ton of it that has been loaded over 20 times...and still functions well.)

I have had Federal brass crap-out after only 3 loadings. And, the only Norma brass I ever used was for a .22 Hi-Power.

I was just wondering why someone would pay 3x's as much for Norma brass...other than the headstamp.

I too opened up 5 boxes(100 pieces) of .222 Rem brass two days ago, I was a bit surprised to see the overall variation in case length is but 0.001". I had to deburr the flashholes as well. There's about 90% of those with round marks surrounding the hole, most of those marks are off-center.

I think of Win, Rem, Fed, etc... brass as pretty much equal quality, and quality is consistently good. I think out of the last 2,000 or so cases I've purchased, perhaps two or three were unusable, but there were enough "extras" (i.e. 51 pieces in a bag of 50) to more than make up for it.

I recently had a rifle rebarreled to .358 Norma Magnum. I was just going to resize and fireform some WW Super .300 Win mag brass to make the .358 brass, but thought I'd get one box of 20 ($16 ) Norma cases to see if they were worth the extra cost.

After examining it and using it once, I've since ordered 100 more of the Norma cases (ouch!). They're better polished, the mouths are perfectly round, the cases are all straight, dimensions are within .002" on all cases, uniform flashholes with no burrs, and overall they just seem to be a lot nicer than the domestic stuff.

Is the extra "niceness" enough to make me pitch all my domestic brass, and replace it with Norma in the various calibers? No way.

But it IS damned nice brass.

Well, granted, for certain calibers you have no choice but to go to Norma or Lapua for brass.

Where I got fed up with Norma brass and decided I would never use it again was with .357 Magnum.
It was pretty. It sized nice. Looked nice when loaded and all the cosmetic things. But case life was about half what WW, RP or Fed brass was.
Norma split, cases came apart and primer pockets grew to where I could stick a jelly bean in them half the time.

And no these were not excessively hot reloads. Traditionally, I loaded that stuff a grain below max. Norma brass was lucky if it survived two reloads.

Everyone tells me how wonderful it is today. Maybe they are right...but I wouldn't pay their silly price just to find out.

Maybe that's just the old fart in me, but I've done pretty good over 45 years worth of reloading NOT using Norma brass. I reckon I can hold out a little longer and "make do" with Win, Rem and Fed.

To the fellow who got some mis-stamped brass, I'm guessing this was a "bulk brass" purchase from someone who maybe bought some "blemished" or "factory second" brass?

I buy a lot of bulk bullets this way and some of them aren't so pretty...but at least I've never got a wrong caliber bullet in the batch! That would be pretty upsetting to discover someone slipped a .280 bullet in with my .277 bullets.

My complaint with Norma has always been their durability. I'm not about to pay a premium price for something that last's half as long as ordinary.

[ 06-25-2002, 03:15: Message edited by: Pecos45 ]

Hey, Paul B -- I'll take a mis-marked .30-30 for my .30-30 brass collection! I doubt if they have much value right now but someday.... I once saw a .45 Colt case, by Winchester as I recall, that said ".45 CLOT." I think they were a contract for the Turkish government. If you're willing to part with one, please contact me at Rezdog34@Yahoo.Com

Pecos,

I'm going to use twenty of my .358 Norma Mag cases for load development, so should have about five to ten loadings through them by the end of July (if they last that long). I'll let you know how they hold up.

Like I said, Norma seems nicer than our domestic brands, but I don't think I'd pay the extra money for a standard caliber like .308 or .270.

My brother, on the other hand, uses nothing but Lapua brass in his high-power competitive rifle. He raves about it day and night. For hunting cartridges, though, he uses pretty much just Federal and Winchester. He claims to get up to twenty uses out of his Lapua .308 brass.

Steve,

What is the weight variation on that brass?

I am not so sure about Remington "brass" I have a lot of Remington 9 1/2's here that split on the outside radius and I have had a number of Remington .22LR cases let go on the rim. One of these resulted in at trip to the eye doctor.

It is true that Remington brass is thicker in the head section and this is a major benefit in belted cases as they last longer than Winchester brass.

Okay, since several people in different forums have brought up the question of the weight variation of the brass, I weighed the same 50 .22-250 and 50 6mm Remington brass.

For the .22-250...lightest was 153.3 grains, heaviest was 154.8 grains. Average was 154.0 grains.
For the 6mm...lightest was 171.2 grains, heaviest was 172.1 grains. Average was 171.5 grains.

I have no idea if these numbers are good, bad or average, since I have never bother weighing cases before.

I read too that people prefer other brass. I prefer Remington brass any day over Winchester, especially for rifle. Win brass I've used had varying primer pocket depth. Always a round or three out of a hundred that the primer won't seat flush or below. I think it's like the Ford or Chevy debate. It's a personal opinion thing and not always based on real factual data. By the way I'm a Remington fan and would rather walk than own a Ford.

I will agree that some of the domestic brass in select calibers is more than sufficient for most reasonable tasks short of extreme bench accuracy. But the key here is "select" calibers. Go buy yourself a bag of 100 6.5x55, get our your essential tools and go to work.

First, the case head size is incorrect. Secondly, I routinely cull 18-22 pieces out of every 100 for various reasons, from extreme weight variations to inconsistent neck thickness to flash holes so off center that I can't imagine how the case make it past a QC inspector.

Of those that I cull, they are relegated to mild loads used for getting a bore-sighted gun close to point-of-aim and also for my son's plinking.

Yes, the Remchester brass appears to be a bargain -- or is it??? If I have to neck turn half the cases, drill out all of the flash holes, etc. how much is my time worth? The Remchester brass runs $24-26 per 100 (make that per 78-82 because of inevitable culling) from my source, but I can pick up 100 pieces of Lapua brass for around $38/100 or Norma for just under $43/100). This brass is amazingly consistent, and I don't think I have EVER culled a single piece of Lapua or Norma brass.

I have some Norma brass that has seen more firings than I care to re-trace, and it's still tight. And, I'd wager that the majority of the loads featured a 140 grain bullet and top-end loads (27-2800 fps from a 24" barrel). So the brass certainly wasn't pampered.

I also trim less often with Norma or Lapua than with anything else in this caliber.

My Lapua brass in 6.5x55...well, I'm not ready to elaborate. After all, the initial batch has only seen a dozen firings.......

You've never owned a Bronco...

Amen, Steve. We'll wave as we pass you by rg1.

R-WEST

I just bought 100 PMC 6.5x55 cases and all seem to be excellent no burrs in the primer holes all smack in the middle of trim to and max length. It was al that was available and I needed brass, I wonder how long it will lst, I also use rem brass for my hornet.

Double Amen on the Bronco. 232K and going strong! Cobalt

I used toload some Remington brass - not anymore. I shoot a 257 Ackley. I bought 250 rounds of RP Roberts brass and made fireform loads. Out of the 250 cases I started with, I was able to fire 100 of them out of which I got 32 that did not completely split the neck. I called remington and they said to send the remaining brass and the fireformed brass to them. I did. They wrote me 6-7 mos. later, and after sevral calls that the brass worked fine for the 257 roberts and was not formed to be made into wildcats. Not only that they never returned my brass or gave me a credit. I subsequently loaded the same recipe in Hornady brass (made by Winchester) and never lost a case. The only Remington brass I buy is for 6.5 and 350 Rem. Mag and 416 Rem mag so I can have head stamped brass!
lb404

HAVE NEVER expeienced any kind of problems with Remington brass. It does tend to have a little less capacity than Winchester in some calibers. (Thicker walls). But, have had trouble with some Norma brass being a lot softer, and hence more prone to wearout quicker with max loads...

When I used to fireform .219 K-Zippers which is an extreme "improvement" the Remington brass would spit at the shoulder and the Winchester would not. Oil on the cases would reduce spliting by the way.

Then I found that it's easier to make the brass out of 30/30's.

I have R-P & WW brass for the majority of my .45 ACP stockpile. The R-P is visibly more robust as well as heavier than the WW. I tend to use the R-P a LOT more than the WW. I may have less case volume with the R-P, but I like the heavy-duty feel of it.

The best brass is Lapua no one make it any better I wish they would make it in more calibers.The next would be Norma and Hornady. PMC makes good brass.

In truth there is very little difference in any of todays brass...I have had good luck with and prefer it in about the following order: RWS, Lapua, WW, PMC, Rem, Norma but I cannot see much difference in any of it...most difference is in the mind of the user I suspect considering it is made in batches and good and bad pop up from time to time in all brass cases so you may be comparing a bad batch of one brand to an exceptional batch of another brand. I certainly have better things to concern me...

I will say that Bertram brass should not be allowed in this country, it is pure junk for the most part.

Oh yes Mass tech is pretty good stuff and Hornady and Frontier is made by Federal I think, and Federal is excellent brass.

Steve, here's another 23 yrs of handloading experience that says that Remington brass has given me fewer problems that any other. They seem to outlast others I've tried, but for the last several years they are all I've used, except for pickups and Weatherby calibers, of course. I came across a great deal on Remington 257 Wea. ammo and will try their brass after the factory 122 gr. extended range bullets are expended. BTW, so far they have done very well on deer.

It seems funny to me that there are so many different experiences with the different types of brass. 450 No2 Bertram brass is the best rifle brass I have ever used. See my previous posts on this. Their 450/400 3 1/4 works good so far, but I like HDS brass in this caliber better. I have had good results from WCC and Federal .308 WCF brass. RP 45/70 seems OK, but their 45ACP brass is too thin in the mouth I will not use it, much prefering WCC Brass in the 45ACP. Norma 9.3x74R is the WORST brass I have ever used, it will seperate at the case head on the third firing most of the time. I shoot it twice and throw it away. And I am not improperly sizing it. I have used a neck sizing die and my loads are not hot. That is one nice think about this forum is to get different peoples opinions and experiences.