Balloon head brass

[fatelk]

I wasn't quite sure where to put this; rifle, revolver, or reloading. If someone feels it should be moved that's fine.

I recently came in posession of a bunch of .45 Colt balloon head brass. It was all reloads from the 60's (at least that's what the boxes said). I won't shoot anonymous reloads, let alone balloon heads, so I pulled them all apart with an inertia puller.

The first question is does anyone know about when they quit making them? Most are Western, some REM-UMC, a few Peters. About half are unfired, still nice and shiny inside. I've been told that balloon head brass was produced up until about WWII.

The next question is demand. Does anyone still use them anymore? Perhaps purists among the Cowboy or black powder crowd? I thought about trying to sell them on Ebay or something.

Yes, I know I will get responses telling me NO! DO NOT USE THEM! CRUSH THEM FOR SCRAP! THEY WILL BLOW UP! I expect that. I know they are old and thin and weak. If I were to list them for sale that would be made very clear. I also have loaded some in the past with very light loads and no problems.

Mostly I'm curious about how old they might be and if there is any demand for them any more.

 

[bfoster]

You may be describing semi-balloon head brass (once, long ago, known as solid head brass). While the area around the primer is relieved the rim itself is solid in this type of case.

Most revolver cartridge cases made up until the WWII era with the notable exceptions of the 38/44 and 357 magnum are of semi balloon head type construction.

In 45 Colt, most, if not all cases were similar to current brass by the late '50's when Dick Casull introduced the precursor to the 454, the 45 Magnum. These revolvers fired a very hot triplex load in 45 Colt brass.

The last semi-balloon head case I'm aware of being sold by a manufacturer is Remington 45AR, part #U45AR, lot #23MTC. The box is dated 3 84. I don't know when this brass was made.

In a true balloon head case the rim is formed by a fold in the metal. True balloon head type brass hasn't been offered by the major makers in a long time- an educated guess is that the last of it was produced in the decade spanning the late '20's to the late 30's. As tooling and machinery designed to produce balloon head brass wore out the factories invested in equipment to produce semi-balloon head brass and/or solid head brass. Some manufacturers offered some handgun cases of semi-balloon head construction much earlier than this period.

Bob

 

[The Deer Hunter]

Whats ballon headed mean?

 

[Vern Humphrey]

If you section a modern cartridge you will see the head (base) is solid. The primer pocket is in that solid head (or web) and the mouth of the flash hole is flush with the floor of the web. A balloon head has the primer pocket punched from below -- the thin brass head is pushed forward to form the pocket, which sticks up above the floor of the web.

Some balloon heads had the rim formed by folding -- like a .22 rimfire.

 

[fatelk]

Thanks all for the responses. Bfoster, sounds like you know your brass; thanks for the info. It looks like what I have is semi-balloon head.

I think I will list them on ebay with the caveat that they are not safe to use with modern high pressure loads. Surely someone out there has some use for them. I don't even have a .45 Colt.

 

[bigjim7t]

45 Colt balloon head brass wanted

Hello all. Fatelk, do you still happen to have some of those 45 Colt balloon head brass cases? If you do, or if someone else does, PLEASE write me and let me know how much for at least 50 cases.
Thanks

 

[rcmodel]

I would think the Black-Powder guys will go ape over them.

Modern solid cases won't hold the old black powder 40 grain charge to replicate the original load.

(Yea! I know about it later being reduced to 30 grains by the Military, and some only had 38 grains, and all that.)

Fact remains, if you want to load the .45 Colt with it's old heavy load, modern cases won't hold enough black powder.


rcmodel

 

[Jim Watson]

Terminology floats a little bit.
What bfoster calls semi-balloon, I learned to call balloon head.
What bfoster calls balloon head, I learned to call folded head.

I think rcmodel is right, somebody wanting to shoot manly full charge black powder loads would probably love to have them.