Flash holes are mishaped

[JoelSteinbach]

I just started cleaning my brass with a Hornady ultrasonic cleaner. It does a great job especially on the primer pockets. I noticed that the flash holes in the primer pockets. on a large percentage of my 44 spec are ragged and enlarged, I have been hand loading for many years and have never noticed this before. Is this normal for brass that has been reloaded 3 or 4 times? Is the brass still useable, I rarely load to the max, I enjoy a gentle load in a heavy gun. Any one have any ideas !

 

[rcmodel]

Most likely made that way.

Shooting them just makes them smoother if anything.

It will have no effect on safety or usability as long as the primer pockets are still tight.

rc

 

[JoelSteinbach]

Thank RC

 

[mdi]

Well, that's what you get fer gettin' yer brass so clean! You can see all the defects!

 

[ReloaderFred]

Flash holes are punched, rather than drilled. That's why they appear ragged, and there's probably a burr on the inside of the case from the punching process. In most cases, it won't matter, especially in handgun brass. Benchrest rifle shooters, and some others, get rid of the burrs in order to eliminate any possibility of it causing a problem, accuracy wise.....

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[gamestalker]

The variations in flash hole shapes, unless they are really significant, won't have a noticeable effect on accuracy with handgun cartridges. Now high powered rifle, that's a different story entirely, in which case many competitive shooters will uniform them.

GS