unknown processed primed brass

[WestKentucky]

So, assume you get a random thousand pieces of brass that appears to be fully processed, primed, but with an unknown primer, unknown history, and unknown as to what all truly has been done. Put yourself in the situation, assume it's what you plan to load next and you stumbled across this free pile of stuff.

 

[wes79]

The way I would do it (maybe not the right way) is pick 10. Compare primer depth to known round, measure trim length, see if it will chamber in your gun. If all is ok, work up a mid-range load. If it goes bang, like you think it should, your most likely good to go.

 

[higgite]

Since it's play like, I'd load them and shoot them. If it were real, I'd give them all to you and let you worry over what to do.

 

[Walkalong]

Check them all internally for signs of a rut. Check them all in a gauge for headspace issues.

Chances are very good they have rifle primers in them. You might be able to match them up if you have a variety of them to compare with.

If they all pass the checks, load 5 with a known load, and test them out. Go from there.

 

[mongoose33]

It would all depend on where and from whom I got it from.

I know you set up the question so that this mystery, primed brass appeared on your doorstep one morning with no indication where it came from, but in the real world, things don't work that way.

 

[Salmoneye]

Snap a few in a chamber before loading to make sure they fire, and then inspect the primers...

They should back out a tad, but show no signs of leakage, piercing, etc....

 

[WestKentucky]

It would all depend on where and from whom I got it from.

I know you set up the question so that this mystery, primed brass appeared on your doorstep one morning with no indication where it came from, but in the real world, things don't work that way.

Truly unknown brass does come up from time to time. I have a batch now, and have had 2 others. I know what I do, but I'm curious to what others would do.

 

[mongoose33]

Truly unknown brass does come up from time to time. I have a batch now, and have had 2 others. I know what I do, but I'm curious to what others would do.

Truly unknown brass does show up from time to time--it's called range pickups. Never have I picked up any of those with unfired primers.

 

[Rule3]

You did not mention caliber(s) is it handgun or rifle?? To me that makes a big difference.

I would not be real concerned with say 38 specials but more so with 223 or 308.

 

[Muddydogs]

I would load up some lighter lead loads in the brass and shoot away or deprime and size the brass then process like any other brass in my stash. Really depends on how I acquired the brass in the first place.

 

[WestKentucky]

You did not mention caliber(s) is it handgun or rifle?? To me that makes a big difference.

I would not be real concerned with say 38 specials but more so with 223 or 308.

I was kinda waiting for that...I agree. I load rifle for accuracy, handgun for function as much as accuracy. For handgun I take the deprime stem out and run them through the sizer. I don't use powders that require a magnum primer so I don't need that extra little bit of pop for ignition in handgun, but it doesn't hurt either. For rifle if it's something I can turn into something else I do, and then I fireform with a light load (7-30 from 30-30 for example). Otherwise I pop the primers and save them for fireforming later.

 

[PCCUSNRET]

Since it is primed I would expect it to either be resized or brass that had the bullets pulled. If pulled I would probably fire a few of the primers without reloading just to make sure the primers are still good. If they fired I would neck size the brass, make sure it chambers in my gun and then reload them. This would be the way i would yreat them if I was only going to shoot paper. If I was going to use them for hunting or self defense I would pop the primers, indtall new primers, full length resize the brass, load up a few, shoot them and then decide if I wanted to risk using unknown brass for this purpose. Personally I use commercial ammo for self defense and new or once fired brass for hunting reloads.

 

[WestKentucky]

Truly unknown brass does show up from time to time--it's called range pickups. Never have I picked up any of those with unfired primers.

Or if you get brass in a bench buy, yardsale, flea market, pay it forward thread...you can end up with partially, fully, or not processed brass, or possibly even a mixture that you have to sort...been there, am there now with 9mm which prompted the thread, but l do like the discussion so far. Keep it up guys...and even if you think you know the reloader you got it from...you only THINK you know.

 

[vongh]

Im with Parker51. I do use reloads for self defense. But those are with primers that I installed. I would proceed very carefully and use the above advice from the other poster but I would definitely shoot them.

 

[Reloadron]

Truly unknown brass does come up from time to time. I have a batch now, and have had 2 others. I know what I do, but I'm curious to what others would do.

Maybe it does for you but not for me. Got some nice range brass a few weeks ago. A few local SWAT teams were shooting at my range. They use new factory Federal Match 308 Winchester and they do not save their brass and they gave it to me. Thus I knew what I had and watched the stuff being fired. There is no "range brass" for me. If it's laying on the range when I get there it's laying there when I leave. Any brass I leave I toss in the trash and when I trash it rest assured it's garbage or beyond where I care to reload it. If I don't know the history of the stuff I have no use for it. Just a me thing.

As to ending up with unknown primed brass? I really don't want the stuff so I'll pass on it.

Ron

 

[witchhunter]

Treat it like range brass, start over from scratch, but save the primers. You can reuse them. A thousand primers is what 30-35 bucks these days?

 

[Reloadron]

Treat it like range brass, start over from scratch, but save the primers. You can reuse them. A thousand primers is what 30-35 bucks these days?

If I have unknown primers to begin with and I knock 500 or 1,000 out and save them I now have saved primers and don't know what they are. May as well leave them in the cases. Yeah, a thousand primers is about $30. I have seen Tula for about $20 a thousand.

Ron

 

[hamp sandwich]

Due to the fact I don't know certain details, deprime and resize everything, treat it as range brass..

 

[Hondo 60]

Someone recently gave me about 300 9mm Luger rounds.
He said they were extremely inaccurate & some wouldn't chamber.

Having no idea what they were, I removed the bullet & threw away the powder.
Crimping was not consistent as some bullets were more creased than others.

Not knowing if the primers were pistol or rifle, standard or mag, I proceeded with caution.
I removed but saved the primers when resizing.
Reinserted the primers & kept 'em to a low-end charge.

They all went bang & seemed just fine.

 

[Rule3]

I bought a very large quantity of loaded handgun ammo. 357 mag, 44 mag, 45 acp. It was all in new nickel brass and had XTP bullets, I bought it for next to nothing with a bunch of other stuff, I probably could have just shot them, but I vowed never to do that. I pulled all the bullets and dumped the powder, I didn't care what primer, as I loaded them all with powder that did not call for mag primer, it they were mag primers it really does not matter with medium loads,

I did resize them all with primer pin removed. There were so many I bought the RCBS die type bullet puller. No way I was going to hammer them out!

I suppose I would do the same with rifle rounds, it's the unknown powder that bothers me, not the primer so much.

 

[FROGO207]

No answer in your poll covered what I would do.
Revolver or rifle brass for use as you describe would require more attention and inspection to clear it as safe to shoot. For pistol brass I have 9mm range brass that has been run through a dozen different pistols for hundreds of reload cycles and it is still good to go. FWIW I have never trimmed a piece of pistol brass in my reloading career . I loose it before it fails most times anyway plus I have a couple 5 GAL buckets of replacements waiting at home. If I got it primed I would try some small sampling with low to mid range loads to assure no high pressure problems and go from there. If this brass was primed with rifle or mag primers I might find them hard to ignite in striker fired pistols. No such worries with revolver brass as the hammer spring is strong. As long as I am not working with an unknown propellant I see little problem when proceeding with caution and reusing them. Bottle necked brass I would fully process and try reusing the primers if I could.

 

[Pete D.]

.223

This scenario is close to the way that i do load .223s....close but not exact. I load from a factory case of Winchester primed brass. I do know where they came from but the rest of the scenario is similar.
Pete

 

[Conservidave]

Brass is Brass... The question for me would be the primers. Assuming the cases are 9mm or .223, why would anybody use a pistol primer in a rifle case or rifle primer in a pistol case...? Im sure it's happened but someone would have gone through a lot of trouble to do something wrong. Load a few up and judge for your self if they're keepers. Either way there's value in what you have, scrapping it all would be dumb.

 

[ku4hx]

Load 'em and shoot 'em. I've been a dedicated scrounger since about 1970 and I've picked up brass for all sorts of places. To paraphrase Andrew Zimmern, "If it looks good; shoot it."

Obviously you have to exercise common sense and good judgement, but if I'd have passed on all the "undocumented" brass I came across in my life I'd have passed up a whole lot of good stuff. Over the years, I have had a few cases split that seemed to indicated they should have been scrapped, but I've never had a real problem.

 

[Dudedog]

I would need a little more info to say for sure.
Are they all the same headstamp, brass from pulls?
Check a few, load some tests, probably good to go.
Mixed headstamp, totally unknown history?
Resize, deprime, trim...prep as normal brass.
I might save the unknown primers for resuse. (but would probably toss them 1000 primers = $30, unknowns would only be safe for handgun, SP in a high pressure 5.56 might not work out well)