Experiences With Hornady Brass

T

Terry Lightle

Active member
Always used Winchester Brass in my reloading,seems to be getting harder to find it for my 22-250.Seems Hornady is readily more available so giving it some thought.Just looking for input from you guys that use or have used Hornady.
 
For run of the mill hunting, I often start with what’s on sale at Midway, Gafs, wherever. I was looking at a brass article in Handloader magazine yesterday where the author was big on ‘neck uniformity’. The reasoning was to start the bullet out straight. He would measure, then discard(sort anyway) cases that had to much variance.

He said that was more important than weighing individual cases. As I recall, Hornady came out fairly well in his measuring. The other thing is how do primer pockets hold up. Some may get loose earlier than others.

I think Starline Has gotten into some rifle making lately, always like them. Jagemann has received good reviews too.

I use a bit of everything.
 
I use Hornady brass. Mainly because I can get it locally. A few other reasons, if I buy a box of 50, I get 50 pieces of usable brass. Its usually a decent price and if it gets lost its not a deal breaker. Seems the Winchester brass is not the brass we use to get. Several times I have purchased Winchester, there have been several cases with crushed necks or shoulders, split necks and have even had cases that had no neck. These pieces had to be thrown away as they were not usable. I have some old Winchester brass and to me, seems like better brass than what we are getting today. Maybe QC was better back then than today. Maybe to some loosing two or three pieces out of 50 is no big deal but if I pay for 50 I'd like to get 50.

Back to your original question. I use a lot of Hornady brass and haven't had any major problems with it. I don't weigh it or sort it. Just load and shoot. Not being a bench rest shooter, it works just fine for my needs and uses.
 
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I found in 223REM that case "spring back" was significantly more than Lake City Nato brass after a few firings.

You need to keep adjusting your sizing die down a bit as you go.

However, accuracy with the brass was great.

I have also had several bad experiences with WW brass. You never know what you are going to get with it. Sometimes you get 101 or 102 pieces in a 100 pack. Then 2 or 3 are culls.

Some times you get shorted and then 1 or 2 are culls.
 
I only had one experience with Hornady brass, and it was not good, though they stepped right up to make it right as best they could. I bought two boxes of fifty in 7X65R and of the first box six or seven split about 1/4 in above the rim on the first loading. I don't remember the powder, but it was the starting load in the Hornady manual, using Hornady dies, and Hornady 175 gr bullets. I called them, sent pictures, and they offered to replace with my choice of calibers, but of course that had been a special run and they no longer had 7X65R in stock. I took 222rem. I have reloaded the rest of that box two or three times with no other failures. I haven't used the other box yet, but did pick up 100 Norma cases for the future.
 
Can get it locally so will give it a whirl,the Winchester brass I have been using is probably close to 20 years old ,stockpiled a bunch back then with a really good deal on some bulk but it is about gone.Thanks guys
 
Mixed experiences with Hdy brass here. I've had a lot of shallow primer pockets for some reason. And some that are super tight. But the Grendel brass has always been pretty good.

Winchester, yeah mixed there too. The Wssm brass has been good once annealed. But I just started on 50 new 243 Win cases, and the primer pockets varied in tension. It's the older blue bag brass, not sure of the manufacture date.

Going forward I'm going to try Starline in the calibers they make.
 
If your not buying Lapua, I feel you’ll have a few pieces possibly in each bag/box that have a issue.

That said the last 400+ pieces of hornady I’ve bought in 3 different calibers have all been phenomenal.

Oal has been .002” of each other. Case weight of the 225 cases of 6mm gt I purchased was all +/- .5gr

The 223 and 6.5 creed wasn’t much out of the above specs.
 
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When you need more brass for your 22-250 try Sig Sauer, extremely nice, price less than 1/2 of Lapua. Always check pocket depth on new or new to you brass. Just as primers(brand) vary so does brass.
 
For hunting purposes I have used Hornady brass and have no complaints. I’ve been using it in my Creedmoor and have 4-5 loadings on it and haven’t lost one yet.
 
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