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260 Remington brass ( who makes the best?)

Partly it's cost, and you can check that on Midway. Starline 7-08 brass. Starline 260 brass. Technically, they are the same case.

But another, more important (to me) reason is that I do partial length neck resizing. I set up the F/L die a bit higher so the rear/lower portion of the neck remains unsized. The 7mm diameter section will still chamber, but it's nice and snug and tends to center the case better in the chamber, offsetting any potential concentricity issues. Because I use SAAMI chambers, concentricity gets tricky, and this helps (I think) maintain it without steps like narrow necks and neck turning.

Also, the wider neck portion where the shoulder joins can tend to acquire a donut, but by leaving the neck expanded there, any donuts would need to grow considerably to actually become a problem. In fact, they could help with aligning the bullet's axis concentric with the bore axis.

This practice goes back to early BR technique when concentricity was first becoming recognized, butt the standard F/L die was the only resizer die style available. It was taught to me by my Elder Brothers Bill and Bob decades ago. They were shooting BR in the 50's.

This technique allows the resized portion of the neck length to be adjusted, and serves as an alternative to neck turning for managing neck tension. Less resizing length = less tension, and vice-versa. This was how neck tension was maintained in those days, before we got into the more modern methods. Bu it still works, and may be simpler.

Obviously, this is akin to neck-only resizing in that it fails to bump shoulders.

But I find that I can use a basic, standard .308 F/L die as a bump die. I just set it up so the 308 die has the proper shoulder length, and remove the decapper stem to use it as a bump die. This also works with standard 260 brass if you partial neck length resize it similarly. This technique, leaving the rear portion unresized, seals the chamber better. Any carbon staining stops dead, right at the line where the neck gets wider. I use a brass catcher, and simply wiping the carbon film from the necks with a cloth dampened in rubbing alcohol is the only case cleaning I need to do prior to resizing.

Greg
 
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Use Lapua 260 brass and a reasonable powder charge. I have cases with 6-7 firings and are still good. If you want to push it to the absolute limit, then your going to wear things out. Doesn't seem like a mystery.
 
Small primers won't reliably light over 40.0 grs of powder in cold weather. You might get a click/bang or two Don't use em!
I have yet to see anyone have this personally happen to them. I have had zero issues running SRP in my 260.
 
I had a chance to talk to G. David Tubb by phone once, and asked him about the small vs large primer issue. He had been a big proponent of the small primers but had gone back to the large ones by the time we spoke.

He told me that the difference was about powder charges; each size primer required a powder adjustment, but that by the time the weights and primers were matched right, there was no potential accuracy difference between the two primer sizes.

The thing (for me) about him is that he tests everything to exhaustion, so I have NO problem believing what he tells me.

So I went with the larger primers because they were the norm. IMHO, a larger primer is more reliable under challenging conditions, like extreme cold, with greater brisance. Reading through this link, there are several additional sources of data worth reading.

Greg
 
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Use Lapua 260 brass and a reasonable powder charge. I have cases with 6-7 firings and are still good. If you want to push it to the absolute limit, then your going to wear things out. Doesn't seem like a mystery.
Not sure where the mystery come from I'm simply trying to get advice on who's brass has the toughest pocket.
I had a chance to talk to G. David Tubb by phone once, and asked him about the small vs large primer issue. He had been a big proponent of the small primers but had gone back to the large ones by the time we spoke.

He told me that the difference was about powder charges; each size primer required a powder adjustment, but that by the time the weights and primers were matched right, there was no potential accuracy difference between the two primer sizes.

The thing (for me) about him is that he tests everything to exhaustion, so I have NO problem believing what he tells me.

So I went with the larger primers because they were the norm. IMHO, a larger primer is more reliable under challenging conditions, like extreme cold, with greater brisance. Reading through this link, there are several additional sources of data worth reading.

Greg
Yea I'm going to give some small a test but I'm guessing I will also stick with large. One big reason for the time being is I have found several thousand LRP and don't want to try and find a bunch of small. I'll save them for my AR stuff.
 
Not sure where the mystery come from I'm simply trying to get advice on who's brass has the toughest pocket.
With good practices even cheap brass should last.
I burned out 2 and almost a third with my first lot of necked up Winchester brass.
Over half still holds primers but a case head separation made me scrap it finally.
A life of 140’s at 2800 then 147’s at 2800 with some chamber mods.
I got a ton of loadings on them.
First 1-2 loads was 140’s at 2650-2700 just to harden them up.

As to the small primer brass?
Meh.
I don’t think the juice is worth the squeeze.
 
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With good practices even cheap brass should last.
I burned out 2 and almost a third with my first lot of necked up Winchester brass.
Over half still holds primers but a case head separation made me scrap it finally.
A life of 140’s at 2800 then 147’s at 2800 with some chamber mods.
I got a ton of loadings on them.
First 1-2 loads was 140’s at 2650-2700 just to harden them up.

As to the small primer brass?
Meh.
I don’t think the juice is worth the squeeze.
I'm am going to try and light load my new brass to harden the case head. I'll. Heck hardness of virgin and then after 2 loads. This does make sense. Thanks for the info.
 
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I'm am going to try and light load my new brass to harden the case head. I'll. Heck hardness of virgin and then after 2 loads. This does make sense. Thanks for the info.
An Old BR guy told it to me about 8-9 years ago and it’s worked for me over the years.
recently a quite accomplished F class did a video snd he said the same thing.

Something must be working because this is some of my 7 saum brass.
It’s on its 19th loading.
06A721D3-F4EF-433E-8673-8243BBB06A87.jpeg
 
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An Old BR guy told it to me about 8-9 years ago and it’s worked for me over the years.
recently a quite accomplished F class did a video snd he said the same thing.

Something must be working because this is some of my 7 saum brass.
It’s on its 19th loading.
View attachment 7714340
Man if I could get that many I would be a happy camper. I have with 308 but not with the 260.