lapua brass .308 and .338

Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

Everybody swears by lapua brass. I personally do not use it. ( my wallet is not deep enough) but i have a buddy that shoots lapua 223 brass and his groups thighten. It is defently worth investing in just be ready to pay a little more then other brass.
 
Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

I'll be the dissenting voice, here...

For square-range use where you'll certainly recover your spent brass, sure, Lapua is good stuff and is probably worthwhile.

For field and tactical use, firing under time and physical pressure, never getting the opportunity to make that "perfect" shot, shucking $1/piece brass into the weeds - it's not worthwhile.
 
Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

Hmmm. Does the OP have a better choice for 338LM?
Hornady? Don't think so. Don't misunderstand, as I think Hornady brass is very good, just not up to Lapua rep for the 338.
That was part of his topic, if I read correctly.
I use my older, well used 308 Lapua brass when I know I am going to loose some.
My 308 loads were developed with it so it is what I use.
 
Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

For my 338LM over time I've used Privi, Grafs, Hornady and Lapua with the Privi and Grafs coming back in the day when it was pretty tough to get 338LM brass at all.

By far, and I mean FAR, the Lapus brass held up the best so for 338LM that is all I have in rotation now. It is a heavy investment compared to other brands but the case life I am seeing with it has been great and I had an opportunity a while back to really stock up at very good pricing so I doubt I will need to buy much/any more for a few years.

For 308 I am exclusively shooting Lapua now as well though in the past I have run FC, LC and other brands also, especially in my gas gun. Now that I'm shooting my bolt gun only and can, even when hunting, collect most of my brass it is Lapua. I have a good stockpile here so I'm set for now and with the good case life on it like the 338LM I think it is a good return.

Basically for me I think that the longer case life I am getting helps offset the additional additional expense. Others may have different results.
 
Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

I have loaded with privi and lapua for my 338 and some of the lapua brass has been loaded 8 times now while I only got 3 out of the privi before I scrapped it.
 
Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

Lapua brass is well worth the investment, accuracy, reliability and cost effective.

Shooting at the range or running hard on a tactical course you always have a chance of loosing brass. But when you can average 10 or more shots out of a piece of brass before failing it makes the cost pretty cheap and very good investment.

Annealing helps extend the brass life as well when
done right



oneshot.onehit
 
Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

Good brass but they sure package it poorly. Every time I've ordered 338 brass, at $2.50 a piece, it shows up with dented necks! You'd think that, when I'm paying nearly twice what match grade 308 ammo costs, the could package it in a way that doesn't require you to run your brand new brass through a sizer.
 
Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: biggenius29</div><div class="ubbcode-body">How does Lapua compare to Nosler or Norma brass? </div></div>

Lapua is best of the three. I do use some Nosler brass in 300WM and 7MM08 with good results. Lapua doesn't offer brass in those two calibers.
 
Re: lapua brass .308 and .338

If you are interested in getting the most life out of your brass the consensus seems to be Lapua. I have found this to be the case in running the Lapua brass that I have.

Setting aside the complaints and/or concerns over dinged up case necks which, regardless of any brand's cost is a minor bump in the road, you will be challenged to find brass that stands up for as many reloadings and is as consistent.

For example I was on "baby due any second" house arrest a few months back and had nothing better to do so I sat and weighed 1500 Lapua .308 cases. Out of that 1500 only 79 fell outside of a +/- .1 gr weight range. Interesting to note on that little test was that all 1500 were not from a single lot, rather they were from 3 different lots. Needless to say I don't bother weighing cases any more since for my type of shooting that level of perfection isn't worth the time investment.

All the above is a long way to get to this point: Like many things in this game the old advice that you get what you pay for is true. As is buy once cry once. Lapua brass is expensive yet if I compare some of my .338LM Lapua brass amortized cost over 12+ reloadings (and still going) on many I figure that I'm paying under twenty cents per loading. If I look at what my Hornady 338LM brass cost me back when that was all I could find, or the Privi or the Grafs for that matter the much fewer reloadings put the case cost per reload up around thirty + cents per reloading.

My advice is buy some and try it. Don't sweat the dinged up necks that may be there from the cases being jostled around during shipping. Clean them up and fully prep your cases. Reload and see how they work for you, in your specific set of conditions and reloading methods. If they work well, buy more and keep shooting.