Sorting pistol range brass

[OnTheFly]

Just curious.  Does anyone sort their pistol brass by headstamp so that they can make brass specific adjustments to their reloading process.

Also, regardless if you sort or not, please let me know how many pistol rounds you reload on average in a year?

I understand that each case manufacturer is slightly different in thickness, length, etc which could mean some fine tuning adjustments to case belling, crimping, OAL, etc, but I'm curious how many take the time to go to the extent of sorting by headstamps.  Especially those that are reloading 5, 10 or even 20K per year.

Fly

[Bigtony]

I separate by head stamp.  More of a mental thing for me though.  Not sure how many I reload each year (guess I never keep track) but I reload 6-7 different calibers

[newfalguy101]

Don't reload as much as I used to, but, I have never sorted by headstamp.

I don't own any guns that are accurate enough ( with me pulling the trigger at least ) to tell the difference.

[bkoenig]

I don't bother for pistol brass. 

[Mudnrox]

For Bulls eye, you may want to check all of those things, but for action pistol type of matches and practice all of the brass works the same.

OAL will not change with brass length, only how far into the chamber the round will go when in battery.

I loaded and shot 10-15K rounds of 9mm this year between myself and my daughter.

[OnTheFly]

Thanks for the input guys.  My thought was that for "Bulls Eye" reloaders probably go through much of the detail work that rifle shooters do to get that rifle & round combination that will shoot the left wing off of a fly at 100 yards.  But for those that are plinking/action shooting out to 25 yards and reloading 10K plus rounds per year, this just is not anything that I have heard of people doing.

Fly

[JTH]

For Bulls eye, you may want to check all of those things, but for action pistol type of matches and practice all of the brass works the same.

Pretty much.  To the level of accuracy needed (we do occasionally shoot out to 40-50 yards, but not on a bullseye target) brass differences affect accuracy significantly less than my poor trigger control does---enough less that I don't worry about it.

I dump all the brass in and reload it, regardless of source.  Reload over 20K a year.

[Lorimor]

Sort out lesser calibers.    then wet tumble, dry and load. 

Rinse, repeat. 

Don't care about headstamps too much.  But I will immediately toss any and all AMERC brass into the junk pile upon detection.

[noylj]

There may be some effect for rifle cartridges being fired at long distance, but I have never found any effect with any pistol out to 50 yards--so, no, I found it to be a complete waste of time.
However, if it makes you feel better, it may give you a confidence edge to shoot better.

[OnTheFly]

There may be some effect for rifle cartridges being fired at long distance, but I have never found any effect with any pistol out to 50 yards--so, no, I found it to be a complete waste of time.
However, if it makes you feel better, it may give you a confidence edge to shoot better.

Thanks for the input.

I guess I should have explained why I was asking this.  I posted a question on a national forum about a reloading issue I was having with new bullets.  One of the other forum members started dogging me about my many faux pas in reloading.  He insisted that one of them was that I did not sort brass by headstamp.  My impression was that hardly anyone was doing this except for someone shooting Bullseye or similar.  He insisted that everyone should be doing it. 

I think he was insulted when others gave me suggestions on what to look at and they were correct, but he told me what the problem was and I told him he was wrong.

Fly

[noylj]

>Just curious.  Does anyone sort their pistol brass by headstamp so that they can make brass specific adjustments to their reloading process.

For any handgun I have, it makes no difference. If I average all the groups of mixed cases and all the groups of matching cases for the exact same bullet, powder, and charge weight and loaded at the same time, the mixed cases actually come out with a statistically insignificant smaller average group size. Most of the mixed cases were of the most obscure and mis-matched I could make them.
For rifles, it hasn't made any difference at 100 yards.

>Also, regardless if you sort or not, please let me know how many pistol rounds you reload on average in a year?

This year, probably about 2000 (I haven't felt well since Christmas). Generally, about 5-10k

>I understand that each case manufacturer is slightly different in thickness, length, etc which could mean some fine tuning adjustments to case belling, crimping, OAL, etc, but I'm curious how many take the time to go to the extent of sorting by headstamps.  Especially those that are reloading 5, 10 or even 20K per year.

Again, not at all. For handguns firing straight wall cases, there is no reason to trim cases. If the case head spaces on the case mouth, any trimming of cases will only increase head space and reduce accuracy.
Some trim rimmed revolver cases to get more consistent roll crimps. I can't even see the difference in length, have never seen any difference in roll crimp, and when I tried it for my S&W M52, could find absolutely no benefit to trimmed cases—they certainly were NOT more accurate.
For bottleneck cases, they can grow with each shooting and they do require trimming.
Now, for the common sense of your questions, even though most of us have still TRIED these things:
There is a world of difference between trying to reduce a group size by 0.01-0.1" with a group that is <0.4" (where the idea "it couldn't hurt" might actually be justified) and trying to worry about such things with a handgun that is lucky if it can shoot <15" at 100 yards (maybe someone will tell me I am wrong, but a 2" group at 25 yards would appear to be 4" group at 50 yards and at least an 8" group at 100 yards and how many of us shoot 2" groups at 25 yards?).
The two shooting worlds simply have nothing in common. Remember, a good rifle can stay under 2" at 100 yards (my well-used Win M-94 .30-30 from 1952 will shoot 1.75-2.5" groups all day long at 100 yards with iron sights and my 65 year old eyes) with mixed cases and no case prep (other than to be sure the case length is safe) and your handguns aren't even CLOSE to the same level of accuracy.
As long as you stay safe, you can do all the case prep you want, but you will be much better off spending that time at the range shooting or reloading so you get back to the range.

[OnTheFly]

Thanks for the feedback noylj.  Hope you feel better.

Fly

[unfy]

Old thread.  I'll throw my two cents in just since it differs from what's been said.

Factory new brass, I trim.  It's notoriously long.

New to me brass, I trim.

Basically. I prefer to start at a know state.

Pistol brass, I would only trim 357 mag every so often.  It did flow just a tiny bit.  41mag or bigger ? I'd trim every time probably. 

45ACP, i wouldn't worry really.

50AE / 10mm ... I dunno.... don't own a firearm in such.