.45 Brass

[GMyers]

How many times can .45 brass be reloaded before is should be tossed (230gr bullet at no more that 170PF).

Some of ours is bulging a little near the case head and won't quite case gage but otherwise chambers, looks and shoots fine.  Would this be a sign of time to go or shoot 'til it splits.  

Since some of this brass has already been reloaded X number of times would it be OK to start now with a full length resizer or might this fatigue the metal even more quickly.

Thanks for the info!

[JFD]

All I've ever done is reload it until it splits.  Usually the rims gets so beat up that they get tossed before that.  No need to invite an extraction problem.

[Bill Schwab]

I second JFD's recommendation.

[Carlos]

I agree; the .45ACP runs at such a low pressure that the brass will harden and split before it enlongates/thins enough to seperate. When it splits upon firing, nothing happens.  When a reload splits, I have never noticed a difference in the way the gun fires, point of impact, etc. I know that a split has occured only after I collect cases.  

Now I have seen other calibers (i.e. 40SW) where a case reloaded too many times will seperate or have a "head seperation". This can be quite ugly. At a minimum, most of the case stays in the chamber and you gun WILL be disabled for a couple stages.

While I don't doubt that a .45 could seperate ( with constant +p+ loads, it probably has) I consider it so unlikely that I never count the number of times I reload 45 cases. Some of the headstamps are barely visible on my brass.

Here is one exception where .45 ACP longitudinal cracks might be dangerous on the 1st reload:

http://www.brianenos.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard...4&topic=265

[cypher]

Yep... I pretty much load 'em till they split... and like Carlos said.  When they split you can't really tell until you pick 'em up.

Been doin' it that way for over 20 yrs.  Never had a problem.  

I think I usually start seeing splits after about 10 or 15 reloads... but I never kept really close track of it to be honest.  It wouldn't surprise me if they could last lots longer.

Homero