Thread: 22 Hornet - Over Length Fired Once Cases?

I have set myself the objective of reloading 1000 Hornet cases before I resume culling operations at the end of this month. When I finish the tray shown I'll be up to 400.

To achieve that goal I have been buying once fired brass from Forum members and TradeMe.

Last night I started on another box of Winchester Super-X with the following codes printed on the box, X22H1 A1D1BH31, which might provide a clue as to year of manufacture and model (old 223 or newer .224?). These cases have been primed by the previous owner, so I wasn't able to clean the flash hole or primer pocket.

I became aware of two interesting measurements.

The first; the cases had stretched in firing to: 1.409, 1.415, 1.418, 1.421 and, the longest 1.426!! The Reloading Bible state, Maximum Case Length 1.403, Case Trim Length 1.393, which means the longest case is a whopping 0.033 thousand over Trim Length. My question, how is it even possible for a case to grow that much inside the confines of the breech? What does it tell us about the state of the rifle? Or the quality, manufacturing tolerances of the brass?

Second thing; the diameter of the projectile seating hole (neck of the case) was too smaller diameter to fit the pilot of my RCBC case trimmer???? I actually ran the cases (after removing the de-prming pin) through my Redding full length resizing die, with case neck expanding ball, before they fitted the trimmer pilot??? What the heck!!!!???

Is the neck tightness due to these being old, very old, 223 Hornet cases, rather than 224?

I'm confident of receiving some knowledgeable responses from experienced reloaders.

FYI Those 50 cases are now trimmed to 1.393, deburred and chamfered inside and out and are ready to load.

What's your recommendation for an electric case trimming lathe?

I'm always looking to buy more once fired Hornet brass, if you have some please let me know.

Hugh Shields
Controlled Rabbit Culling
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