Thread: Case life and case weights.

Reloading my 22 hornet after a burst of renewed interest I noted how much easier in was to reload projectiles into some cases I was given by a forum member. The old Imperial cases I have used for 40 plus years have been showing there age.
Looking at the Winchester cases the necks are visibly thicker so I weighed some. Imperial are 49.8 grains and Winchester are 54.1 grains nearly a 10% increase. These are primed case weights but still quite a difference and could be a wake up call with full loads.

I have hundreds of Hornet cases. Imperial, Rem-UNC, Remington, F C, Sako, S & B, a couple of different Winchester types plus some others.

I have settled on Win Super X and yes they are heavier than some of the others but haven't found the reduced powder capacity an issue. The Super X are the most consistant weight wise.

Although I've got an AMP I've not yet attempted to anneal my Hornet brass. Yours look to be classic candidates for annealing.

those four might be candidates for the bin!!!!!!

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

those four might be candidates for the bin!!!!!!

They are repairable but no already in bin.I have silphosed up Snider cases and already gained another couple of shots and they are still going. At least Sniders are low pressure,black powder and don't swell on firing.I do not lube hornet cases when resizing so thats a little hard on them,and probably work hardens them.

silphosed= some kind of solder????

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

silphosed= some kind of solder????

Silphos is a brand name for Silver/Copper alloy used in the electrical industry.

Straight from Google.
In 1931, (HNH) patented Sil-Fos, a silver brazing alloy. When designed and brazed correctly, joints brazed with SilFos will exhibit strength higher than that of the parent materials, often leading to failure in the base metal before the joint itself

Great stuff,stronger than Esi-flow but lower melting point and anneals the case when doing it

Howdy. I load a fair bit of 22 Hornet. I bought a bulk lot of brass, reloads, and powder etc. including a box of Hornady Z-Max. A few years back now. I discovered pretty quickly that case capacity varies a lot. Have not got my notes in front of me but some cases will require compression of the same amount of powder that is not compressed in others. To the point e.g. where some cases cannot be max loaded with the Hornadys because you can't compress the powder enough to get the bullet in far enough to load in the mag. I had the experience of doubting my press and my calipers only to realise that the thin brass of the case mouth could not stop an overly compressed projectile from slowly creeping back out of the brass! No matter how hard you crimped it. And this was using published data for the given projectile and powder. The guy I bought the stuff from gave up and sold out of the calibre. I figured I could save the higher capacity cases for the Z-max and/or settle for a lesser charge and lower velocity. Its one of the few calibres I sort my brass for. The thicker brass crimps better of course. But different 22 Hornet brass not only varies significantly in brass thickness but also in case length. For all that I find it a wonderful little calibre to master reloading of and rewarding to shoot.