WWII Brass

[elementfreak431]

Is WWII brass good to reload? I have a lot of 30 06 brass from the 40's that I shoot out of my garand. It looks like good thick brass. Its mostly lake city and some remington. Does it have any value as far as reloading?

[hornady]

I have reloaded a bunch of it, two items I would get, one is the Lee universal de primer, and also the RCBS primer pocket swag. The primers are crimped in, some can be a pain to get out. And the Lee universal de primer die is cheap and strong. Just make sure the cases are brass, during the war they did use some steel cases as well.

[762xIan]

As long as it is brass and is boxer primed you should be fine.

Like hornady mentioned, the Lee universal decapping die is handy, especially for tough crimped in primers on larger cases.

As for removing the crimp themselves, I got away from cutting them out and broke down and bought the Dillon primer pocket swager tool.

Remember when reloading though, most military brass cases ARE thicker...and have less case capacity than commercial brass, always start on the low end with powder charges.

[red dog]

ditto on the dillon swager, and again reduce your loads by 10% or more when using military brass.

[GeneCC]

Be vigilant for neck splits. You may wish to consider CAREFUL annealing of the mouths and necks of a lot if you see a few starting to go.

My late grandfather had left 38 special from the 1930s that I found in the 1970s. The condition of the rounds were abysmal, much corrosion and mouth splits.

Gene