Winchester Brass

[fj40mojo]

So I recently purchased 2 bulk packed bags (50 rounds each) of 6.5x55 Winchester unprimed brass and as is my custom opened them to run them through my sizing die prior to trimming them all to the same length.  Bag #1 was short 1 round and contained one round that was so far out of spec that it wouldn't fit in my shell holder. Bag #2 all fit the shell holder and 50 were present, but in the sizing/inspecting process I found one with a split case mouth. 3% attrition is awfully high for new unfired brass. WTF over? I thought Winchester was supposed to be one of the better brands out there? I've bought Win before as well as Fed and Rem and have never been shorted brass or had brass that was defective right out of the package. I wrote a nasty gram to Olin/Winchester. Hope they do something to make this right. Anybody else have problems similar to this?

[egress81]

I had a bag of .243 brass once from Winchester that had a split neck and a couple pieces that had a small lump on the mouth in one spot. I just ran them through the trimmer and the lump was gone and they shot fine.

The last couple of bags have been ok though

[fj40mojo]

Upon further inspection I've found 2 more split case mouths. Still no response from Win/Olin on the email on sent them. Won't be buying any more of this crap.

[fj40mojo]

*UPDATE*

Friday I received a letter from Winchester/Olin. Basically, it stated that they were conducting an investigation and requested that I send them the bad cases. I had already gone through the entire 99 pieces of brass and sized and trimmed them so I called this morning to ask if this would effect the investigation. They said no and are having UPS come to my house to pick up the 3 split cases. So, pending the outcome of the investigation and based on the current level of customer service I retract my previous statement "Won't be buying any more of this crap."

[egress81]

well thats good to know that they are fixing the problem.

Im gonna pas this info on to a friend who had a couple of 22-250 cases that didnt have flash holesdrilled in them in a brand new bag of winchester he just bought the other day

[fj40mojo]

well thats good to know that they are fixing the problem.

Im gonna pas this info on to a friend who had a couple of 22-250 cases that didnt have flash holesdrilled in them in a brand new bag of winchester he just bought the other day

Shit, now I gotta go through and look for that too.

[Spiff]

Makes you wonder who's making Winchesters brass for them these days. Some little hole in the wall joint in Beijing......

[fj40mojo]

UPS showed up and picked up my 3 split neck cases. Now we wait. BTW the remaining brass all seems to have come with flash holes included.

[sheepdog1]

you're lucky you dont buy a bizillon at a time .  Thats pretty normal they short you and thier specs  are'nt prefect as you think they would ,should be

[fj40mojo]

Resurrecting this thread, now that all the brass at minimum has been once fired, flash holes deburred, primer pockets trued, etc, etc now I'm having about 1 in 5 showing signs of head separation after the second firing and this is with loads that are 1 1/2 grains under max. Now I'm reinstating my previous statement, "I won't be buying anymore of this crap!" Just purchased 100 rounds of Lapua which I should have done in the first place.

[Nealio]

Sounds like Winchester has some QC issues in general.  See my several posts about their brass and factory ammo.
My dad and I have ran Winchester whitebox .223 exclusively in our AR's and and we both get under .5 MOA with our loads.  The brass has been fired once with the factory load and probably 5 of our hot Win748 loads and all the cases are perfect.
Now the 9mm Winchester whitebox ammo that I bought and shot this year has tons of issues with the cases.  1% are bulged so far they can't be resized, 50% of them have a bulge in them that is hard to resize out, and 100% of them resize very hard.  The Federal, R&P, Fiocchi, and CCI Blazer Brass cases I have are all perfect.....

[Nomad]

 Just bought a bag of 3006 Winchester brass and three of the necks
have splits in the necks Bar code20852 53204 and on top of that 2DD41
may have to express some discontent with their product......

[fj40mojo]

Just bought a bag of 3006 Winchester brass and three of the necks
have splits in the necks Bar code20852 53204 and on top of that 2DD41
may have to express some discontent with their product......

Buzz,
If I were you I'd cut my losses and take them back now. Return them, get your money back and go a different direction. I wasted a lot of time and effort on the Winny brass for my 6.5x55 and now am starting over. Save yourself the headache.

Mike

[Nomad]

 The remaining brass has been worked primer pockets, resized to to bring out any dents
in the mouth, flash holes done.
 Will call them and let them know .............()$%*% T..... 

[adrewiske]

I too have had some problems with the 200 or so rounds I've bought for my 22-250. Of those 200 I've had 5 so far that didn't have the primer pockets drilled. But no split cases or anything like that. But still..WTF

[loaded]

I bought a bag of .223 brass a few months back. When seating the primers I had to look to see if they were staying in the brass. The pockets were that loose. I think I'll give up buying their brass.

[fj40mojo]

Anybody besides me starting to notice a trend?

[Niner]

This was a problem 20 years ago before I took a hiatus from shooting due to locale.  A friend of mine at the time worked in one of the competitor's factories and told me that this was common.  He stated that before actually loading brass at the factories the newly manufactured brass went through a prep process and then QC before loading.  If you buy just the bulk brass, it hasn't gone through that process and you should prep and inspect all of your new brass.  He suggested buying the bulk target ammo (Win White box, Rem, etc) shooting it and then reloading that brass as you would have a better batch of brass for multiple reloads. 

[Shortmag]

I've got a ton of winchester brass, and never had a problem.

that being said, i'm keeping a little closer eye on them after reading this thread.

and, i've also only bought NEW winchester brass for my Shortmag, all the rest is range pickups.

SM

[Jrhoney]

This is why I only buy once fired brass, its cheap but still good and I don't worry about losing some.

Sorry to hear about Winchester's poor product. Lapua and Norma seem to be the way to go for 6.5x55 brass. I have about 80 rounds of Prvi Partizan 6.5x55 and I'll let you know about that brass. Seems to be good.

[Steve N]

Makes you wonder who's making Winchesters brass for them these days. Some little hole in the wall joint in Beijing......

Pakistan -

[fj40mojo]

Don't know how this thread keeps coming back to life but it's time for an explantion of all the contributing factors. It turned out that a large part of my problem was not the brass but my dies. The head separations were symptomatic of a headspace issue and eventually by process of elimination we determined that the rifle itself didn't have a headspace issue and that I was creating the excessive headspace through my reloading process. Turned out that my dies although set to the mfg's specs were setting the shoulders back by .014". That may not seem to be alot to some of you but it is double the allowed tollerance for the cartridge. I started having case failures with the Winny brass on the second firing, this didn't occur with the Lapua. This speaks to the toughness of Lapua brass. All 100pcs survived the second firing after being sized improperly, not so for Winny. I have heard from others that loads that show no pressure signs in Lapua brass will pop primers in Federal and Winny. So, still disappointed overall with the quality of the Winny brass, but I can't attribute the case failures I was experiencing solely to Winchester. All things considered I would advise anyone thinking of investing in new brass to look at Lapua if they have the caliber you are looking for. It cost me $.60 per round or $.05 more than the Winny and for my nickel I didn't have to touch the primer pockets exept to deburr the flash hole, every piece weighed within +/- .1 grain negeting the need to sort by weight, every piece was +/- .002" of nominal OAL so I didn't have to trim but did, and the stuff is tuff.

[luvmy45]

And, And, And!!!!

If you use a cabela's $20off/$100 purchase, ship to the store option, you can get 200 lapua pieces of brass for reasonably.
 

I just got 200 308 Lapua brass cases for less than I could have bulk ordered online.

Anyway, just thought I would throw that out there.

[J Mack]

*UPDATE*
Friday I received a letter from Winchester/Olin. Basically, it stated that they were conducting an investigation and requested that I send them the bad cases. I had already gone through the entire 99 pieces of brass and sized and trimmed them so I called this morning to ask if this would effect the investigation. They said no and are having UPS come to my house to pick up the 3 split cases. So, pending the outcome of the investigation and based on the current level of customer service I retract my previous statement "Won't be buying any more of this crap."

Don't know how this thread keeps coming back to life but it's time for an explantion of all the contributing factors. tuff is tuff.

Thank you FJ.
Can you let us know what Winchester told you on the original issues with the brass.

[Grumblecakes]

bit of irony i guess....
im working on loading 9mm right now. went to seat a bullet, case is on its second loading, split from the mouth to the head, fliped it over and guess what brand it is? this has happend before with second loading of wwb

to be fair though ive only had problems with win 9mm brass. 40 and 223 have been decent for case life