Starline Brass question asked and answered;

[REDLINE]

You guys know how it is...sometimes not being sure who or what to believe...so two days ago I sent Starline brass an email as follows;

Close to a decade ago I recall a couple instances where people on internet forums suggested your brass being on the harder side of most other manufacturers brass. Now in the past year I've come across a couple instances where it's been suggested your brass is softer than most other manufacturers brass.

The latest example can be seen in reply #14 here -
http://10mm-firearms.com/factory-10mm-ammo/ammo-mfg's-you-consider-unsafely-loading-10mm-offerings/

I have a hard time taking people at their word on an open internet forum. Can you tell me if your brass runs harder or softer than that of the average brass cartridge case manufacturer, and also give a short explanation of the pros and cons of both harder and softer brass in relation to cartridge cases?

Your reply would be much appreciated. Thank You.


Moments ago I recieved the following reply;

Not sure if our brass is any harder or any softer than any of the other manufacturers.  I'm sure that some calibers are harder, and some are softer. The hardness of a case is kind of a double edged sword anyway. Start with your case too soft and it over expands and gets sticky in the chamber and primer pockets don't hold up, start with your case too hard and you get splitting and it work hardens quickly. You have to have the head of the case hard enough to keep the primer pocket from getting loose with use while leaving the case walls malleable enough to obturate to the chamber and not be so brittle as to split. We just build it and test it and tweak it when designing the cases and then stick with what works the best. Most of the manufacturers on that list on that forum use our brass (often with their headstamp, ex. HPR, Hornady, DoubleTap) for good reason.


Regards,

Hunter Pilant
Process Manager
Chief Ballistician


I figured a few here might be interested.  IMO the reply gives us some pretty decent info.

[sqlbullet]

It is good info.  The one confirmed that I already know is that lots of the brass out there is starline brass even if it is head stamped something else.

[The_Shadow]

RedLine, did you have doubts?  I am flattered you singled out my post.  Thanks for posting the info! 
They didn't go into detail of heat treating or annealing in their process, may be trade secret...
I have handloaded about every brand of 10mm brass made and my limited experience has shown me Star-Line is slightly softer.  Like I sad it is not a bad thing for us who handload because of work hardening at each resizing and it will show signs of flow sooner under pressure.  The hardest/stiffess I have found is probably Winchester, although I have seen way more split Federal FC on it's initial firings, especially as fire by FBI and LEO from HK MP-5 10mm.

Brass is unique blend of alloy, the molecular structure can be somewhat porous and things like ammonia can attack it chemically and deteriorate it quickly.

[REDLINE]

LOL  Sorry The_Shadow, didn't have a specific intention of singling you out.  It just worked out that way from what you said in your post.  Glad you took it lightly.

Otherwise, yeah, I did have doubts.  Actually I wouldn't even say I had doubts.  More that I wasn't sure what to think in general and simply thought I'ld see what Starline themselves would have to say about it.  Heck, I didn't know if I should even expect an answer back.  Anyway, I think it turned out pretty good with info right from the proverbial horse's mouth, even though it certainly doesn't answer every question in existence.  I certainly had no idea Starline was manufacturing Hornady's brass.

I wonder who makes Winchester's or Federal Cartridge's brass.  And if they actually manufacture their own in house, I wonder how the hardness might change from lot to lot.

Has anyone noticed changes over the decades in brass hardness between each individual manufacturer themselves?

[sqlbullet]

Federal makes their own brass.

Winchester gets their from Olin Brass, one of the subsidiaries.

[The_Shadow]

I notice that Winchester brass tarnishes so fast, I don't know if it is what they use to polish it with or what.  I bought a couple of 1K boxes of NEW Winchester and they turned blueish color before I was able to load them.  You would think at the price they demand they would last better.

Nickle plating is very thin these days on most all brands, it wears off in the tumbler too easy, as compared to years past.  May have to do with electro plating and economic cost of materials.

CCI / Speer 357Sig has a smaller flash hole than all other cases and the downside is it can break your decaping pin as it gets stuck in the casing flash hole.  This may have been done to contain pressure better on this high pressure cartridge...I drill all of them out to standard sizes.

You may run accross 10mm as well as 45ACP with smaller primer pockets, as used in the "NT" lines which utilize NonToxic small pistol primers.  These were mainly for LEO indoor ranges to keep airborne lead leves down.

[REDLINE]

Nickle plating is very thin these days on most all brands, it wears off in the tumbler too easy, as compared to years past.  May have to do with electro plating and economic cost of materials.

I asked Starline about the thickness of their nickle on the brass.  They said it adds about .0001" on the inside and on the outside of the case.  The .0001" is NOT a misprint.

[Taterhead]

Starline is a great company to work with. I would order all of my brass from them if they made rifle brass. That is great customer service to write a thoughtful reply such as the one above.

I placed a backorder for brass a while ago. They usually don't charge your card until the order is ready for shipment. Turns out they had a timing mixup between the office and the plant so they inadvertently charged my card a few days too early. No big deal at all as far as I was concerned. A very nice lady immediately called me to explain what happened, apologized profusely, and explained that she was preparing to submit a credit back to my account. She would then re-charge my account when the order was ready to ship. I told her not to worry about the "premature" charge and to just ship the order when it was ready.

In my experience, they ship backorders a bit earlier than they advertise.

Great brass, great prices, great customer service.