Reloading brass with fluting marks

[Liam]

My buddy bought several hundred once-fired .223 brass casings. They are nice and shiney, but primer not removed yet and in need of resizing. As I started the process I noted every 10th or so shell casing has fluting marks on the neck and shoulder. They are impressions, and not carbon residue. Anyone have an argument for NOT reloading these shells? I expect a shortened life of the casings, but is there any danger? The brass is mixed and I planned to segregate the flute-marked brass into their own small groups for reloading, so they can get the added attention they most likely deserve. Your thoughts always very welcome.

[JimF]

They hand load just fine, BUT . . . .

UGLY LOOKING!!

[Tuna]

Ugly is right. All part of the HK designed chambers to prevent sticking of a case in the chamber but they do as JimF said reload OK.

[joem]

I have a .308 CETME with a fluted chamber. The flutes a DEEP and even the case mouth has flutes on it. Even after sizing the neck will not hold the bullet tight. I tried to size and reload them but it was a bust and fed them to the scrap bucket. As the rifle would have a FTE I bought some russian steel case ammo and it runs just fine on that.

[slamfire]

These flutes are there because the brass was fired in a high power delayed blowback action.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v479/SlamFire/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/FlutedChamber.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/SlamFire/media/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/FlutedChamber.jpg.html)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v479/SlamFire/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/DSCN1990Flutedchamber.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/SlamFire/media/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/DSCN1990Flutedchamber.jpg.html)

Who discovered chamber flutes is a bit of an argument, but of the stories I heard, I consider credible the one that says the Germans took the idea from a captured Soviet aircraft machine gun. The machine gun was taken off a plane in Spain, during the Spanish Civil War.

These flutes are a great idea as they break the friction between case and chamber, increasing extraction reliability and function.

XTRAXN has a version in their AR15, a little shallower, slight curve, but chamber flutes nether the less.


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v479/SlamFire/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/XTRAXNchamberflutes_zps917cfc53.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/SlamFire/media/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/XTRAXNchamberflutes_zps917cfc53.jpg.html)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v479/SlamFire/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/XTRAXNchamberflutesonfiredbrass_zps7a06e5bf.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/SlamFire/media/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/XTRAXNchamberflutesonfiredbrass_zps7a06e5bf.jpg.ht ml)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v479/SlamFire/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/XTRAXNchamberflutesonfiredbrass2_zps13314bb1.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/SlamFire/media/Reloading/Case%20Lubrication/XTRAXNchamberflutesonfiredbrass2_zps13314bb1.jpg.h tml)
Prior to WW2 all high powered delayed blowback mechanisms required active lubrication techniques, and oilers were common. Future General Hatcher writes about this in 1933:

Army Ordnance Magazine, March-April 1933

Automatic Firearms, Mechanical Principles used in the various types, by J. S. Hatcher. Chief Smalls Arms Division Washington DC.

Retarded Blow-back Mechanism………………………..

There is one queer thing, however, that is common to almost all blow-back and retarded blow-back guns, and that is that there is a tendency to rupture the cartridges unless they are lubricated. This is because the moment the explosion occurs the thin front end of the cartridge case swells up from the internal pressure and tightly grips the walls of the chamber. Cartridge cases are made with a strong solid brass head a thick wall near the rear end, but the wall tapers in thickness until the front end is quiet thin so that it will expand under pressure of the explosion and seal the chamber against the escape of gas to the rear. When the gun is fired the thin front section expands as intended and tightly grips the walls of the chamber, while the thick rear portion does not expand enough to produce serious friction. The same pressure that operates to expand the walls of the case laterally, also pushes back with the force of fifty thousand pounds to the square inch on the head of the cartridge, and the whole cartridge being made of elastic brass stretches to the rear and , in effect, give the breech block a sharp blow with starts it backward. The front end of the cartridge being tightly held by the friction against the walls of the chamber, and the rear end being free to move back in this manner under the internal pressure, either one of two things will happen. In the first case, the breech block and the head of the cartridge may continue to move back, tearing the cartridge in two and leaving the front end tightly stuck in the chamber; or, if the breech block is sufficiently retarded so that it does not allow a very violent backward motion, the result may simply be that the breech block moves back a short distance and the jerk of the extractor on the cartridge case stops it, and the gun will not operate.

However this difficultly can be overcome entirely by lubricating the cartridges in some way. In the Schwarzlose machine gun there is a little pump installed in the mechanism which squirts a single drop of oil into the chamber each time the breech block goes back. In the Thompson Auto-rifle there are oil-soaked pads in the magazine which contains the cartridges. In the Pedersen semiautomatic rifle the lubrication is taken care of by coating the cartridges with a light film of wax.

Blish Principle….There is no doubt that this mechanism can be made to operate as described, provided the cartridge are lubricated, …. That this type of mechanism actually opens while there is still considerable pressure in the cartridge case is evident from the fact that the gun does not operate satisfactorily unless the cartridges are lubricated.

Thompson Sub-Machine Gun: … Owing to the low pressure involved in the pistol cartridge, it is not necessary to lubricate the case.

However, post War, you will find that retired General Hatcher , in "Hatcher’s Notebook", is claiming that greased bullets, and lubricated cases are dangerous. He is recounting, and supporting, an Army cover up from the early 1920’s. At that time single heat treat receivers are blowing, only the Ordnance Department knows why, (they made 1,000,000 defective rifles and issued them!) and when single heat treat rifles break, the Army misdirection was to claim the blowup was due to increased bolt thrust from greased bullets or oil in the chamber. You see, the Army made rifles that could not hold the complete thrust from a cartridge, in fact, people have shattered low number receivers by tapping them with 5/8” combination wrenches. The defective receivers were dangerous with any load, greased, lubricated, or dry. The Army never admitted that their defectively made receivers were at fault in any way and always misdirected, through clever arguments, the problems onto the shooter. You would think Hatcher might have remembered the 100,000 anti aircraft cannon he made, and issued, during WW2 that used greased cases, and all the mechanisms he knew that used oilers, but somehow, in 1949, when writing his book, he does not.

Since WW2 chamber flutes replaced oilers, oilers went on the ash heap of history, and have been gone so long, that modern Hatcherites repeat the early 1920's Army coverup in total ignorance of firearm history.

[joem]

The pic posted by Slamfire isn't close to what happens to my cases. They are fluted so deep it look like a spline shaft. I know my crappy portguese <sp> barrel is the problem. But it runs fine on steel case ammo.

[da gimp]

You see, the Army made rifles that could not hold the complete thrust from a cartridge, in fact, people have shattered low number receivers by tapping them with 5/8” combination wrenches. The defective receivers were dangerous with any load, greased, lubricated, or dry. The Army never admitted that their defectively made receivers were at fault in any way and always misdirected, through clever arguments, the problems onto the shooter. You would think Hatcher might have remembered the 100,000 anti aircraft cannon he made, and issued, during WW2 that used greased cases, and all the mechanisms he knew that used oilers, but somehow, in 1949, when writing his book, he does not.

Since WW2 chamber flutes replaced oilers, oilers went on the ash heap of history, and have been gone so long, that modern Hatcherites repeat the early 1920's Army coverup in total ignorance of firearm history.


I have never seen any claim by any person , that someone could shatter a low numbered 1903 Springfield by simply hitting it with a wrench.........................................Hec k there are guys here that have fired several thousands, if not many thousands of M2 ball .30-06 ammo thru several low numbered 1903's...... and their only nod to caution is to keep their reloads to the same level of pressure that M2 has...................I've seen JB, RtL & several guys over the years here on the 1903 board have lively discussions about the strengths of those actions.............. but no one has ever said that.............

:eusa_liar::headbang::eusa_liar::headbang::eusa_li ar::headbang:

[slamfire]

Rifle Magazine, May-June 1985 “About Low Numbered Springfields, Sedgleys and others”, Author Hugh Douglas.

This article is about more than just the low number that the author had crumble under a combination wrench. But, the author recounts buying, in 1964, a 600,000 series serial number 03, a WW2 rework because it had a new SA42 barrel. It had a crack on the receiver ring, sitting at the kitchen table, he was able to totally disassemble the receiver into pieces by tapping and hitting the receiver with a 5/8” combination wrench.

The article also had the results of hitting five low number receivers and one double heat treat receiver with a nylon faced hammer. The test procedure was to hold the receiver in one hand and the hammer in the other. The hammer arc was 18 inches or so. All of the receivers, including the double heat treat, shattered into pieces.

The process controls of the era were primitive, Springfield Armory was behind the times and had not installed pyrometers in the forge room, this was not the fault of the forge room workers, they did not have budget authority to go buy industrial equipment, and there may have been perverse incentives at work. If SA paid the forge shop workers piece rate, it would have been in the financial benefit of the forge shop workers to increase temperatures in the forge furnaces as they could stamp out billets faster and make more money.

I think the best way to test a low number receiver is to hit it a sharp blow with a hammer and make the hammer ring. If the receiver falls apart, it is a bad receiver.

[Rock]

I wonder how the Pederson rifle woud have fared in the tests against the Garand if it had chamber fluting instead of lubricated cases?

[MJ1]

No problem at all with military brass. sizing removes most of the impressed flutes and the carbon comes off in the soap and water wash I do before processing. I have several hundred CAVIM 7.62 case on the seventh reload or eight and some LC .223 on their fourth.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v130/montereyjack/3bbd24fe.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/montereyjack/media/3bbd24fe.jpg.html)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v130/montereyjack/ffcc3a60.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/montereyjack/media/ffcc3a60.jpg.html)

[Liam]

Thanks for the responses. I processed another 50 last evening. The fluting marks/indentations are primarily on the shoulder, with some on the neck. Not nearly as deep or long as the marks in Slamfire's photo above. And nothing as far down towards the base as in MJ1's photo of the .223. A couple so far have been scrapped because when I beveled the case mouth, inside and outside, to ease bullet seating the neck sort of tore away leaving a nick. This won't be as bad/wasteful as I originally feared. Again, your time and opinions have value and I appreciate your attention. - Liam

[MJ1]

Be careful and inspect inspect inspect. Try and stay away from commercial brass if possible it's just to thin. The ladies shoot 300 and 500 yards regularly so we use a healthy NATO load.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v130/montereyjack/Good%20days/DSCF9232_zpsdb613bb4.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/montereyjack/media/Good%20days/DSCF9232_zpsdb613bb4.jpg.html)