LC-52 or 53 .30 Carbine brass

[Abe Normal]

Has anyone else out there purchased the over crimped LC-52 surplus brass from Wideners?

Any problems shooting it?

IMHO
I thought the pain in the backside factor getting it ready to load was twice as high as the savings of the reduced price would justify. Knowing what I know now I'd spend the extra few bucks and buy new brass.
Abe


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If everyone thought like me, I'd be a damn fool to think any different!

 

[Cheapo]

What's "over crimped?" I've reloaded a few hundred LC 52 through 55s and had not a single problem, until the cases grew long enough to pinch in the bore just ahead of the chamber.

Was using lead bullets and a bit too much crimp. Trimmed 'em and never had a problem again.

If you mean that the primer pockets are crimped, that's a simple one-time operation to take it out.

 

[Abe Normal]

With the cases I got about 1 in 4 were so heavily crimped that trying to put them through the expander die (Lee) only crushed the case mouth. Many others were crimped so heavily that they needed to be expanded then sized then expanded and sized again! If I were forced to guess, I'd guess that these were some of the over pressure Chinese LC-52 marked ammo that has been demilled.
They were a mess to deal with, although after much work they are ready to load.

Abe

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If everyone thought like me, I'd be a damn fool to think any different!

 

[Cheapo]

Really round roll crimp?

Sounds like blank ammo that's been demilled. In .30-06 at least, the cases "selected" for loading as blanks was often REJECT brass. According to legend, there was a remote possiblity of case failure, depending on the underlying defect.

Now that you're scared (maybe), I should note that I've heard no stories of the same being true for .30 Carbine.

I strongly suggest annealing the case mouths before ruining any more cases. Either dip in molten lead for 2 seconds, or hold in your lefthand fingers while hitting the mouth with a propane torch. As soon as it's uncomfortably hot, drop it into a water bucket.

The old pan of water and heat 'em till it just starts to glow approach overdoes it.

A clue to whether they're Chinese--closely compare the headstamps' typeface/letter spacing with known USGI stuff. They usually don't get an exact match.