Brass 12 gauge shells

[mazo kid]

 I have a BUNCH of 12 gauge Winchester and Remington brass shotshells and also several new Alcan Berdan primed brass shells.  Being a che...frugal kind of guy, I wanted to know if there was a way to make those Berdan shells useable. I'm certainly no machinist but I do have an old metal lathe and I used that to drill out the Berdan center portion of the primer pocket. Found the proper sized drill to make the hole for 209 primers and then countersunk the base for the recess for the primer. Now, how to know if everything was OK.....revelation! I found the brass shells were a very good fit in the empty threaded hole (for dies) in my regular press. Insert them mouth up from the bottom. I had a scrap piece of 3/4" round stock about 1" long, put that on top of the ram (any flat piece of metal would work). Put a fired 209 primer (for checking fit) on top of that and raised that up to just below the base of the shotshell. Looking through the shell, it was easy to see if the primer was lined up. Then just finished raising the ram up until the primer seated flush. WOW, made my day! Saved me trying to figure out a way of buying/making a shell holder, etc. Next is making/finding something to put a slight crimp on the case mouth. Any suggestions or advice welcome!

[Hawg]

An old roll crimper. You can put any degree of crimp you want.

[mazo kid]

How easy is that? Thanks Hawg, I do have a couple of those old roll crimping tools.

[Hawg]

Put the lightest crimp you can on them. Just enough to work through a repeater.

[mazo kid]

Yep, I understand. Just enough crimp to hold the over shot wad in place. I don't have any repeater 12 gauge shotguns.

[mazo kid]

Oops, I forgot....I do have an old '97 Winchester.

[Hawg]

Yep, I understand. Just enough crimp to hold the over shot wad in place. I don't have any repeater 12 gauge shotguns.

You can leave them straight and glue the card in.

[ShotgunDave]

Yep, I understand. Just enough crimp to hold the over shot wad in place. I don't have any repeater 12 gauge shotguns.

You can leave them straight and glue the card in.

Yep, what Hawg said. I don't crimp mine, I just glue an over shot card in with Duco cement.

[AlaskanGuy]

i use the rcbs cowboy loader for putting the ever so slight crimp on mine... also, best thing to do to help them last forever is to anneal them a bit.  I just dip them in my bullet casting pot till i get the appropriate color change. helps keep the tip soft..

ag

[mazo kid]

Thanks for those useful tips guys. Yes, I have been gluing in over shot wads, but I need to modify my technique as I had a couple break loose (410 shells) and had shot all over in the little box I was keeping them in. I just used Elmer's glue, will have to see about finding some Duco cement. I don't know if it is common knowledge , but I sure was pleased to find the 12 ga. shells fit perfectly in the threaded die hole and I could seat primers. Yaaay! No more pounding in 209 primers as I can set them with the press ram.

[Hawg]

Try some water glass glue.

[mazo kid]

OK, will go with what I can find first, maybe try both!

[ShotgunDave]

Hawg is right. Water glass works well too.

You can get Duco and water glass on Amazon.

I had trouble keeping the cards glued in too. I figured out that I had to run a piece of sandpaper around the inside mouth of the cases, before I put the glue in. I just made it a regular part of my case prep. If there is any fouling left in the case, the glue won't hold. Just run a piece of 220 sandpaper around a few times, until the fouling is gone, and all will be well.

I had over shot cards popping out with the shell in the chamber. Pretty embarrassing to have shot rolling out the end of the barrel.