Hello again,

I am thinking of buying a bag of nickel plated brass for my .44 mag. The reason for this is just to differentiate magnum loads from everyday loads. I was wondering about the durability of nickel plated brass. I here that only after a few reloads, the nickel plating starts to fall off. Is this true? What brand is the best for nickel plating? The only one that I know of that offers this is remington. Are these a good product? Any help would be great!

thanks,
vanbuzen9

I have used the plated brass for both handgun and rifle rounds for years. I have never bought the plated brass for handguns but have used the factory plated cases and never had a problem with them.
But I buy the plated cases, Remington, for my rifle hunting rounds. I carry them in leather some of the time and they do not corrode. I think they are less apt to stick in the chamber because they stay 'cleaner' and the nickel will not 'flow' like brass under high pressure. :)

Back in the mid 60s, I ruined a perfectly good steel sizer die sizing .357 Remington nickel plated brass. After a few reloads, the nickel blistered. As I continued to reload these cases the the blisters separated forming little nickel tool bits that scored the sizer. After that, I went to carbide sizers and all brass cases. Now I strongly feel that straightwall nickel plated handgun cases should only be resized with carbide dies and a little case lubricant wouldn't hurt either. But times have changed and perhaps so has the quality of nickel plated brass. An alternative to using nickel might be to use one brand of brass for each special purpose. An example would be to possibly use Starline brass for hunting and other brands for self defense, plinking, etc. Shoot straight and reload safely. :)

You will find your case life is better with the non plated. Plating is tough and hard, two qualities you don't want in a firearms chamber. Get one thing between that case and the chamber, it won't be absorbed by the case like a brass casing. It will be dirven into the chamber.

Scroll down a bit on the page to the "Similar Threads" and read through some of the past posts on this issue.

I generally use the brass that's on hand, be it nickle or plain, but I have noticed that probably 90% of the split case necks I've seen have been with nickeled cases. There may be some truth to the idea that they are more brittle than plain brass cases, but it's no big deal.

I use nickle plated brass for my target loads in all of the cartridges I can get them for, except for the 45/70 which I use exclusively Star-Line brass. I haven't found a noticeable difference in case life for these loads.

For full power loads, the story is much different. The nickle plated cases don't last any where near as long as the unplated cases in my experience. Neck splitting is the most common with bottleneck cases, body splits were most common with straight walled cases. I don't load full power or hunting loads in plated cases.

I have also read about problems with sizing dies and plated cases, although I have not had any issues with the variety of dies I have.

I lube all of my bottle neck cases for sizing, and don't for straight walled cases regardless of plating, the exception being the 45/70 for which I lube the cases. But then, all of the straight walled cases I load are "pistol" callibers (45/70 excluded) and I use either "carbide" or "titanium nitride" dies for them might have something to do with that...

I use nickle plated shells unhesitatingly.. I usually load them a few times, then "retire" them by loading a known good load that I like to stock up on. They are less likely to corrode or tarnish in storage.

I do think that they will ruin steel dies in a hurry as I have toasted a set of Pacific "durachrome" .45acp dies sizing un-lubed nickle. That being said, I now understand that nickle case demand greater attention to lubrication in the sizing process. I use lots of nickle .45-70 rounds and the trick is to use enough lube to make them size easy, but not enough to cause any "dimples" or dents from accumulated lube.

I use carbide dies on .38/.357's and have noticed no difference from regular brass in sizing or the effort required to process a case.