Why so much dislike for Hornady brass?

[Lefty7mmstw]

Here's the measured Weight Data Grains:

Lapua Dry Filled with H2O

336.5 451.4 114.9
329.5 446.7 117.2
330.2 446.35 116.15

Avg. Case vol. water weight Lapua 116.1


Hornady


319.3 426.8 107.5
318.8 426.4 107.6

Avg. Case Vol. Water weight Hornady 107.5


Do your own comparisons. This was on once fired brass. Clearly the Hornady Brass weighs less Dry and has less volume of H2O
when filled. Could be its just shorter in the neck or case, or maybe it doesn't have the same alloy, weighs less and is less volume.
Yep, try this on your own too.

So, with the supposed shortcomings, how DID IT SHOOT? I only ask this as I've seen some pretty good components shoot like crap and some stuff that shouldn't do worth a hoot turn in 1/2 moa consistently... I've had 7mm stw fireforming loads with 375 h@h brass haphazardly trimmed with tossed charges toss ten in 3/4 inch. I've seen 30-06 with 3 different primers and 3 different brands of casing but a bullet the rifle liked and a decent powder dump 1/2 moa.. I've also had groups with turned/ uniformed brass that would make a shotgun cringe. The brass is a vessel; as long as it fits with a few thou. wiggle room to center and isn't a total joke concentricity wise you will probably not notice the difference in most rifles.
More people on this site have trouble staying in nodes with fickle bullets than really have any issues with modern brass. I hear people chasing bad loads that they spent 1/2 of their barrel life developing and wondering why their trickled charges and perfect brass couldn't fix a poor barrel/ bullet relationship. I've dumped deer at 1/2 mile with 140 grain 7mm flat based pills in a factory sporter with tossed charges in rp brass. The trick was the rifle would consistently shoot 1/4 to 1/2 moa.. Offhand at distance was rather easy knowing exactly where the bullet was going. Too dang bad I shot that pipe out.

 

[Varmint Hunter]

I only use Hornady brass in a custom 6.5 PRC because that is the only brass I locate over the last year. However, I really can't complain. It has been used to develop several very accurate loads (<.5mao) and I have reloaded most of it 7x. The pockets are still tight enough for another load but without annealing them I'd rather not push things too far.

Midsouth has just shipped me 200 rnds of Lapua 6.5 PRC brass so It will be interesting to see if my handloads actually improve with the new cases. At $145 per hundred, the Lapua cases were a steal!

 

[DJ Fergus]

First let me say my I would rate my skills as a reloader as intermediate. For reasons I can not explain I absolutely love the 300 WSM. Unfortunately my choices in brass are VERY limited and only Hornady and Norma/Nosler are ever available with any regularity.
As I am not a wealthy person I bought 150 pieces of the Hornady, prior to having read and was unaware all the negative reviews of it. I took at complete random 20 pieces each from each bag of fifty and measure them for weight and length and both were very consistent. And my reloads with it have given me sub 1" 300 yard 5 shot groups. Now I realize for most dedicated long range shooters who reload consistency in weight and length of new brass are no where near as important (if at all) as consistent case neck thickness, and concentricity, which at this time I do not own the gauges needed to measure either, but I do plan on buying a Sinclair concentricity gauge and a Redding case neck concentricity gauge in the very near future as an affordable alternative to one of the awesome concentricity gauges that are simply out of my price range.

So I'm guessing the disfavor I have read of Hornady brass is most likely due to one or more of the fallowing reasons: Two few reloads before case necks or primer pocket issues. Issues with case neck concentricity or uniform case neck thickness, over all brass quality doesn't justify it's rather high price. Or something I am unaware of.

I would like to here from those who have had first hand experience with Hornady new never fired reloading brass that once you tried it you won't use it again and why. I will say where as I'm sure I have read a negative review of Norma brass, I am unable at this moment to recall it.

One of my biggest gripes of late is there is almost nothing Cabela's sells anymore I need I can't get else where much cheaper, but they do carry Norma brass in 300 WSM and the wife and I buy all of our gas and groceries on Cabela's CC's so I will use my point to buy some Norma brass in 300 WSM. It will likely take me several months to build the points, but buy half way through 2019 I should have enough points to afford 200-250 pieces of Norma brass.

Thanks,
Art

I was previously very critical on Hornady brass. I must say that I have had some better experiences lately with Hornady brass. While I won't rate it as good as ADG, Alpha or Lapua, I will say that I much prefer it over Winchester, Remington & federal. I ran some Hornady 25-06 brass and it gave me good E.S. and the primer pockets held up pretty well. I will say that those primer pockets held up better than the nosler and Norma brass I've used but the nosler & Norma were probably just a tad more consistent.

 

[Lefty7mmstw]

I just took my kid's creed out with hornady brass today... the 143's were running a bit slow on the labradar, but 2616, 2617, and 2620 for 3 shots of somewhat uniform brass from 1 20 round box (trimmed necks and uniformed pockets- nothing special)... The other box was running about 2660 with around a 10 fps x, but that brass has had differing shot counts and is basically hunting brass for the kids. I'm only runing 41 h4350 also, so a bit more cowbell might get the speed to 2700 fps or so.

 

[cornstalker]

I have Hornady brass from two different batches for my 7mm Rem Mag. One batch shoots very consistently, the other is not good at all. I decided to weigh the two to try and figure out why. One batch has about a 4-grain variance across the batch (the good one), the other is a lot lighter than the first batch and has a 20+ grain variance.