Lapua .260 Rem Brass Proves Very Uniform
If you have a rifle chambered in .260 Remington, you may be wondering if the Lapua .260 Brass is worth the money compared to domestic-made brass. Well, the answer is “yes” if you demand consistent weight and dimensional uniformity (including neckwall thickness).
Mike Harpster of Dead Center Sports took the time to weigh and measure Lapua .260 Rem brass. His test show this brass to be extremely uniform. Weight variance was less than one (1) grain in a 20-case sample. And case neckwall thickness was very consistent.
Report by Mike Harpster: Lapua .260 Rem Brass Test Results (with Comparisons)
I pulled twenty (20) pieces randomly from one Lapua box to do some measurements. I weighed them on my Mettler-Toledo digital lab scale and here are the individual weights of each case. Remarkably, the Lapua brass had less than one grain total weight variance among all 20 cases!
While checking the Lapua brass I remembered I had just received some Winchester brand .308 brass, so I thought it would be interesting to do a comparison between the two brands. I again pulled 20 cases at random from a bag of 50 and repeated the same measurements. The results are shown in the right half of the table below.
Weight Variance Lapua .260 Rem Brass vs. Winchester .308 Brass
| LAPUA .260 Rem Brass | Winchester .308 Win Brass |
 Average: 172.20 grainsES: 0.94 grains SD: 0.259 |
 Average: 158.49 grainsES: 2.64 grains SD: 0.678 |
Lapua Brass Further Inspection
With sample Lapua .260 Rem cases, I also measured the neck wall thickness in four places with calipers, not the most accurate method but I feel confident that the thickness did not vary more than .001″ over the 20 cases (.0145-.0155). The inside diameter of the neck measured .260 which would give .004 of neck tension out of the box. I visually checked the flash holes and I did not find any flakes of brass or burrs inside, the holes were round and centered.
Winchester Brass Further Inspection
The flash holes on the majority of the Winchester brass were not round or centered and they had large burrs inside. The neck wall thickness was pretty consistent, varying only .0015″ (.0125″ – .014″). As you can see in the photo (right) many of the Winchester cases were badly dented while the Lapua brass showed very few minor dents. The annealing on the necks of the Lapua brass was clearly evident while the Winchester showed no signs of being annealed. [Editor’s note: Winchester tumble-polishes its brass before shipping — so you would not notice annealing coloration if annealing had been done.]
I have never done these measurements on any other brass so I don’t know how they compare, but I am very impressed with the overall quality of the Lapua .260 brass. If they prove to hold up to the repeated firings I get from my Lapua 6BR brass I believe .260 shooters wil be very happy.
Mike Harpster — Dead Center Sports
105 Sunrise Drive
Spring Mills, PA 16875
phone: 814-571-4655
www.deadcentersports.com
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- Lapua Brass Uniformity Confirmed with .260 Rem Measurements
- .243 Win Brass Comparison Test — Surprising Results
- .243 Winchester Brass Weight and Capacity Tested
- New Lapua 220 Russian Brass — Thicker Necks?
Tags: .260, 260 Rem, Lapua, neckwall thickness, Remington, Winchester
Did you find any of the Winchesters with un-formed shoulders, that look like milk-bottles?
Earlier this spring I finished going thru 1200 Winchester .308 cases purchased in 2009-10 and they were just about the most awful things I’ve ever used. Milk-bottle shoulders, under-size case heads, dented up mouths & bodies, primer pockets so tight I had to use a bench-mounted primer seater… I had to fire-form the cases before use in a match as they were so grossly under-sized that a full-power .308 load either would not fit in the case, or if it did, caused pressure excursions.
*AFTER* a lot of sorting/culling/clean-up, they do shoot surprisingly well. Not sure the lower price is worth the additional effort.
Whats the price difference per 100?
Depends… whats your time worth, whats the powder and bullets needed to fire-form worth, etc.? The cost difference per package rapidly becomes moot. The sole saving grace of the Winchester brass as I see it is increased capacity – you can’t get that any other way.
What’s does the .260 lapua brass measure at the neck when loaded?
measuring neck thickness with a caliper?
Fireforming is a very important step for all the brass I compete with. I see a tangible difference in load tuning/accuracy with virgin vs FF brass.
Case necks on the Lapua are thick which may be a problem in some chambers but then we check all of this anyways.
I found the brass overly stiff and had to reanneal again for my tastes AFTER outside neck turning.
Anyone check the case volume of the Win cases? I bet you find them to be very uniform…. why they shoot so well.
Weighing cases DO NOT TELL YOU CASE VOLUME.
I do enjoy the Win case extra volume.
New Norma brass is also amazing stuff and may beat both of these brands for out of the box QC.
Enjoy
Jerry
Life is way too short for crappy brass.
I also like my primers not dumping after just a few high pressure loads. I have been using the same 100 pieces of Lapua brass for the last 940 rounds out of my 260 AI. About half of those shots were very high pressure. I also accidently over pressured them once which resulted in extractor marks. However, the primer pockets are still tight. Winchester would have been toast in either scenario. Final note, does the slightly higher capacity of Win brass actually create a much higher velocity?
260 PTG saami spec,Lapua brass, some brass are sticking. Neck seemed to be too thick.I then compared a nolser .008 to a lapua there is 0.002+ in wall thickness difference. Even in the brass itself the wall are thinner on the nosler….saami reamer spec give .008 body diam. wonder why lapua are thicker.Unless I dont understand something. Having a neck thickness of .010 to .015 will be too tight for a saami spec chamber.
Correct me if im wrong!
I have a .294″ neck reamer since before the Lapua brass came out. Shoots sub 1/3 moa at 600 with the Winchester brass and has been used in a number of guns for 1000 yard f-o matches, and tactical type guns. Very tight fit on the Lapua 260 brass and has caused issues for some who try it. So be forewarned what your neck dia. may be in a custom barreled rifle. I am now asking customers what brass they will be using and this alone seems to be a tough question for some of them, based on availability of components.
Justin, see Gun of the Week #75. I have been beating on ALOT of Win 308W brass in my 6.5 mystics and 260AIs.
When you push a 140gr Berger close to 3000fps, the load is very hot no matter how you slice it. Brass lived just fine.
I found a more accurate node at 2900ish fps and that is where I left it. Got bags of still useable brass and a box full of fried barrels.
I think you need to shoot the stuff before thinking it “no good”.
If you have a brand preference, by all means, enjoy BUT there is alot you are missing out.
Besides, you can thank your Uncle Sam for allowing Win 308 and 223 brass to be some of the best stuff on the market.
Someone mentioned that more then a few rds are fired in these two chambers in your country every day?
I gave up on Lapua 223 brass along time ago when competing in F TR with the 223. Brass was way too thick, alloy way too stiff for this chambering to work as well as it could. Too much mucking about to the brass.
Win 223 on the other hand was near perfect out of the bag. A few easy prep steps and good to go.
Just because something can handle a zillion PSI’s doesn’t make it good. In fact, that which lets it survive those types of pressures may make it less then ideal in some competition set ups.
Ask some competitive Palma or FTR shooters about Win “lite” brass. Maybe they will talk,…. maybe they will not
Besides, I have yet to find a common powder that shot consistently well over magnum pressures.
YMMV.
Jerry
Ideally, you will just outside neck turn any brass to a set thickness. This makes life so much easier in the reamer and neck bushing choices.
With Lapua, you may find that the alloy is tough or “sticky” making turning a royal PITA. And because you will need to take a fair amount of to get to “normal” thickness, you may need to do it in a few passes.
LOTS of shooters use Lapua so it is not the end of the world but just a heads up.
If you want superb, give the new Norma stuff a try. This stuff comes in a pretty 25rds box with egg carton partition inside.
Expensive? You bet but how much is your time worth?
Norma/Lapua – same corporation so they thank you for your support either way
Jerry