38-55 brass length

Post by **Old Savage** » Sun Mar 30, 2008 11:33 am

I mentioned on the 38-55 thread by KirkD that Ken Waters in his Pet Loads article of May 1976 gives the length of new Remingtom factory brass as 2.120. In reading his article on the 375 Winchester cartridge and the 94 BB to go with it he gives the length of the new factory Winchester brass as 2.080. That article was published in Jan of 1979.

It would appear that Winchester came out with the new length of brass with the introduction of the 94 BB .375. Chambers for both the Winchester and the Marlin 375s appear to be cut to accept the 2.080 length. I have not tried the longer 2.120 brass.

Cast Bullet Hunter · Post by **Cast Bullet Hunter** » Sun Mar 30, 2008 1:09 pm

The flaw to this theory is the SAAMI dimension for the .375 chamber shows a MAXIMUM dimension of 2.080". The SAAMI maximum cartridge length is 2.020". The "short" .38-55 cases would still have to be trimmed to be correct, although there may have been the reasoning that by shortening the cases, should someone inadvertantly or intentionally try to use the .38-55 in the .375 it would not result in such a great increase in pressure that it would result in a catastrophic failure of the brass. On the other hand, if they had stuck with the standard length case, and set the SAAMI standard for the .375 closer to the 2.020 case length a .38-55 could not have been inserted in the .375 chamber ala the .357 in .38 Spl., etc.

The real answer is probably to be found only in the minds of the engineers at Winchester when they specced such a difference between the chamber and case length for the .375. My thought is it is more for production reasons and economics of manufacture rather than haveing anything at all to do with the .375 Winchester.

Post by **Old Savage** » Sun Mar 30, 2008 2:16 pm

Measuring new untrimmed Winchester 38-55 brass gives 2.080 - 2.083 - even the longest easily slide all the way in. The chamber is apparently longer than that.

Cast Bullet Hunter · Post by **Cast Bullet Hunter** » Sun Mar 30, 2008 2:38 pm

Old Savage wrote:Measuring new untrimmed Winchester 38-55 brass gives 2.080 - 2.083 - even the longest easily slide all the way in. The chamber is apparently longer than that.

Yes, they very well may easily chamber at he 2.080, remember the crimp. This is a reference direct from this forum:http://www.leverguns.com/dimensions/images/375win.jpg

This is why the SAAMI standards exist. Your chamber may be a little on the longer side, but all aren't. Sometimes you can get away with a mis-match, and sometimes it will bite back.

1886 · Post by **1886** » Sun Mar 30, 2008 3:27 pm

All of the .38-55 chambered rifles that I have played with, again that I have played with, will accept the proper length of 2.125". Marlin and Win. 375 rifles will accept the 2.080" brass. This topic seems to pop up every month or so. Some where along the line case length was reduced to 2.080". Most likely a case of economics and ease of manufacture. The siren song of cheap is sung quite often by the manufactures. Starline has responded to the wishes of .38-55 shooters by offering the proper length case. Regards. 1886.

Post by **Old Savage** » Sun Mar 30, 2008 3:34 pm

Seems the base of the brass ahead of the rim on the 38-55 is also different that the original measuring .415" instead of .4213

w30wcf · Post by **w30wcf** » Mon Mar 31, 2008 9:26 pm

Old Savage,

I did a little research on .38-55 brass length and it appears that only the later W-W and Winchester headstamped brass were of the shorter 2.08" length. The change most likely took place sometime in the 1970's for whatever reason is anybody's guess.

The original U.M.C., and the later REM-UMC and still later R-P brass had the 2.12-2.13 length based on the cartridges I checked.

It appears that R-P discontinued .38-55 ammunition production in the mid to late 1960's since it is not listed in their 1968 and later catalogs.

Most likely, they continued to offer brass for a few more years as Ken Waters indicated.

w30wcf