re life of a case

[abj]

first, i want to thank-all of you who have helped in answering the questions i have asked. now i have another, let us say we are shooting medium loads for a 357 mag. using universal clays powder, and a 125gr. jaketed bullet , with a med crimp. i know cases can crack at anytime, among other things, but can you give me some idea as an average, how many shots can i fire from one shell casing. and this is if one takes good care of the cases. i am not holding this to anyone , i know it can be as low as one. some have said average form this type of case is 10 to 20 shots. thanks everyone.

[Dand]

Looks like you never got any replies.  I'd venture to say that yes 10-20 loads may be possible. It will also depend on 1) the chambers of your gun: Loosely chambered guns and subsequent resizing will result in more working of the brass. 2) Particular lot of brass, some may be harder than others and may crack more quickly. 3) Nickel plated or not: nickel makes the cases hard and the cases tend to crack more quickly.

I have some 38 spl cases that I think were made in the 1950's.  I have no idea how many times they've been loaded but I'm getting pretty regular splitting from this batch as I shoot them up. I know I've reloaded some of these 5-7 times and I suspect they had been reloaded when I got them.

[abj]

thanks for your help. i shoot a revolver , and when i reload the case gets resized every time. so the whole case gets worked each reload. but i have not been using full loads, mainly because i am just a target shooter. i do have a few full loads ready just in case i want to get some aggression out on a big thick phone book. now thats fun, but for now its just punching paper