Lapua .308 Winchester Brass, Large Rifle Primer, 100 ct

Lapua brass is the reference point for .308 Winchester, and Lapua says so plainly, describing its .308 case as the standard to which all other cases in the caliber are compared. The claims behind that are specific and they matter to a handloader. Case heads are drawn exceptionally hard, which is what keeps primer pockets tight after many firings; a loose pocket is the most common reason a case gets retired, so head hardness is effectively case life. Necks and shoulders are annealed to withstand repeated sizing, the other end of the same problem, since work-hardened necks split. Lapua also holds strict tolerances in neck wall concentricity and thickness, which is the property that determines whether your dies are correcting the brass or just reshaping an inconsistency. Buy it if you are loading for accuracy and intend to reload the same cases many times, because the price only makes sense amortized: at roughly a dollar a case, five firings puts brass near twenty cents a round and ten firings halves that again. For plinking ammunition it is money badly spent.