While I was doing early development and chronographing work on the Hoosier wildcat I used cases formed almost exclusively from Winchester factory .358 Winchester brass. It was the easiest to work with, did not require neck annealing or outside neck turning, already had a ”.358” in the head stamp, and was the logical parent case for the wildcat. As an experiment I took one case formed from .358 Winchester brass and loaded it many times to use for a fouling shot as I tested many different bullets and powder charges. Would you believe that I have reloaded that one case 35 times! Some of the reloading involved neck sizing only and some involved full length resizing. I did not keep track of how many of each. However, I believe the time has come to retire the case. Now it does not seem to grip the bullets quite as tightly as originally, and the primers are not held as tightly, but they do not fall out! I have never annealed the neck of that case and the neck has never split.

Originally I gave a recommendation that handloaders stick to factory .358 Winchester brass to form cases for the .358 Hoosier. Further, I warned against using military brass in 7.62 NATO and other brass made to military specifications (milspec) because that brass is typically thicker and heavier than the commercial .308 Winchester brass. Cases formed from military and milspec brass would likely have thicker necks and reduced powder capacity, which could lead to excessive pressures for a given load. But, cases formed from most commercial .308 Winchester would probably be OK. However, there could be some extra work in expanding the neck of the parent cases.

During chronographing work I also used for fouling shots a case formed from the Winchester brand of factory .308 Winchester brass. The resulting case worked just fine. I annealed the new neck. However, I probably did not need to anneal because all of the Hoosier neck came from the .308 Winchester neck and shoulder, both of which I believe are already factory annealed. [You may have seen the annealing “colors” on 7.62 NATO and .30-06 military brass just below the shoulder/body junction.] The annealing “colors” are polished out on commercial brass, but the brass is properly annealed. I have reloaded that case 10 times and it is still going strong.

Also, as a result of the seasonal short supply of commercial .358 Winchester brass, as well as its relatively higher price, several handloaders have started using the Winchester brand of .308 Winchester brass to make their Hoosier cases. The commercial supplier of .358 Hoosier ammo to A. J. Brown Arms is also using the Winchester brand of .308 Winchester brass for much of his ammo. I do not know if the supplier has tried other brands of commercial .308 Winchester brass.

This would also be a good time to note that handloaders forming their own .358 Hoosier brass should first cut the parent case back to an overall length of about 1.80 inches BEFORE running it into the Hornady brand of .358 Hoosier full length resizing die. [Otherwise you may ruin the case inside the Hornady die because of its limited interior space.] Then trim the formed case to proper length and chamfer the case mouth. You are ready to prime and load.