Shooting Factory Seconds and unbranded bullets

[Labrat198]

Picked up a bunch of Factory Seconds from Midway for cheaper fun shooting. The shape and description tells me they are likely SMK120's.

Other than checking the Base to Ogive and weight, are there any measurements I should take to confirm they match the branded version?

I plan to drop down a percent or 2 for safety first, but I should be GTG just using the data I have from my branded version right?

[stubshaft]

I've shot a bunch of Midways blem bullets in 6mm, .270 and .223 and have found very little difference between the blems and the full price bullets. The most notable is that they do not have the high polish as the regular bullets, and I have found a couple of misshapen bullets and oversize/undersize bullets. I tried weighing them once and found for the most part that they were within .2 grains of each other, and I consider them the same as the branded version. It is easy to find which bullets you are buying by matching the photos of the bullets as Midway uses the same photo for the blems and branded.

They are good enough that I still use them to shoot half-scale Silhouette competition.

[ErikS]

I recently got 300, 77gr .224s that appear to be SMKs with cannilures. The cannilures are all over the place and some don't have them, one bullet base was crushed out of 200 I have looked at.

I loaded some up and my first group was .69 inches at 100yds, so the still work. If I stumble on some 6.5s I would try them.

[curt514]

I used to shoot almost nothing but seconds. Sierra was just on the other side of town. I would go to the store and purchase by the pound.
I would weight sort because sometimes you would get one or two mixed in but no other issues.
I have shot thousands of them and hunted with them and never had a problem.