I have read reviews on brass sorting trays and the most helpful review was from someone that said the National Metallic sorting trays were the best there were. One look at them and it’s obvious why; There is not a lot of plastic separating one slot from the next. All others I see have a lot of real estate taken up with wide dividers.

The National Metallic sorting trays are discontinued. Roll eyes, of course they are!

Does anybody know of a brand that works as well as the National metallic trays? Or does anybody have another that is just as fast for less than the price of a kidney?

Do you have kids?

Seriously, I'd like a system that can sort 9mm from .380ACP. I can typically eyeball it, but that takes time.

EDIT: I found this: https://www.shellsorter.com/co...ll-sorter-value-pack

While I haven't tried them, it's simple design (similar to National Metallic) that makes me think I can take some measurements of the cases with some calipers and mill my own sorting plates for 5 gallon buckets.

Dillon sells a case shorting

Flesh, the rim diameter for 9mm is .392”
.380 has .372” for its rim diameter.

The way I have always separated those two is by filling a plastic loading tray full with 100 cases and just looking across the top at a low angle. The 380s are easy to spot.

Not a bad technique! That's also enough of a difference to mill some sorting trays of my own, too.

If you can mill them do it. I bought the fluorescent light covers that are the plastic squares, cut them into 10x10 squares, epoxied two layers high, and glued them to a piece of plywood. I can have roughly 2000 cases all lined up ready for inspection.

I also fill them up by dropping a handful of cases into them and letting the extras fall back into a 5 gallon bucket. Most land primer side down due to the weight as they skid across the surface and find an empty hole to nestle in. The individual squares are plenty big enough for just about any handgun round.

Range brass that I pick up, I sort by caliber and clean, then zip lock bag to sell at my local gun store. They have shelves for just this purpose and is used for used items like die sets, used press's and other reloading goodies.