Yesterday's Weapons Forums

I was rummaging thru the garage and out of boredom dug into some old ammo I have stored and piled in the corner. I still have these wooden crates of 30:06 AP ammo I bought in the 70's! Have 3 sealed tins as pictured below,(2 come in a crate), with the other half crate being boxed AP. Yep it's old corrosive stuff. Below those was another crate of 1040 rds of non-corrosive AP that came packed in Garand Clips, and 3 crates of CMP ball. Then theres another double crate stored with a mixture of Tracer,ball and match. Thats most of the '06, except for the reloads which are stored in a half dozen ammo cans. My records reflect 9,000 rds in 30:06. The pictured ammo is 1943.

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Hailstone

Will the CMP ship to Alaska? Too bad someone who wasn't flying and was driving could get you a case. Ah they would have to pass thru Canadian customs.

Every once in a while, I run across some ammo that I bought back in the 1960's. The oldest I have is 1900 date German 7.92mm (8x57) with the leavy, round nose bullet. I fired some of this in the 1980's and it still worked. It's 107 years old and will probably still fire.

I also have some 1930's and 1940's German military ammunition, some with the wooden (blank round) bullets. This stuff still looks good, but I had a box of 15 rounds from, oh, I forget what date, but they were brass case German Army cartridges. They went bad in their box; the powder started to break down and liquify, then it ate through the cases and wanted to leak out. I discovered this a few years ago, and I remember my first thought being, "Say, I just looked at those a few years ago and they were still good." On second thought, I had to remind myself that a few years ago was in the 1970's.

Certain of the WW2 US-made rifle powders have been seen to melt down like this after X number of years.

Is this not about the same ammo that is from Greece?
Im thinking CMP Ammo is currently being sold on Garand Clips is Greek...

Any heads up on which powders "melt"? i have a small stach of tis stuff from JnG sales, last year I picked up 1,920 rds on "free with the ammo" M-1Clips, and shoot it through my 1917, and give a couple friends with M-1's the clips, but Im way satisfyed with it. Im thinking its WWII stuff, and corrosive

UPS will deliver, no problem, but aircargo, on cargo flights only, hazmat fees and $1.10 by the time its here, a pound pi$$'$ me off.

The price of ammo AND freight have combined to make me think about every shot. I gotta get like M14 and Txpete and get my reloading act together.

There are alternatives......
Besides, drooling at the beach in Florida is "ALMOST" as good as shooting my rifle
what would you do with your $$$......I know what Kaintuck would do!

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Hailstone

The CMP stuff at present is Greek Ball ammo. It is supposed to be decent stuff.
This stuff pictured is U.S. Armor Piercing; and AP and Tracer in the can which I am sure you can see is linked. It's WW2 vintage and except for it's corrosiveness is sought after because its AP. I have not had problems with any U.S. stuff except if it has gotten wet and stored. You get a high degree of primer failure then.The dates more or less will indicate whether or not it's corrosive. If it's US. most 54 and later is NC. Foreign stuff is a guess.
The beach gets old, I have not been to one in 5 years (to swim) although there are some just 10 minutes away. I walk, look, but don't swim.

Re. a "heads up" on which powders deteriorate in surplus ball ammo.

Nitrocellulose was used as the basis for making single-based propellants. Over time, this can break down chemically and create an acid that destroys the cartridge. Chemists sometimes add a stabilizer to nitrocellulose to counter deterioration in it. The propellants that experienced deterioration that I am familiar with were made under war-time conditions in Germany and the United States. It may be possible that some propellants made under wartime conditions were made under hurried conditions and stabilizers were not added.

Under certain conditions, destabilzation can cause spontaneous ignition in propellants, but not usually in small cartridges such as those used in military small arms. It is more likely in large blocks of propellant, since gases generated by deterioration cannot escape from the core of the mass. One example might have been the turret explosion aboard the USS Iowa. I cite this as a possible example, which the second investigation suggested rather than the bogus reasons the US Navy gave after the first investigation.

The US propellant that I have seen go bad apparently was one of the slower numbers, something like that sold by Hodgdon as H-4831. This propellant was originally used in 20mm ammunition made during WW2.

It's important to note that powders are made in different batches, so fortunately not all powder of a similar type has the exact chemical composition. For this reason, only certain lots of powder seem to be prone to this deterioration. It can take many, many years for powder to destabilize, if it ever does.

A note for reloaders: This may be good reason for not loading up lots of ammo in advance; it's much easier to inspect powder condition in the can than after it has been loaded into finished rounds.

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It's 5 o'clock and it's watermelon time.....................
because you can't drink beer & load rockets - TXPete

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Herr Messer,

if that is newly made and newly bought, you should be able to take it back for a refund or get a refund from the manufacturer. It certainly shouldn't go bad that quickly.

It was only about half left and I got it around 1980 but the can rusted out so I put it in another container. I think I loaded some 300 win mag but can't remember for sure and they are still in good shape.

Rad

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