Old Amunition

TR Treeman 4 years ago

About 15 years ago a friend of mine left PE and he gave me 30 or so odds and ends ammunition in .270 caliber that he had reloaded. The last two/three of the batch left when he set scope in again for new batch new hunt season with only to few cartridges left from previous batch for new season, these went in a bucket and later to me.
I did not have a issue shooting his reloads, he is a meticulous multi millionaire successful man who owns a few Spar's around country as "something to keep himself out of mischief in his latter years", but I knew nothing about storage and age before I got them.
Besides, you may shoot another mans rifle with his reloads, but you do not shoot his reloads in your rifle.
As can be see in picture the cases show time had taken its toll on outside of the case, they were just thrown in a bucket before they came my way.
20220619_172806[1] by David Frank Allen, on Flickr

I have a job that gets done with mixed ammo, accuracy is of 5 inch group importance, no living thing involved - hence the mixed batch reloads.

When I tried removing the bullet from case with a hammer it quickly became evident that the floor, house, kinetic hammer would all break before these bullets moved.
WHAT IF I HAD SHOT THEM ?
I then got my bullet puller out and collet crimp bullet puller out - tried. The collet system just slipped off bullet, they were "vaas!!!!" - WHAT IF i HAD TRIED SHOOTING THEM?

I eventually tightened the collet that it was as tight as can be by hand alone, and then the bullets came out, some after 3 - 4 tries.
Look at the corrosion and black chemical like? welding on bullets, the guy must have had sweaty hands and the tiny bit of sweat on the bullet must have over the years kind of bonded the the brass - copper, gilding metal.
They were so stuck, I really wonder what would have happened under firing them? My guess is they would just go off with major recoil, but ????

Next, a lot of the propellent S385 was stuck in case and needed a tap or two to get it out, look in top right corner some clumping can be seen, rest broke up coming through the neck.
20220619_172829[1] by David Frank Allen, on Flickr

I post this just awaken that reloaders awareness in ye all again - you never careful enough.

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Replies 14

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[deleted]

I had a similar experience with 222 ammo. It broke the RCBS kinetic hammer and I utterly destroyed the bullet with a plier to extract it from the case.

TR Treeman OP

I had a similar experience with 222 ammo. It broke the RCBS kinetic hammer and I utterly destroyed the bullet with a plier to extract it from the case.

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Geees, wonder what the result of shooting that shit would be? - I am sure many people must just pick it up and shoot it ?
Makes one wonder just how strong the guns are ?

[deleted]

Those cartridges were severely corroded between the bullet and the case neck. I did not even use the cases after pulling the bullets. They would most probably have caused a kaboom, or something similar.

TR Tripodmvr

Lots of reports of bullets chemically bonded to cases after a long time. A culprit seems to have been some types of case lubricant that had not been properly removed before seating the bullet.

TR Treeman OP

Lots of reports of bullets chemically bonded to cases after a long time. A culprit seems to have been some types of case lubricant that had not been properly removed before seating the bullet.

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Never heard of it being blamed for a rifle failure,but then how would one know.
Actually never heard of old ammo being blamed for rifle failure.

TR Tripodmvr

Found this on Saubier.com

I had this problem with a rifle i sold to a friend in 6mmAI.
Fireforming fed factory no problem - handloads he was blowing primers out with 6mm rem loads - thought he had loaded the wrong powder, messed up his scales etc etc - had me pulling my hair out and he was looking very darkly at me
Turned out he wasnt cleaning out the case lube on the inside of the neck when he was loading them - they stuck together like you had glued them in, after a month or so! Only found out when we went to pull some of his loads to re weigh his charges. Pressure went up dramatically as you can imagine
Do you carefully de-lube your necks - or do you use graphite?
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TR Treeman OP

Found this on Saubier.com

I had this problem with a rifle i sold to a friend in 6mmAI.
Fireforming fed factory no problem - handloads he was blowing primers out with 6mm rem loads - thought he had loaded the wrong powder, messed up his scales etc etc - had me pulling my hair out and he was looking very darkly at me
Turned out he wasnt cleaning out the case lube on the inside of the neck when he was loading them - they stuck together like you had glued them in, after a month or so! Only found out when we went to pull some of his loads to re weigh his charges. Pressure went up dramatically as you can imagine
Do you carefully de-lube your necks - or do you use graphite?
Reply With Quote

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I have never been too fussed with carefully cleaning out necks, just a brush through ? I have without fail used Lee lube, some of mt .270 rounds are 2014, no issues /

TR Tripodmvr

Lee lube is a soluble wax and is chemically inert and does not cause a problem.

OA oafpatroll

Lee lube is a soluble wax and is chemically inert and does not cause a problem.

Would you expect Imperial Sizing Wax to be similarly benign? That's what I use, very sparingly, and have never cleaned necks. I have also never pulled a bullet from a reloaded rifle case after more than a couple of days so have no idea if i could have the same issue.

TR Tripodmvr

I also use Imperial. Wonderful stuff. I dont think that it would cause problems. Too much might affect the propellant as can be seen in the picture Treeman posted. Cartridge in the sun will make that worse.

I used to use olive oil as case lube and although it works extremely well, not removing it completely has caused the primers to become contaminated and led to misfires.

[deleted]

How necessary is it to use lube in the case neck? I have never done it because I shoot little enough that my ammunition stands for months.

TR Treeman OP

How necessary is it to use lube in the case neck? I have never done it because I shoot little enough that my ammunition stands for months.

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I get the impression you think the lube is for shooting ?
The lube is for when sizing, if there is no lube in the neck the expander ball really works the neck hard. If you load in one straight process, clean - size - prime - charge- seat bullet then there is lube left on and in case - the way most people do it and have been for years, its so little lube. Some folk tumble after whole process to get all oil and hand acids of cases for storage - but the bit of lube remains in the neck area then, never been a problem ????
OR
Add some steps - clean - size - (brush in neck, wash, dry and tumble or just one of these steps) prime - charge- seat bullet.
..........................................................I think if you use dry lube or wax cleaning the neck is not a "have too" I also now think that wax may protect the case from this problem.
YOU MUST lube inside the neck or the expander balls work will severely shorten your case life.

OA oafpatroll

I also use Imperial. Wonderful stuff. I dont think that it would cause problems. Too much might affect the propellant as can be seen in the picture Treeman posted. Cartridge in the sun will make that worse.

I use so little that it's all but invisible. My normal method is to impregnate a meranti dowel with some wax I then I give it a turn in the neck. There's so little that it doesn't even catch any grains of propellant so I'm going to move this very minor concern to my list of things to forget about.

[deleted]

How necessary is it to use lube in the case neck? I have never done it because I shoot little enough that my ammunition stands for months.

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I get the impression you think the lube is for shooting ?
The lube is for when sizing, if there is no lube in the neck the expander ball really works the neck hard. If you load in one straight process, clean - size - prime - charge- seat bullet then there is lube left on and in case - the way most people do it and have been for years, its so little lube. Some folk tumble after whole process to get all oil and hand acids of cases for storage - but the bit of lube remains in the neck area then, never been a problem ????
OR
Add some steps - clean - size - (brush in neck, wash, dry and tumble or just one of these steps) prime - charge- seat bullet.
..........................................................I think if you use dry lube or wax cleaning the neck is not a "have too" I also now think that wax may protect the case from this problem.
YOU MUST lube inside the neck or the expander balls work will severely shorten your case life.

Indeed, but not entirely, as if one would oil/wax the bullet before seating to minimize friction upon seating. That was the only sensible explanation why there would be wax or oil in a stored cartridge.

I do lube the inside of the neck when sizing, but I also thoroughly clean it after sizing.