People are still shooting through ammo shortage

[Member 52301]

I thought that some of the wheel weights were not all lead or that they were changed in the last 10 to 20 years.

My MT husband 'casts' bullets too.

Cate

 

[Dinglenutz]

Just sayin', a bit of a friendly warning.

What he said. I shoot my reloads, my brothers shoot my reloads, my BiL shoots my reloads, my dad shot my reloads. That's pretty much my limit.

I also generally need to know the provenance of the brass.

 

[Badger Jack]

You do it any way YOU want. The rest of us will do what WE want. PERIOD

Wow, dog, that is twice now, you are an angry person!

I am not TELLING anyone how to endanger their life, or not, I am simply supplying information that an intelligent person might appreciate...

 

[BigDog67]

Wow, dog, that is twice now, you are an angry person!

I am not TELLING anyone how to endanger their life, or not, I am simply supplying information that an intelligent person might appreciate...

Not angry, just tired of your nattering. Ignore.

 

[Badger Jack]

I thought that some of the wheel weights were not all lead or that they were changed in the last 10 to 20 years.

My MT husband 'casts' bullets too.

Cate

They are marked with the symbol of what they are: Lead is Pb and Zinc is Zn. I have never seen any other symbols on wheel weights.
I start the separation with a large magnet to first remove the all steel weights, then the lead and zinc with steel clips, and finally the stick-on [basically heavy double sided tape] weights, and end up with 5 piles. The sticky tape is a pain...
Zinc is supposedly not good for casting bullets, but I do not understand the math behind that statement, so I toss those aside and sell them to the metals guy, along with all of the steel that comes out when the casting begins.
I get enough money from the metal buyer to 'pay' me for the time spent making those 5 piles!

 

[CLT65]

Everyone has different levels of risk that they're comfortable with. Some people share their reloads far and wide, while others vow to never let anyone except themselves pull the trigger on their ammo. Personally I'm somewhere in the middle: I'm a very cautious, deliberate reloader, and if my reloads are safe enough for my kids to shoot, they're safe enough to share with friends and family.

I have a friend who will never load a piece of brass that he didn't buy new or shoot as factory ammo. Personally I think that's over the top and a bit silly, but it's his choice and I can respect that. I know another guy who, I'm pretty sure, won't ride in a vehicle unless he's at the wheel. There was a guy at the range once, as as he was packing his stuff up to leave, crushed each neck of his fired brass as he threw it in the trash. When asked, he replied that it was so nobody would reload it, since reloading is dangerous! To each their own...

I did have a slight scare a few years ago. A friend who I hadn't seen in a while called me up. After formalities and small talk, he got around to his reason for calling. He asked if I'd ever had any trouble with my reloads?

It seems that he'd been out shooting, and shot up some old 12 gauge reloads that I had given to his dad back in the '90s. He said the end of his barrel looked exactly like Elmer Fudd's shotgun after Buggs Bunny stuck his finger in it. He had the thought that my reloads blew his gun up. Fortunately nobody was hurt.

It's a pretty worrisome accusation, even though we was nice about it and seemed to just want to figure out what happened. I couldn't believe it was my ammo, since I've always been very cautious, but if it was I sure wanted to know about it!

After a minute to take it in and think about it, I realized that the failure mode was glaring evidence of the cause, and it wasn't overloaded ammo. I asked him what could have been stuck in the end of the barrel. Had it been stuck in the dirt, mud, or snow?
Nope, not a chance, why did I ask?
I told him that the only way for the barrel to burst open at the muzzle like a banana peel was if something was lodged in the end of the barrel.
Well, he admitted, they had been messing around with the ammo a bit, cutting shells open and replacing the shot with marbles and nails, stuff like that. Is that a problem?

 

[Badger Jack]

I did not say I would not let anyone shoot my hand loads, just not shoot them in an any firearm that is not mine.

Did your friend mention if the barrel looks anything like this?
A customer came in many years ago with an early Remington 1100 barrel. It seems there was a problem with ice in the muzzle... he did not admit to poking it in the snow, but said he fell asleep [something he and I have in common when hunting!] and thought the snow may have melted while the barrel was warmer than the surrounding air, then froze. It is possible...
h

 

[Deerhurst]

I occasionally load for friends. Always work up the loads in their guns. I only load for those I don't trust to load safe ammo themselves! I'm a lot more OCD/anal about reloading than most I've met.

So far no failures in any way. Especially since many of my pistol caliber loads get run in open bolt guns.

 

[CLT65]

I did not say I would not let anyone shoot my hand loads, just not shoot them in an any firearm that is not mine.

Did your friend mention if the barrel looks anything like this?
A customer came in many years ago with an early Remington 1100 barrel. It seems there was a problem with ice in the muzzle... he did not admit to poking it in the snow, but said he fell asleep [something he and I have in common when hunting!] and thought the snow may have melted while the barrel was warmer than the surrounding air, then froze. It is possible...
View attachment 828640h

Yes, that's the way he described it. He also said it was plenty long enough that they were able to cut it back to a perfectly usable, legal barrel.

Personally I have no problem letting friends shoot my ammo in any gun they want, as my reloads are just as safe as any factory ammo they might shoot. I know that others see it your way, and I can't argue with that. To each their own.

 

[RevBadger]

Yes, that's the way he described it. He also said it was plenty long enough that they were able to cut it back to a perfectly usable, legal barrel.

Personally I have no problem letting friends shoot my ammo in any gun they want, as my reloads are just as safe as any factory ammo they might shoot. I know that others see it your way, and I can't argue with that. To each their own.

That's the key, right? Know your supplier and know those you can trust. There are very few people I would feel comfortable shooting their re-loads. One is my buddy, who I've known for over a decade. The other is my dad (who reloads and you all should buy his ammo). I absolutely wouldn't trust reloaders on gunbroker/armslist without some more information. I'd rather shoot Wolf Steel cases than some rando on the internet.

 

[CLT65]

Random reloads from someone I don't know and trust? Absolutely not!

A friend of mine overpaid for a box of 500 5.56 rounds at a gun show a few years back, towards the end of the last ammo scare. He brought it to me because only a few rounds would even chamber in his rifle.

What a mess. The brass was not fully/correctly resized, nor was it trimmed. There were proud primers. It was clearly some amateur's lousy reloads. He got taken.

Just to help him out, I pulled it all apart, sized and trimmed the brass, and re-reloaded it. Since he had already fired some and the empties looked fine, and the powder was all the same, I reused the powder. It was a fairly light load.

Yeah, stay away from unknown reloads.

 

[Badger Jack]

Yes, that's the way he described it. He also said it was plenty long enough that they were able to cut it back to a perfectly usable, legal barrel.

Personally I have no problem letting friends shoot my ammo in any gun they want, as my reloads are just as safe as any factory ammo they might shoot. I know that others see it your way, and I can't argue with that. To each their own.

... and what if there is some unseen problem with their firearm, and the time when YOUR handload in in the chamber s when it decides to let go?
Even if the shooter is not injured, in a court of law you will be liable, unless you can prove the firearm was defective in some way.
I am simply suggesting that people who do not have a million dollars of liability insurance should think three times before putting their hand loads into a firearm they do not own.

 

[Badger Jack]

That's the key, right? Know your supplier and know those you can trust. There are very few people I would feel comfortable shooting their re-loads. One is my buddy, who I've known for over a decade. The other is my dad (who reloads and you all should buy his ammo). I absolutely wouldn't trust reloaders on gunbroker/armslist without some more information. I'd rather shoot Wolf Steel cases than some rando on the internet.

Same reply I gave CLT65:
... and what if there is some unseen problem with their firearm, and the time when YOUR handload in in the chamber s when it decides to let go?
Even if the shooter is not injured, in a court of law you will be liable, unless you can prove the firearm was defective in some way.
I am simply suggesting that people who do not have a million dollars of liability insurance should think three times before putting their hand loads into a firearm they do not own.

 

[CLT65]

... and what if there is some unseen problem with their firearm, and the time when YOUR handload in in the chamber s when it decides to let go?
Even if the shooter is not injured, in a court of law you will be liable, unless you can prove the firearm was defective in some way.
I am simply suggesting that people who do not have a million dollars of liability insurance should think three times before putting their hand loads into a firearm they do not own.

I understand what you're saying, I just think it's a stretch, and no it doesn't concern me, not in the slightest. You can go down a long road full of what-ifs in life, and end up living in a bubble. I think the likelihood of my buddy shooting my ammo in his gun, his gun blowing up for some unknown reason, and him suing me out of existence is incredibly remote.

I know that others have the same personal rule they follow, and that's fine. I don't, and I'm not worried about it. I don't push the limits with my reloads, and if my ammo is safe enough for my kids to shoot in my guns, I'm not worried about it harming my friends' guns. I have bigger things to worry about.

 

[Dinglenutz]

I am simply suggesting that people who do not have a million dollars of liability insurance

I would suggest that first, people who don't have at least a million dollars in liability insurance fix that ASAP. Sad but true.

 

[EHJ]

Project Eldest Son: Covert Ammo Sabotage in Vietnam

A few posts ago Mike55 asked if anyone else had read about the special forces operation in Viet Nam in which our troops slipped exploding cartridges into enemy ammo supplies. He was referring to Project Eldest Son, which, from a Gun Nut perspective, is the most fascinating covert operation ever...

www.fieldandstream.com

Know Where Your Ammo Comes From! Project Pole Bean: How Sneaky Green Berets Blew Up a Few Guns and Frightened an Entire Army

In 1968, American troops in Vietnam reported scattered incidents where dead NVA soldiers were found with parts of their exploded rifles protruding from their skulls. Technical Intelligence attributed this to poor metallurgy and bad ammunition. The situation was a little more complicated than it...

www.gunsamerica.com

Since 2A fans are slowly being seen as some sort of enemy these days, it pays to be a bit more cautious.
Stranger things have happened.

 

[oremike]

I guess back in the day like most things, I was doing it wrong. Me and my shooting/reloading buddies would be like church women at a bake sale swapping recipes, shooting each others guns and ammo just to see and maybe find a new load or gun we like. No one did anything that was reckless or endangering. I never shot any body else's ammo I didn't see them shoot first.

 

[CamoDeafie]

Remanufactured ammo? Does anyone really trust that stuff? Theres lots of anecdotes about 2 specific lots of Hornady Frontier 5.56 blowing up AR15s which basically caused a lot of AR15 owners to distrust the Frontier brand as a whole.

And then you have the CCI aluminum cased rounds; in addition to Wolf and Tula steel case.

I know I'm good with the reman 124gr fmj 9mm rounds dad acquired at a gun show back in the 1990s, has been 100% since then in the Ruger P85 and the Hi Point carbines since then.. but then again, those firearms were relatively overbuilt. We are now down to like 200 or so of the old reman 9mms from 2,000ish and we have boxes and boxes of factory ammo that aren't "reman". None of our other ammo are remans though.

 

[BigDog67]

Project Eldest Son: Covert Ammo Sabotage in Vietnam

A few posts ago Mike55 asked if anyone else had read about the special forces operation in Viet Nam in which our troops slipped exploding cartridges into enemy ammo supplies. He was referring to Project Eldest Son, which, from a Gun Nut perspective, is the most fascinating covert operation ever...

www.fieldandstream.com

Know Where Your Ammo Comes From! Project Pole Bean: How Sneaky Green Berets Blew Up a Few Guns and Frightened an Entire Army

In 1968, American troops in Vietnam reported scattered incidents where dead NVA soldiers were found with parts of their exploded rifles protruding from their skulls. Technical Intelligence attributed this to poor metallurgy and bad ammunition. The situation was a little more complicated than it...

www.gunsamerica.com

Since 2A fans are slowly being seen as some sort of enemy these days, it pays to be a bit more cautious.
Stranger things have happened.

I would suggest a good supply of tin foil.

 

[oremike]

Remanufactured ammo? Does anyone really trust that stuff? Theres lots of anecdotes about 2 specific lots of Hornady Frontier 5.56 blowing up AR15s which basically caused a lot of AR15 owners to distrust the Frontier brand as a whole.

And then you have the CCI aluminum cased rounds; in addition to Wolf and Tula steel case.

I know I'm good with the reman 124gr fmj 9mm rounds dad acquired at a gun show back in the 1990s, has been 100% since then in the Ruger P85 and the Hi Point carbines since then.. but then again, those firearms were relatively overbuilt. We are now down to like 200 or so of the old reman 9mms from 2,000ish and we have boxes and boxes of factory ammo that aren't "reman". None of our other ammo are remans though.

All I know is I get a lot of repeat customers and if they didn't like my ammo they wouldn't keep buying it.