Have any old batches of Norc 5.56 been bad?

the_klenzer

the_klenzer

CGN Ultra frequent flyer
Location
Vancouver, BC
Hey guys, I hoover through your Norc surplus 5.56 in the TMSA Tacmatch series (which we appreciate you sponsoring! I shot on the CanAmmo team for the big match in Aug), and have bought around 3-4 cases per year for the last couple years.

However... since I cracked into one case this summer (yellow cardboard box, I think stamped 93 or 95) I've had numerous problems, from blown primers to various FTE and FTF issues, all from the same order (though different crates). I've done some extensive testing over multiple mags and serveral different rifles and isolated the ammo as the issue. I was wondering if there have been any known issues with any previous batches? This order is from last fall I think. Still good for plinking and practice, but I can't use it in competition anymore.

Also... and no coincidence... when will you have Rem .223 back in stock. I need to order a lot of it. :)

Thanks!
 
Some VZ58's have case separation and jamming problems with this stuff and yet others run it no problem. Overall pretty decent stuff, just don't expect to many reloads from the brass.
 
shooting this stuff the other day,had nemerous FTF.....all light strikes we thought till i put it through my AR which had been eating it now stop for the last year.but honestly.....thats one bad batch out of maybe 5000 rounds...ill deal with it
 
Check your case "lot" number. My experience leads me to believe that bad batches tend to come from lots in the mid-high 20s+.
I've run through 2 cases now of low lot number batches with ZERO issues in my ARs. Any friends that have had issues tend to have higher lot numbers.
 
Thanks Tigerbalm, I'll check. I'd say my issues have numbered 1 in 40-50 rounds.

At the last match, I had enough ftfs that any FTF off the beep was thus named after me. :)

Edit... Just want to add that I've been through thousands if not tens of thousands of rounds from canammo up to this point and this is the first potentially bad batch I've had.
 
I had a batch norc 556 headstamp cj93 that I had no ftf but 6 out of 100 rounds had the primer blow out a hole where the firing pin struck. One of them blew back primer bits into the bolt and jammed up the firing pin rendering the rifle inoperable until the bolt was disassembled to unjam the firing pin (AR) I didn't shoot any more of that batch.
 
Hey,

There were a few batches in the 20s that were not as good. CanadaAmmo probably has more info... Guess it's the price of buying cheap...

At least you weren't using your Tavor and could clear the stoppages fast!
 
84wh1 said:
I had some yellow box norc that wouldn't fire from my buddies mossberg MVP. I wasn't willing to try norc in my tavor so I don't know if my rifle would have shot it though
Click to expand...

A lot of bolt guns don't like it... Never had a problem in any of my ARs, but it is unreliable in my 700.
 
I've seen a couple threads now that mention problems with the Norc yellow box .223 ammo (or is it 5.56?). Anyway, yellow box bad sometimes, apparently.
I have only bought a case of the white box Norc 5.56 (1120 rd case) so far, but didn't know until I opened it. A lot of people have reported no issues with the white box stuff. Is it luck of the draw, or how else would one know what one is getting inside the crate, without prying the nailed-on lid off in the store? Is there a code stenciled/stamped on the outside of the wood crates that differentiates between the yellow and white box stuff inside? Would be handy to know for future reference.
 
Continuous FTF's in a Savage Axis .223, tried several strikes to detonate and still failure. (Norc ".223" wrapped in paper")

Zero issues shootings Federal, MFS, Barnaul.
 
if your AR has a trigger with a lighter hammer spring or lighter hammer itself, or it has different geometry as on some nicer triggers, you may have light primer strikes on Norc or other surplus ammo. Its one of the reasons I have kept my stock trigger. I have had two dud primers, but never light strikes. I put both of them back in the gun 3-5 times each and they never went off.
 
at the range the morning and experienced 1 in 20 ftf in a norc cqa. I now its a cheap gun and cheap ammo but I hate that click and no go boom feeling. All yellow box and all light strikes that did go bang the second time through
 
I had a crate of Chinese 5.56 - but it was the brown paper wrapped, not the yellow boxed stuff. The head stamps were all CJ 95. No idea about lot number.

I found that I was losing around 5 out of every hundred rounds in my AR. Some failures to feed due to the bullet being pushed into the casing. Never had that issue with AE or PMC 5.56. Also some failures to fire due to the primer blowing out of one round, sticking on the bolt face, and preventing the firing pin from striking the next round. No cracked cases or other issues though.

It's about as accurate as a playing card thrown in a hurricane, and it's dirty as hell. It's not ammo to be relied upon - but it'll get the job done for plinking.
 
I am interested to hear people stating that the Norinco primers are harder. Is that enough to actually screw up the firing pin on something? My Mossberg MVP firing Norinco rounds started to have lighter and lighter primer strikes, before eventually not striking it at all. Upon disassembly, the firing pin was not coming forward at all. This required a warranty fix/replacement, which was free to me but still troubling.

I thought it was just the gun having issues, but if it may be the hard primers I may stop using it.

Until that point the only thing I was noticing was that the groupings were terrible. I don't care about close-range performance when I'm doing tactical AR stuff, but from 100-200 in the MVP I was normally getting groups of 1-3" with good ammo and 4-6" with Norinco ammo.
 
I don't think light primer strikes/harder primers would put any measurable wear and tear on the firing pin or rest of the bolt parts.

However I've burned through a couple cases of norc yellow box and I've had one jam requiring my ar15 to be mortared, two primers have fallen out after firing and couple ftf/fte. I'm guessing less then 10 per 500. Cheap foreign ammo comes at cost but nothing I've found unreasonable. Though I don't expect 100% out of cheap Chinese stuff.
 
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