FMJ Safe for barrel?

Ghunter

Ghunter

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I can get a bunch of Military Surplus 308 rounds in FMJ, but are they good to fire in a modern hunting rifle? Will they ruin accuracy? Also I was thinking of using the casings for reloading but they are the same copper colour as the bullets and stamped 61 on top and 92 on bottom. Are they good enough to reload? Any info would be great.
Ghunter
 
Almost all military surplus 7.62x51 (.308) will be Berdan primed making it unsuitable for reloading. I don't think shooting 7.62x51 out of a modern .308 rifle is a good idea either.

If the bullets are cheap enough grab them and sell them to somebody with a military rifle that is designed to fire 7.62x51 and .308. Surplus ammo is hard to come by these days.
 
Well - They wont hurt your barrel any more than commercial hunting rounds. Whether they are accurate is another story. Some surplus is boxer primed, and can be reloaded - eg Hirtenberger.
 
Go ahead and shoot them out of your .308. The only major differences between commercial .308 and military 7.62 NATO are that NATO chamber dimensions allow for a much larger maximum headspace and military cases are heavier. External cartridge dimensions are identical.

Check for Berdan primers (two off-centre flash holes) before attempting to reload the cases. It isn't worth the effort to source Berdan primers and deprime the cases when Boxer primed cases are readily available. Keep your maximum loads 1-2 grains below listed maximums when using military brass.
 
cosmic said:
Well - They wont hurt your barrel any more than commercial hunting rounds.
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Actually they will... Most bullets in surplus ammo have a copper-plated steel jacket. Commercial hunting rounds have a full copper, or copper alloy jacket.
Shooting steel-jacketed bullets will shorten the life expectancy of a barrel, but not significantly.
Some surplus ammo could also be loaded hotter, which will increase the barrel wear further.

You can find newly manufactured .308 for 80-90 cents a round if you know where to look. Shoot it, then sell the brass for 20 cents each, bringing the cost down to 60 cents a round. This is about as cheap as you can expect to pay for .308 surplus. OR you can reload the cases yourself to bring the cost down even further.
There is no point in messing with surplus ammo unless you can get it CHEAP (like the current x39). 60 cent a round for surplus .308 is NOT cheap.
 
Ghunter said:
These casings are not Berdan primed type but why the copper looking cases?
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Most likely copper washed steel cases. Probably Norinco, corrosive. Good shooting ammo.
Norinco6192.jpg


Are you sure they're not Berdan primed? Most are.. And even if they arent, you cant reload steel cases anyway.
 
If surplus ammo, such as you describe, is harmful to modern sporting rifles, then... well... there would huge piles of ruined sporting rifles laying around.H:S:

Unless it has been dipped in some menacing acid and injected with radioactive juice, go ahead and fire it off!!:sniper:
 
You nailed it right on Zz denis, I have the same ammo as in your pics. And after pulling one apart they are Berdan primed. So it looks like it's safe to go, but not the reloading part due to the steel casings, thanks guys.
 
kjohn said:
If surplus ammo, such as you describe, is harmful to modern sporting rifles, then... well... there would huge piles of ruined sporting rifles laying around.H:S:

Unless it has been dipped in some menacing acid and injected with radioactive juice, go ahead and fire it off!!:sniper:
Click to expand...

Remember good protective eyewear!:wave::popCorn:
 
Stevo said:
Copper washed cases and projectiles is not uncommon with East-bloc steel cased, steel projectile ammo.
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Dam!! Does that mean I have ruined my minty mosin nagant sniper by shooting all that surplus ammo over the last 25 years?No wonder I can only hit a 6 inch gong at 700 metres.Snaperskaya anyone?
 
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