Brass vs. Steel Cased Ammo – An Epic Torture Test

DMcFaul

DMcFaul

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Brass vs. Steel Cased Ammo – An Epic Torture Test

This would be a good sticky here;

This is likely going to go down as the be-all, end-all discussion on Brass vs Steel Cased ammunition. The empirical data, high res images and comprehensive recording on the test is by far the most thorough I have ever seen. The staff at LuckyGunner Labs really did a hell of a job on this.

http://www.luckygunner.com/labs/brass-vs-steel-cased-ammo/

Enjoy.

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Great review, thanks for posting. I just recently started shooting MFS through my rifle, it's been reliable and decently accurate. It's a zinc plated steel case 55g FMJ. I just wonder if the projectile is copper coated or bimetal (copper and steel). I checked the case and it doesn't say...
 
jdman said:
try a magnet on it?
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Duh....I should have thought of that, what a loser I am. I'm home sick with the flu and not firing on all cylinders.

Anyway, I just checked, magnet stuck right to it. MFS definitely has a bimetal jacket. Once I run through what I have I won't be buying any more of it for my AR...
 
jdman said:
why not? Too hard on the BBL?
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Well, I have a 10.5 AR so barrel life is shorter than a regular AR anyway.

And, according to the test above:

The steel cases themselves don’t have any effect on the condition of the bore. The difference lies with the projectile – the soft copper jacket of the Federal ammunition simply doesn’t cause the same amount of wear as the bimetal (copper and steel) jacket of the Russian ammunition.
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As indicated by accuracy testing, the steel cased/bimetal jacketed ammunition caused accelerated wear to the inside of their respective bores. While the barrel of the Federal carbine had plenty of life left, even after 10,000 rounds at extremely high rates of fire, the Wolf and Brown Bear barrels were subjected to the same rates of fire and were completely “shot out” by 6,000 rounds.

At the end of the test, the chrome lining of the Wolf and Brown Bear barrels was almost gone from the throat forward, and the barrels had effectively become smoothbores, with the rifling near the muzzles acting only as a mild suggestion on the projectiles. A throat erosion gauge could be dropped into the bore from the muzzle end with absolutely no resistance.
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Now, these guns were abused to the point that they were too hot to hold and that rounds would cook off in the chamber, but given what I read above I'd think it prudent to stick with the AE that I usually shoot out of my rifle. Though, shooting MFS may give me another excuse to buy a new barrel....
 
Indeed thanks for posting this. I have just got a 223 semi auto and have been trying different brands of ammo in the kel tec. Althou i`m more concerned about bullet performance on coyotes, will be fun also in the gopher patch.
 
Interesting read...

They way they break down economics, they are saying that economically speaking it makes sense to buy cheap steel cased stuff and use the saved money to buy replacement barrels and extractors. When supply is not a problem, that makes a certain amount of sense I suppose, but given our supply issues up here, I am not sure it makes sense for us.

When I was doing my recent build, I bought an extra 16" mid-length Spike's barrel, because they were hard to get and I wanted to make sure I had a spare for a rainy day. That was before all the current shortages when things were "normal." It took months of waiting before I found them for sale. Now there is no telling when you might see them for sale up here again. If you are a medium to heavy user in Canada, I can't see how it would be a good idea to be wearing out barrels every 5k rounds, especially keeping in mind that we typically can't get ammo as cheaply here either.

Granted... I would not typically abuse the rifle to the point that they did, so you might get more than 5k rounds out of it under "normal" use. It would be interesting if they did a series of tests that followed a more normal usage pattern, rather than doing mag dumps until the rifle got too hot to hold. Not that doing that wouldn't be fun, but I can't afford that much ammo :p
 
very interesting thanks for sharing, I pay the same for MFS as I do federal .223 localy, I know what i'll be sticking with.
now i'm not to sure i'll be buying MFS pistol ammo anymore either. still have 250 rounds of that to burn though.
 
fred0000 said:
very interesting thanks for sharing, I pay the same for MFS as I do federal .223 localy, I know what i'll be sticking with.
now i'm not to sure i'll be buying MFS pistol ammo anymore either. still have 250 rounds of that to burn though.
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We definetly pay WAY too much for steel cased ammo here.
 
After looking into this issue a little further I found some interesting information regarding bimetal ammo:

ht tp://www.uspsa.org/front-sight-magazine-article.php?Should-I-Buy-BiMetal-Ammo-8

And that got me thinking:

I shoot MFS ammo exclusively from my Glock. The Glock uses polygonal rifling, which is supposed to provide many advantages (taken from wiki)
1) Not compromising the barrel's thickness in the area of each groove as with traditional rifling.
2) Providing a better gas seal around the projectile as polygonal bores tend to have a slightly smaller bore area, which translates into more efficient use of the combustion gases trapped behind the bullet,[5] slightly greater (consistency in) muzzle velocities and slightly increased accuracy.
3)Less bullet deformation, resulting in reduced drag on the bullet when traveling through the barrel which helps to increase muzzle velocity.
4)Reduced buildup of copper or lead within the barrel which results in easier maintenance characteristics.
5)Prolonged barrel life.
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Also, velocities are a lot lower with pistol ammunition...not sure what to think here.

One final thought: I wonder if Polygonal AR barrels like those from Noveske and NEA would have worn more slowly with the bimetal ammo in this test?
 
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I wonder if that is why they say the T97 only lasts 6000 rounds.... Perhaps the chinese use bi-metal?

I will keep this in mind when buying .223 ammo for mine if and when it arrives ( and any other rifle down the road).
 
^^That's an interesting thought. I wonder if the test ammo they used had bimetal projectiles?

Also, as an aside I wonder if Norc brass case ammo uses a bi-metal projectile?
 
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