Coolio milsurp ammo

Sea Monkey

Regular
Rating - 100%
155   0   0
Hi guys, I wanted to post some pics of some old and antique and coolio milsurp ammo, and ask for some intel on these. I had begun posting some on another thread, but didn't want to wind up hijacking it. Thanks to everyone for their imput so far!!

IMG_0080_zps9674369b.jpg


below is the point-ish end (read: Bubba meets grinder...) of the five in the pic above
IMG_0083_zps799fe0bd.jpg


and this is the 'two'...
IMG_0084_zps6e9307c2.jpg


here's a few others:
IMG_0085_zps01a8ddda.jpg


and the pointy ends...
IMG_0088_zps11b936b7.jpg

IMG_0092_zps2b60abb6.jpg


and a few special ones...
IMG_0096_zps62cec22f.jpg

IMG_0097_zps19ab0695.jpg


Thanks for any assistance in identifying these!
 
most of them look like the old 215gr round nose full jacket bullet quite rare sad to see what someone has done idk if the ones hollow pointed are done by someone or are the old hollow nose bullets
 
the DI Z ones are normall ww2 era mk7 ball, the 1920s ones are Mk 6 ball, the others are older, im sure smellie will be by to explain them
 
Thanks Scott585, here's a couple more pics that I forgot to post here. One of them I suspect is commercial (because the head stamp has .303 British), but the similarity in the bullets, and the similar brass of the others makes me think that at least 5 of them might be milsurp training (low velocity) rounds...?? Or maybe they are all just home-rolled...???

IMG_0098_zps1c01e4c2.jpg


and in the same arrangement...
IMG_0099_zps0594a2ca.jpg


Cheers!
 
Thanks Scott585, here's a couple more pics that I forgot to post here. One of them I suspect is commercial (because the head stamp has .303 British), but the similarity in the bullets, and the similar brass of the others makes me think that at least 5 of them might be milsurp training (low velocity) rounds...?? Or maybe they are all just home-rolled...???

IMG_0098_zps1c01e4c2.jpg


and in the same arrangement...
IMG_0099_zps0594a2ca.jpg


Cheers!

most of those look like short range training rounds
 
Be careful with the ones with the tips ground off. They may squirt the lead core out the barrel and leave the jacket inside. May be alright for the first shot but number two gets exciting.
 
Thing to do is learn your types and your headstamps

D/!\C is the Dominion Arsenal, the Government plant. You have several DC Mark II and Mark VI rounds there, some dated by month as they were for a short time.

ONE of the ones with the points "ground off" looks very like a factory job. Turn it over and look at the base: it could be a Cordite Mark IV or (more likely) Mark V. These are the "Dum-Dum" series as made in Canada. Canada DID make the Dum-Dum Mark III also but specimens are exceedingly rare. I have the headstamp on a case which was converted to Blank. I also have English and Canadian Dum-Dum Mark V rounds.

R/!\L is the Royal Laboratory, located at the huge Woolwich Arsenal site in London. They made some of your Mark II rounds. Note on all of these the C on the base: Cordite.

DC 16 is Dominion Cartridge Company, 1916: Boxer-primed ammunition made on contract for the Government but using the commercial specs for the casings and powder, military specs for the slug.

Your single round with DCCO and .303 BRITISH likely is inter-war stuff. Dominion did make commercial Mark VII spec ammunition for some time. It came in a blue-and-yellow box and was marked as suitable for Lee-Metford, Lee-Enfield, Ross and Winchester rifles as well as for Lewis and Vickers machine-guns. A fairly large contract of this went to Newfoundland shortly before the Second War, being that Newfoundland did not have its own ammunition plant and so imported from the Canadians.... who were foreigners at that time.

You will note that much of the old stuff is dated. Some dates are VERY hard to find.

DI is Defence Industries, a Crown Corporation which operated 5 huge ammunition plants during the Second War. For their .303 plant, they borrowed the core staff from the Dominion Cartridge Company and filled the plant out with unskilled workers who had to learn on the job. This worked out MUCH better than it could have and they turned out what I believe to be the BEST .303 military ammunition ever made, more than 3 BILLION rounds of it. The rims (vital for headspacing) all were right at the specified Max or just 1 thou short of it, the brass was excellent quality and extremely uniform in all respects and the primers were non-corrosive and non-mercuric, whereas the Government plant stayed with that huge British primer which was corrosive and mercuric both. DI ammunition all displayed a Z on the case-head because they did not use Cordite, they used a specially-made powder based on Nobel Neonite. It was quite similar in burning characteristics to what we now call 4895 and also was a single-base powder. Near the end of the War, DI also turned out some ammo for the US: the ONLY NCNM military 30-'06 ammunition of World War Two. This is the NICEST darned brass you EVER reloaded! When DI made Specials, they were NOT stamped on the case-head, but instead the bullet tips were colour-coded as US/German practice.

The GP-B rounds are Gallery Practice, Ball. Several are correct but one has been 'handloaded' likely with a .32-20 bullet. These were regarded as safe on indoor rifle ranges, developing only about the velocity of a .22, although the slug was 115 or 120 grains as opposed to the 40 grains of a .22"LR. Britain experimented with gallery rounds and developed two different ones, but Canada was the only country to standardise one for Service use. There also was a Canadian variant with a lighter RN bullet, but they are scarce.

I note that some f your Mark VI ammunition is dated 1912. AFAIK, this was the final date for manufacture of the Mark VI, the Imperial standard having changed-over to the Mark VII on its adoption in 1910. Canada was using the Ross Mark II at that time, and all of the early Ross sights were designed for the Mark VI round, so that is what the Militia used until the Mark III rifle came into use. Mark VII ammunition also was made in Canada in 1912, so there is one to find.

Mark VI ammunition used the 215-grain RN bullet at 2060 ft/sec nominal MV. MV for the Mark II with the same bullet was 1960 ft/sec. Specs for the Mark VII were a composite 174-grain pointed flatbased bullet at a nominal MV of 2440 ft/sec.

You have a good start on a collection.

Enjoy!
 
Be careful with the ones with the tips ground off. They may squirt the lead core out the barrel and leave the jacket inside. May be alright for the first shot but number two gets exciting.

Thanks 37patt, I was also advised by Tiriaq with the same advice (in another thread that I inadvertently started to hijack); yup, these ground down rounds will stay in the collection for now, maybe let em go with the brass pile when I accumulate enough to sell - definitely won't take em to the range. That kind of exciting, I can (heh - and probably will!) live without. ;)
 
Hi smellie, thank you for the advice and wealth of info...so, next step I s'pose is to pick up a reference manual on this ammo - and probably one on the No.1 Mk. III (and/or other L.E.s). I started out with my Ishapore smle (FTR) because it looked really good - style, history (afaik, it was a Commonwealth military rifle & that was it) but now the history has me intrigued lol! In the meantime, staying tuned to the forums and learn from the pros. :)
 
Be careful with the ones with the tips ground off. They may squirt the lead core out the barrel and leave the jacket inside. May be alright for the first shot but number two gets exciting.

Fire one rd, look down bore. Fire second rd, look down bore. Repeat as neccessary
 
Fire one rd, look down bore. Fire second rd, look down bore. Repeat as neccessary

Well that would work. And that leads to another question...what do you guys use to clear obstructions? When I fired one of those suspected Krag rounds (still unsure of that, but anyway...) I suspected something was up because it went "pop" not "bang" so I checked for daylight, and stuffed my cleaning rod down the barrel to poke that bullet out.
 
Smellie - you say that Canada made the Ball Mark III (Dum Dum) round. May I ask what evidence you have for this please, as according to all records on this side of the pond the only Ball Mark III ever made was one lot of 119,000 rounds at Woolwich in October 1897.

I would be very grateful of any information you may have.

Regards
Tony
 
DC = Dominion Cartridge. DA = Dominion Arsenal.

There was a batch of MK. VI ammunition sold off surplus which was commercially converted to softpoint ca. 1930. Tips were clipped to expose the core, then the end was swaged to form a RNSP. Dominion started quite a ruckus about the stuff being unsafe, and marketing was discontinued.
 
I have the cartridge.

As stated previously, it is a Mark III CASING, headstamp cancelled with a turned ring, loaded as a Blank round.

Hedstamp is D/!\A C III.

It's in one of these boxes of junk, around here somewhere. I'll try to dig it out.

Interesting point is that it was made into a Blank. In those days, anything they had that was surplus to requirements was made into Blanks. Entirely possible that they set up to make a batch, the project was cancelled because of the Mark IV development and adoption and so the whole batch was reprocessed and never loaded as Ball rounds.

The III on the headstamp is readily visible despite the cancelling.

Only one like it I ever saw. Tried to find another to send to Peter Labbett because I knew he didn't have one, but couldn't find one.

Hope this helps.
 
Thanks, Look forward to seeing it.

There are a one or two blanks in collections here made from reject Ball Mark III cases but they are by RL.

Interestingly, there are a couple of fired Ball Mark III cases set in a Boer War memorial in South Africa.

Regards
TonyE
 
Well that would work. And that leads to another question...what do you guys use to clear obstructions? When I fired one of those suspected Krag rounds (still unsure of that, but anyway...) I suspected something was up because it went "pop" not "bang" so I checked for daylight, and stuffed my cleaning rod down the barrel to poke that bullet out.

WD-40/oil etc. Pour some down the barrel and let it sit for a couple minute's then use a GI STEEL cleaning rod to tap it out.
 
Back
Top Bottom