How can you tell if SKS ammo is corrosive?

dand883 said:
The long and short of it is, if it is military surplus from a former soviet country, russia, poland, czech, etc, it is corrosive.

If it is military surplus Chinese from before around 1995, it is corrosive (middle number on crate, ex 31-71-13 is made in 1971). The 1971-1973 chinese in green crates has been sold and labeled at "non corrosive" but i have found that not to be entirely true. I had one spam can that the first 300ish rounds were non corrosive, didn't clean my sks, never had any problems, the last 100-150 rounds rusted everything it touched. So even if you do the nail test on this early 70's ammo, it's not consistent. You would literally have to test every round, but then you would get to shoot any of it. My guess is they were experimenting with non corrosive primers around this time, but it wasn't consistently applied across the board.

If it is chinese surplus made after or around 1995 is may or may not be corrosive and you will need to test to make sure.

If is comes in 20 round boxes with big bold letters saying "NON CORROSIVE" then it is likely non corrosive.
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I was informed that's true for 71.
But the 72 I have used seems different, and packaged differently too.
 
I got some copper wash chinese from Canam a few years back that came in crates marked Saudi Arabia. My understanding is that it was a military order that never shipped for one reason or another.

It was some of the best, most consistent and non corrosive ammo I have ever come across. I still have a bit left that I am saving.
 
If it costs less than $0.12 a round then it's corrosive.
If it's head stamped with only seemingly random numbers around the primer, it's corrosive.
If it's head stamped with writing that looks weird and you can't read it, it's corrosive.
If it comes packed in cans which are packed in wood crates with funny writing all over them, it's corrosive.
If it meets any/possibly all the above and a dealer is selling it as NON corrosive at considerably more than $0.12 cents a round, it's corrosive......
 
klaus enuff said:
I got some copper wash chinese from Canam a few years back that came in crates marked Saudi Arabia. My understanding is that it was a military order that never shipped for one reason or another.

It was some of the best, most consistent and non corrosive ammo I have ever come across. I still have a bit left that I am saving.
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Ammo lineage can be interesting to track, and their confluent tends to get over simplified/generalized just like most things.
 
Thanks for the info, I was kinda hoping to be able to tell before I bought it, and given it doesn't say non-corrosive it probably isn't.
 
Put it in the gun and fire them all - then clean your gun thoroughly and don't worry about it, oh yah always buy corrosive it's cheaper and that makes it funner to shoot thousands of them
 
klaus enuff said:
I got some copper wash chinese from Canam a few years back that came in crates marked Saudi Arabia. My understanding is that it was a military order that never shipped for one reason or another.

It was some of the best, most consistent and non corrosive ammo I have ever come across. I still have a bit left that I am saving.
Click to expand...
I still have 2 crates of this stuff. Your right it is the best stuff I have come accross.
 
pc9 said:
I still have 2 crates of this stuff. Your right it is the best stuff I have come accross.
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Just checked I have some of this stuff too, made for Saudi's "Ministry of Interior" in "Riyadh".
An example of non-corrosive in crate and spam can.
 
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