Where does surplus ammo come from?

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Billpaxton

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I'm curious to know where surplus ammo comes from (if anyone knows). For instance, the 7.62x39mm Czech ammo obviously comes from Czech republic, but what I'm wondering is: what path does it follow from there to here? Did the military sell it to a private suplier? Does this private entity just sit on 1000s of boxes of it? How much of this stuff is there?

Just curious about how the gun trade works
 
generally made in a factory, bought by government for thewir military, military doesnt need all of it so government sells of the excess to a dealer, who sells it to smaller dealers.

Or the factory itself produces more than needed and gets rid of it.
 
There is a lot of ammo on the market that is produced and then fails the acceptance tests. The company has to do something. Police forces are obliged to test ammunition by lot and their acceptance standards are quite high.

For a while the Auditor General in Canada complained that the CF had too much ammunition in storage. Why buy so much when the factories were sold off with strings attached? In peacetime it makes some sense, but in wartime the boys can burn through containers' full weekly. Not to mention it takes time and coordination to stage the production runs through the factories according to staff and circumstance.
 
Some of it used to come from ammo bunkers. There are still some out there that aren't emptied but are rare as pope s**t. Some exist but haven't been found/or nobody has checked what was in there. Alot of it was emptied out to fuel civil wars in third world countries. Part of the reason why there are so many AK-47s used in those types of conflicts. Worldwide production on 'em is estimated at 90,000,000+ IIRC. lol
After the cold war, bunkers full of AK-47s were sold for cash, favors, small islands lol etc. by crooked military and political figures.

Factory makes new stuff. Military stock is rotated and old stuff is sold. This is pretty much how it goes now tho. Alot of the 7.62x39 stuff here now is from the 1970s ... not exactly hot out of the plant.
 
Recall that Military ammo needs to be able to perform 20 years after it's manufacture date. Not just shoot but have the same basic performance (After external corrosion is cleaned).

So you have ammunition that is 15+ years old from some unknown revolution/war/uprising which stockpiled millions of rounds and never used them. Surplus.
 
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