How old is too old for reloaded ammo.

[Rsadams]

Not rifle but I just shot some I would say closer to 75 year old pistol bullets and they were perfect.... Now they had been stored indoors and belonged to my grandfather , they were steel bullets ( 32acp ) because copper was still scarce after WW2 is my guess... The recoil was all the same on the 30 rounds I fired...

I inherited about 900 .223 rounds my dad picked up at a gun show definitely reloads... They where probably picked up in 1990ish... I didn't want to fire them because I realized they were reloads so I decided to pull the bullets and keep them for plinking.... Some of them pulled EXTREMELY easy but some were EXTREMELY stuck.... I was using the Hornady puller that installs in a press to pull and with some of them I had the strike the handle to get them to pull so I would say they were welded but some basically pulled with finger tip pressure....

Since then when I load bullets that will be around awhile I use imperial neck lube ( graphite ) even with brass that has carbon in the necks which I am sure those .223 did when loaded I don't think people where wet tumbling back then... I wish I would have saved the primers though at the time there was no need to... Just fyi the bullets suck and group 2 inches at best , not sure if they were just crap bullets or it's because I pulled them I save them for AR plinking...

 

[Homerange]

The cold weld caused the necks to split from just sitting? I figured the brass hardened with age and split do to neck tension. It was split without even shooting it.

Back in a recent neck tension thread, discussion focussed on the projectile release mechanism where common consensus was the neck was swelled by pressure and in this case a strong (aged) bullet weld could cause the neck to crack.
I have seen this in very old WWII ammo and recently in some reloaded Fed 223 brass, just a few years old from a silent trigger.
This 223 brass cracks nearly every neck on firing, some longitudinal cracks but most radial close to the case mouth where it seems the case weld is strongest.

It's obvious to me the chemical process of case welds could grow the neck and the neck brass crack from fatigue as you have seen.

 

[IMR4064]

some of my best ammo was loaded in 87.

 

[TaperPin]

There are/were some old surplus imported lots of ammo that were either too hot to begin with, or got hotter with age. Guys that shoot old odd calibers would know the details better than me, but one particular ammo was well know for being on the high side and watching how bad the ejector marks were I wouldn’t fire it in anything of mine. Lol

 

[BigBolt]

I have shot some 30-06 WWII ammo in 1978 it went bang like it was new.

 

[Bill Clifton]

Back in a recent neck tension thread, discussion focussed on the projectile release mechanism where common consensus was the neck was swelled by pressure and in this case a strong (aged) bullet weld could cause the neck to crack.
I have seen this in very old WWII ammo and recently in some reloaded Fed 223 brass, just a few years old from a silent trigger.
This 223 brass cracks nearly every neck on firing, some longitudinal cracks but most radial close to the case mouth where it seems the case weld is strongest.

It's obvious to me the chemical process of case welds could grow the neck and the neck brass crack from fatigue as you have seen.

The ammo that I am talking about was not even fired, the necks were cracked just sitting in the box. I've always heard discussion both ways on some brass age hardening and I blame it more on that then cold welding to the bullet. If it was cracking upon being fired I might buy the cold welding thing more.

 

[WAMBO]

I've shot surplus ammo for the 60's without any issues.

 

[Lee Whitsel]

Fire a couple and you will know. Why would you think old ammo gave higher pressure? I was in the Army 1963-1966. When we went to the range it was standard procedure to give us the oldest ammo first. We shot ammo well over ten years old. The ammo cans are dated.

I started reloading in 71 and very well remember reading an article somewhere about ammo unearthed that was there in rain and cold since WW2 and it was cleaned up and it fired in the proper guns. I was impressed when i read that.