Anyone know if this is decent ammo?

Two of my ARs love it and one hates it.  I know two out of three isn't bad but not with ammo.  This is just my experience with it.  It isn't much cheaper than XM193 and I go three for three with that + its much hotter.  

Around here it seems to be the only ammo other than wolf that is on the shelf. I went shopping today and could not find anything. I finally found one place and it had wolf,silver bar and S&B. I figure at least the casings are brass. My rifle despises wolf so I wont even think about using steel casings anymore. I am just wondering if any one has had anything bad happen with this ammo?

I am a big S&B .223 fan.

S&B .223 has worked fine for me.

Got got a new DPMS 20" HBAR Upper and installed it on my lower.  I'm having problems with FTF (fail to feed) with the S&B.  I had one round of M193 and it locked the carrier back as it should. Is the S&B that much lighter of a load that cycling would be a problem? I know it a dumb questions sense all I read in this section is different ammo works differently in each AR. Should I see a improvement after breakin? Receiver is tight and needs about 200-300 rounds through it for ample break in. Any feed back welcome!

Quoted: Got got a new DPMS 20" HBAR Upper and installed it on my lower.  I'm having problems with FTF (fail to feed) with the S&B.  I had one round of M193 and it locked the carrier back as it should. Is the S&B that much lighter of a load that cycling would be a problem? I know it a dumb questions sense all I read in this section is different ammo works differently in each AR. Should I see a improvement after breakin? Receiver is tight and needs about 200-300 rounds through it for ample break in. Any feed back welcome!

What an amazing coincidence!!  

I just got a DPMS 20" HBAR yesterday!! The gun was known to me--it had FTFeed problems with lighter ammo (UMC) and sure enough, it  worked fine with hotter ammo (Federal IIRC). It is practically new.

I just bought a box of Black Hills today anticipating my S&B may be too light for it. (S&B is tried and true in my Oly)

Planning to shoot it tomorrow and wanted to have at least one hot brand for my initial shoot. I guess I called that one right.



From what I have gathered (and seen first hand once), DPMS is known for tight chambers that cause more drag on the bolt and tend to cause FTFeed problems with light loads, and no problems with normal/heavy load.  I am told that other brands do this sometimes, and that they should break in after a while.

If I had read your reply yesterday, I would have picked up more BlackHills today!!

I think we will both be fine--don't start tearing apart your gun yet.

Update:

I fired 50 BlackHills and 120 S&B today with no jams and no fail to feeds, but, with the S&B, I had several bolt-fail-to-hold-open on last shot.  Didn't happen with the Black Hills.

I'm not sure what to make of it.  I'm guessing the S&B may be on the light side but not so light to cause FTFeed.

Perhaps catusbills rifle is a bit tighter than mine, or the BlackHills loosened mine up some.

Developing...

I also  had several bolt-fail-to-hold-open on last shot with S&B.  It  jammed about every 5th round on one AR and was fine with my other two.  I will stay away from it.

S&B is decent ammo, I have used it a few times in the past when it could be found at a good price

I have had good luck with it.  I tired a couple of hundred rounds just for testing purposes.  Not much of a change in the group or zero at 100 yards from XM193 but at the price difference I'll stick with the XM193.

Runs great for me.

To be clear on this, I have about 4,000 rounds through my Oly and I don't think it has ever jammed or failed to hold open.  This weekends problem was with a new known-tight rifle.

The verdict seems to be:

--YES.  it is a light load.

--If you have a tight rifle, which is presumably the tradeoff for more accuracy, then skip S&B and use something hotter.

--If it runs in your rifle, no need to change

Don't forget to check out the ammo review in the AR15 > Ammunition forum

So with XM193 and Q3131A getting harder to find would anyone recommend S&B Ammo for SHTF

Quoted: So with XM193 and Q3131A getting harder to find would anyone recommend S&B Ammo for SHTF

I wouldn't recommend any FMJ for SHTF, personally. YMMV.