I just picked up four 5 gallon buckets of assorted ammo, mostly pistol calibers, absolutely FREE.

I got it from the local professional reloading shop, where I worked for a while.  The shop does a lot of business and hast a great reputation.    

Half the ammo is rejects from their presses.  Most of it's been rejected just because it isn't shiny enough,   while some have upside down bullets or primers or half crushed cases, and so on.   I'll pull down anything that's at all suspect and may choose to pull it ALL down, in which case I'll find out what the service life of an impact bullet puller is!  

The other half is ammo that has been found in range brass.  Mostly dropped rounds that got swept up, with the occasional dud.   Almost all of it's factory loaded.    I will shoot anything that I'm sure is factory ammo and looks good.

I sat down and spent half an hour sorting out about 20 pounds of ammo just now, and found several interesting duds:

Five dud rounds, all W-W stamped,  one in .380, three in 9mm, and one in .45 that don't have the flash holes punched in the primer well,  and no primer.     The .45 doesn't even have a primer well at all!     Three of these rounds have an almost black finish on them, like Wolf ammo, but the cases are apparently brass.   I haven't previously noticed any black finished W-W ammo, but I don't go out of my way to check on what color all ammo types are, either.

What's interesting to me is that I have yet to find any factory defective cases in this lot (though I've only scratched the surface) except for Winchester-Western cases.    

You'd think that a big, well-established company with a solid rep like Winchester's would have its case making down to a science by now, with glaring defects like these not getting out the door!

Has anybody else found similary defective ammo of this or any other brand?

CJ

We to stopped selling Crapchester ammo several years ago due to these reasons.  Some brass was even corroding in the box and was less than 6 months old.

I have seen multiple problems with Mag-Tech,  American Ammo,  & a few with PMC, but more Winchester than anything else.

American?  AMERC by the case head stamping?

It's junk, for sure.  I've heard more stories about poor quality with that brand than any other.

Sellier &  Bellot  has had some problems, too.

But at least I've never heard of someone's gun getting KB'ed by Winchester ammo.

CJ

I know of one, but would not say it was entirly the fault of the ammo.

In every case, we had the customer open the box to look at the ammo, and it was obvious.  They bought something else.  

The ammo that was brought back from repeat customers was to so bad they noticed it before loading.

There were alot of primers in backwards as well. Got this a lot with PMC also.

It would not surprise me that Winchester does not blow up guns.  It is so underloaded it is pathetic.  Most American ammo isanymore though.