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Posted: 10/18/2010 6:08:55 AM EDT
| I am curious what the hive thinks of this statement. It never ceases to amaze me that some shooters swear they will never shoot someone else's reloads, YET they are perfectly willing to shoot ammo that was made in some third world country decades ago and declared surplus for god only knows what reason. i.e defective components, poor storage conditions, high pressures. What do you think? |
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I've never heard anyone espouse the particular variation you've described (typically the issue is "don't shoot reloads you bought from some guy at a gunshow"). The biggest concern being the unknown provenance of gun-show reloads and the indeterminate skill of the reloader who made them.
Anyone with a couple of hundred bucks in the pocket and 2 brain cells can make an attempt at reloading but you may not be happy with the results. For the record, I shoot both reloads (of people I know that take care with what they're doing) and as much surplus as can I get my hands on. So even though I think your premise is a little off I'll provide my perspective on it. By definition if it is declared "surplus" that means it passed any required QC checks to initially enter the inventory. Ignoring everything else, that screen alone is more assurance than you'll get from 'unknown gunshow guy' reloads. Also keep in mind that even "Third world countries" don't like their national assets like ammunition plants blowing up, nor do they like the ammunition produced by these plants to explode unexpectedly/not explode when needed... therefore they're likely to at least require some minimum production standards and QC within the manufacturing process and prior to the military of that country accepting any given lot of ammo. Also keep in mind that the surplus ammo was almost certainly assembled with brand new components and materials of somewhat uniform quality (vs range pickup brass, unknown powder lots/types, mixed bullets, etc etc) Is it perfect? Not usually (although that SA from a few years ago was damned close!) Is it better than some mixed headstamp .223 in a ziplock bag? Maybe/maybe not (only testing can truly determine that) but given the choice I'll definitely take my chances with the surplus. That's my take anyway. |
| I have seen a lot of reloads that look like someone made them with range brass while watching tv and turning the seating depth knob during commercials. 3rd world ammo can be corrosive, hot, dirty and out of NATO spec. But at least it is usually consistent and new. |
| If the simple question is, Reloads vs Surplus, I'll take reloads 7 days a week! Of course I'm referring to my own handloads which I prefer over any factory loaded ammo. I'm aware there are some high end factory target ammo that can compete with my own loads but not in the $$$ range. |
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