Our Department has used Winchester Q3131A as issue ammo for our rifles for several years.
We have been very happy with the reliability, accuracy and lethality.
We recently got some Winchester Q3131 (No "A" at the end)
Apparently the Instructors at the range have not been pleased at all with the accuracy of this ammo.
They are not issueing it for duty use but we have been shooting it from less than 100 yards.
They continue to issue Q3131A and at 100 yards for qualifications we use it.

My question is, Has anyone else experienced accuracy problems with the Q3131?
What is the difference between the two?
I kept 35 of 35 in the diminished man size target with what our instructor was calling "Shit" ammo, but apparently others were not doing so well.  He referred to it about 10 times as shit ammo and made sure we diod not take any to "mix up" with our duty ammo.  Is there really any or that much difference?
Mine shot fine but the Q3131A has always shot fine also.

I believe Q3131 is the .223, Q3131A is the 5.56 made by IMI.  Someone will come along and double check me I'm sure.

The box on the Q3131 did say 5.56 mm
The box on my Q3131A says .223 Rem

Are they similar in quality control?

do your rifles have .223 chambers or 5.56 chambers?

You should post this in the "AMMO" forum.

At best it's 2 MOA ammo in my guns (both Q3131 and Q3131A). Have you measured your groups with each?

Most mil sur ammo is around 2 MOA or a bit more. If your department wants good ammo tell them to spring for Black Hills or reload. Otherwise, tell them to quit blaming blaming shitty shooters on the "bad ammo".

The Q3131 I have here at home says on the boxes in big black bold letters: 5.56x45

Quoted: Most mil sur ammo is around 2 MOA or a bit more. If your department wants good ammo tell them to spring for Black Hills or reload. Otherwise, tell them to quit blaming blaming shitty shooters on the "bad ammo".

This I believe is the answer.  Not everyone is that great a shot with a rifle.  Some cops are not really gun people.  As we get more people carrying rifles some of them just are not up to snuff.

To answer a post a couple back the rifles are mostly commercial .223's although we did get 100 M16's a year and a half ago. (Brand new in the box and we converted them to semi auto. $20 bucks a piece!) I am guessing those would have the 5.56 chambers.

I am not a target shooter and have always shot fast and good enough to hit.  I think I would do a little better if I slowed down, but I train like I believe I would act in an actual shooting.  I keep all shots in at 100 yards which is as far as they want us to shoot.

Quoted: q3131 has never been known to be "good" ammo. my last time firing it had a case seperation and destroyed a keltec plr16 pistol. I had stopped shooting it years ago due to primers blowing out consistantly. i should have learned then. i have never had an issue with q3131a

I was wondering if that was the case.  Do you know what the difference is.
Different brass?
Powder?
Primers
Bullets?
Less Quality Control?

If there is a significant difference, what is it?

Old Q3131 might had some problems...not the new 2005+ ones

Q3131 and Q3131A are practically the same ammo.  Made to the same specification.

Q3131 is domestically produced by Winchester/Olin, and Q3131A was imported from IMI (Israel) under a previous Winchester contract.

BOTH are 5.56 pressure.  I have never seen Q3131 or A ammunition that didnt state "5.56" on the box.

BOTH use a M193 spec bullet.  BOTH have crimped primers.

Both should have very similar accuracy potential.... about 2MOA.

Some prefer the "A" Israeli ammo, because IMI has such an excellent reputation for quality.

The domestic Q3131 hd a bad year run in 1999, but I doubt that is what you are using now.  Sounds like the guy doesnt know what he is talking about.


Like any 5.56 ammo loaded to military pressures, you can and will pop primers, when fired in any chamber other than a NATO spec, as that is what this ammo was designed for.  This is due to the high pressure of a hot loaded round.

I stepped into this debate here in this thread: www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=3&f=16&t=268030 and stand by my comments there, as to "my" perceived differences between Q3131 & the Q3131A, which is what I prefer for plinkin.

Not going there again.

Mike

ps - fwiw, although I thought the Q3131 was abit underpowered when compared to the "A", actual group sizes of the little Q3131 I have shot has varied little from the Q3131A "IN MY RIFLES".

Bass Pro had Q3131A on sale for $2.33 a box a couple of years ago and I loaded up. Israeli made.  5.56mm.  55gr FMJ.  Out of my Savage 26" hvy bbl bench gun this stuff will stay under 5/8" at 80yds  [ dnr range ] and go into 3/8 pretty regularly. This is 5 shot groups off a bench rest and sand bags with a Leupold 24X BR scope.  

Bass Pro also had some UMC and I bought a couple of boxes.  First group moved to the right off the 3" Shoot-N-See paster and opened up to about 1.5".  I was flabbergasted.  Cleaned the bbl and tried again for 2 more groups with the same result. Put the Q3131A back in and the first shot was right on the '10' and the next 4 were clustered right around it.  

I would not throw stones at any ammo until you shoot some groups off a decent benchrest setup and through a good shooting rifle, with a light trigger and with a very high power scope. You want to test ammo, not shooting skill.

I could see where it would be smart for a dept to have something like a Savage 10FV 223 with the accutrigger set to 1.5lbs with a 24x scope just for ammo verification.  Every time you get in a new lot of ammo shoot a few groups.  You would know instantly if you had a problem.

rj

The below is purely my experience:

My 16" Carbine consistently shoots 1 to 1.5 MOA with Q3131 bought from Academy.  
I have NEVER had any type of failure with it.  I have shot somewhere around 1500 rounds of it.

That being said, I will continue to buy it, since it is relatively cheap and readily available to me.

Brian

Quoted: Most mil sur ammo is around 2 MOA or a bit more. If your department wants good ammo tell them to spring for Black Hills or reload. Otherwise, tell them to quit blaming blaming shitty shooters on the "bad ammo".

This is correct.

Look at some informal tests:  www.theboxotruth.com/docs/edu8.htm

It's blastin' ammo.  Probably shot in blastin' guns, not target rifles.