I've bought about 1K of Hirtenberger 7.62.  The rounds were loose, but not corroded or in any way damaged.  I've paid a fraction over $0.41 with shipping a round.  Considering the scarcity of good surplus today, is this a bad deal?  The stuff shoots flawlessly through my PTR91, and shoots MOA at 100 yards through my DPMS 24".  Given the opportunity, would you buy Santa Barbara, Radway or Portugese first?

The Hirt is good stuff but I've always favored the Port. Besides it functioning flawlessly in my M1A, HK91, and 3 FALs (plus my M60), there is just "something" about those green combat packs that tears at `ya. Aside from that, I've had no problems with the Santa Barbara either. I can't say anything pro or con about the Rad as I've never purchased or fired any.

Sadly, 41 cents/rnd is something we're all going to have to get used to --- and probably higher unfortunately. A good friend of mine's Significant Other is the sales manager for a large wholesale business and she says there is NO .308 out there coming in to the U.S. for the foreseeable future. I'm shelving all my 308 rifles and dusting off my Garand to shoot up a bunch of the cheaper 30cal that's on the market now.  Who would have thought? Looks like a long (and expensive) dry spell for us 7.62x51 shooters

Hirt is very good ammo, it has a very boat tailed bullet and a deep cannalure. It's as good as Port is and I'd buy either without reservation.

Some of it however will have small holes in the BPs, seems it has the same problem as some of the Guat 5.56 where termites ate thru the plastic to get to the paper boxes. Ammo will be fine. That might be the reason it was taken out of the BPs.

The Hirt that I bought isn't sparkling bright, but it's probably late 70s stuff.  I checked it it pretty carefully before storing it in ammo cans.  Not one reject in the crowd.  It's all clean and straight.  And the accuracy really impressed me.