This is sort of a reloading question since it deals with components, so this seemed the best place for it. Mods feel free to move where better...
I had some ammo go bad on me, and I wanted to demolish my remaining stock of it. So, I pulled the bullets, dumped and burned the powder, and decided to shoot the empty cases so that I could recycle the brass. I did not want to press the primers out since they were sealed.
Below are some of the things I noticed, and I have questions regarding if I had a normal experience shooting a primed-only case or if it was just a by-product of the bad ammo.
1. Some of the cases did not want to extract after shooting. I had to tap the stock on the bench, or worst case, give a very light tap with a cleaning rod. Nothing really stuck, but stuck enough that my extractor couldn't pull them out.
2. Some of the primers backed out a little from the case. There may have been a slight correlation between a backed-out primer not extracting, but plenty of them extracted with no problem.
3. Doing this has proven to be very dirty. I've been through about 30 patches and decided to take a break before I continue working on getting the barrel clean. Are primers normally very dirty but the residue gets burned with the powder, or just these primers?
As a background, this was Yugo (supposedly via Venezuela) 88 .30-06. The last I shot it was maybe last year at a Garand match, and had no problems. I shot it a few weeks ago, and had a case split on me and crack my stock. I decided to destroy my remaining ammo rather than risk any more problems, and discovered quite a few cases that had turned blue-green once I pulled the bullet and dumped the powder. In the course of shooting the cases today, I could tell a few of the primers were weaker compared to most of the others.
So, as a warning, if you have any Yugo 88 .30-06 with red sealant on the bullet and primer pocket, take a close look at it before firing.
I had some ammo go bad on me, and I wanted to demolish my remaining stock of it. So, I pulled the bullets, dumped and burned the powder, and decided to shoot the empty cases so that I could recycle the brass. I did not want to press the primers out since they were sealed.
Below are some of the things I noticed, and I have questions regarding if I had a normal experience shooting a primed-only case or if it was just a by-product of the bad ammo.
1. Some of the cases did not want to extract after shooting. I had to tap the stock on the bench, or worst case, give a very light tap with a cleaning rod. Nothing really stuck, but stuck enough that my extractor couldn't pull them out.
2. Some of the primers backed out a little from the case. There may have been a slight correlation between a backed-out primer not extracting, but plenty of them extracted with no problem.
3. Doing this has proven to be very dirty. I've been through about 30 patches and decided to take a break before I continue working on getting the barrel clean. Are primers normally very dirty but the residue gets burned with the powder, or just these primers?
As a background, this was Yugo (supposedly via Venezuela) 88 .30-06. The last I shot it was maybe last year at a Garand match, and had no problems. I shot it a few weeks ago, and had a case split on me and crack my stock. I decided to destroy my remaining ammo rather than risk any more problems, and discovered quite a few cases that had turned blue-green once I pulled the bullet and dumped the powder. In the course of shooting the cases today, I could tell a few of the primers were weaker compared to most of the others.
So, as a warning, if you have any Yugo 88 .30-06 with red sealant on the bullet and primer pocket, take a close look at it before firing.