Steel Case Ammo Yes or No?

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lsudave said:
Steel case is cost-effective, so if your gun shoots it, go ahead and use it. They mention the barrels on the steel were shot out- after 10k rds in 2 days. Started keyholing around 5-6k. My takeaway from that:
  • I would have to assume one of the factors for the increased wear is shooting while the gun is smoking hot. A couple mags down the pipe will not affect the steel as much as a continuous flow (we're talking 5k a day, for 2 consecutive days). They mentioned the guns got so hot that a couple of the Eotech optics had heat-related issues, they also said at times they would fire off 10 mags (300 rds) in a row rapidly. It was mentioned that they had both dust-storms and rain, and kept shooting through these events.
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I can't help but think this was a huge contributing factor in shortening barrel life. Most of us are not going to run one that hot.
 
lysanderxiii said:
Few minor corrections, Gunny:

1) The chrome plated bore was not "done away with", the AR 15, as made by Armalite, never had one. The first time the Army ever saw an AR-15 in 1958, they expressed a desire to have the bore and chamber chromium plated, as they felt the small bore would be especially vulnerable to erosion. The ability to get a uniform thickness chromium plating in a small diameter deep hole was not something easily done with the plating techniques and technologies of the time. They were having problems doing .30 bores to the quality expected. This is why barrel passed through three eras, the early un-plated bore and chamber, the later plated chamber and unplated bore, and last the fully plated bore and chamber.

2) The switch to ball propellant was not a cost saving measure. It was a performance and producibility measure. The original propellant, IMR 4475, did not average a high enough energy density across lots, and was notorious for producing fluctuations in chamber pressure. The Army had tried using it in 7.62mm cartridges in the late 1950 but found the pressures and velocities were hard to control. One of the many reasons IMR 4475 has not been produced since the mid 1960s. Because of the behavior of IMR 4475 only hand picked lots were capable of meeting the pressure and velocity requirements. In 1963 none of the ammunition producers bid on a RFP for a few million rounds of 5.56mm ball. The only propellant that had the required energy, and the proven record of consistence pressure and velocity stability was WC846. This in itself would not have been a problem if the suggestion of Frankford Arsenal, Winchester, and Springfield Armory to test the ammunition in the gun to see what changes might be experienced. However, the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD), states that no testing was going to be done as they (mistakenly) believed the AR-15 was a fully developed and not being engineers, did not think a change in propellant would make any difference. (Bullets are bullets, right?)

3) It is not that the OSD did not think they were needed. It is more of the fact that the people in the OSD in charge of the M16 project did not understand what "fielding a weapons system" actually means. It does not mean that the guns and ammunition gets in the hands of the troops, it means all of the required logistical infrastructure be in place as well. When Armalite made the AR-10 and AR-15, they did not design cleaning kits and combination tools and all that support stuff, so when the Army boughtthe AR, they had to design and make all that stuff, get in production and then ship it to the troops with the rifles.

As to the AR-15 performing well in testing, that is quite true. There is only one major thing that required fixing, everything else was a tweak*, or not strictly necessary**. That one thing was the "action spring guide", it was too light, and subject to having its buffering springs seize, which made the high rate of fire higher and the bolt bounce in full automatic fire even worse.

(All of this information can be found in Ezell and Steven's "The Black Rifle, M16 Retrospective")
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* the extractor spring and the addition of the extractor spring buffer, these improvements just improved the life of the spring. The flash hider, and the pivot pin, charging handle and the magazine fence are minor things.
** the forward assist is strictly not necessary, but it was, and always has been, a requirement on everything, except the M1918 BAR.
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Good info. I was just going off the top of my head. I’m not a cut and paste master like some are.
Steel case ammo has had some issues in some ARs, but as you and I know, it’s not a design problem. It’s just the simple fact that not every AR has the same buffer and springs in them. And then not all barrels have chambers cut, or the same size gas port. With a little tweaking, most ARs can be made to fire steel case ammo without problems.
 
It's fine. I've literally used over 8,000 rounds in rifles (VZs, AKMs, SKS), About 1,000 in handguns. No mechanical damage and such Ammo is very reliable.

Rifle steel (in quality guns) is higher grade than the soft steel used in Ukrainian, Russian etc ammo. Isn’t Your gun of high quality…? ;)

Clean chambers now and then, as advised, to allow normal extraction. It's not medieval witchcraft.:feet:
 
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Given that in 1972 the Army put about 40,000 rounds of steel cased 5.56mm through M16s during testing, and actually had a higher number of malfunctions* in the brass cased control ammunition tells me reliable steel case ammunition can be made.

* It was something like 71 for brass and 53 for steel, and out of all of these malfunctions only three were attributable to the cartridge cases, two for the brass cases, and one for the steel cases.
 
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I'm just gonna go with a simple YES here. Not a problem in my rifles and carbines; I'd rather not shoot a butt-ton of steel-cased cartridges, but if it comes to shooting them or not shooting, I'll shoot some steel-cased rounds.
 
Just to round out this conversation on steel cased ammunition.

-ONE-

Current supplies of steel cased ammunition come from a few plants in Russia or countries in the former Soviet Union, and it quality varies from plant to plant.

Back in my day, most of the steel cased ammunition came from China (remember all that all copper-washed stuff). The quality of the Chinese ammunition was better.

The problems seen with current steel cased ammunition are not problems inherent with the use of steel, but problem inherent with low quality ammunition. I can run a batch of brass cases that would be guaranteed to stick in the chamber, just allow the annealing to creep down the case another 1/4 inch. The same with steel, don't temper the case right, and they start to stick.

A good bit of steel cased ammunition on the market is low cost and lower quality and prone to problems, if the cases were made from brass they probably wouldn't be much better.

-TWO-

Steel jacketed bullets are more common in military ammunition than most people know. All 5.56mm Tracer is steel jacketed, about half the 7.62mm M80 Ball is steel jacketed, most .30-06 M2 Ball is steel jacketed. The jacket material is actually barely 'steel.' It is 1013 mild steel with a maximum hardness of 30T 56.5, or B60. It wears the barrel not really any faster than copper jackets, it just wears the barrel in a different manner. Given the same propellant, copper jackets wear from the throat forward, steel jackets wear from the muzzle back.
 
WisBorn said:
With the lack of available ammo I am seeing more Steel Case Ammo at the range.

What are your Thoughts / Opinions about this option?
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For my Self Defence or Duty weapons? No only quality ammo or my reloads. For everything else, hell yeah, training, plinking, fun shooting, teaching new shooters, it’s good to go, will i use steel case if i had no other choice in my self defense weapons? Yes, i test all my guns to make sure they run with all ammo types, if it doesn’t it gets fixed or scrapped for parts.
 
lysanderxiii said:
Okay, we have multiple problems here.

If you read the report it came from or my original post where I posted it, you would know that it is NOT an M1 gas system (and we would know it too, if you hadn't cropped the header information off). That graph is for a T44 with a gas impingement system.
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I was about to agree with you on this, that is, I don’t know the impingement gas system from the expansion, but then I looked over my graph, and it is the “Garand” impingement gas system. And surely you over looked what equipment was used in the test. Later on that.

If you are concerned about me taking your image and using it, you know I have had you on “ignore” for a couple of years now, told you I was not interested in reading your posts, or you mine. And I and have not noticed a post of yours showing this kinematic pressure curve. Because you are on my ignore list, I did not know you were commenting on my post, until I noticed Gunny’s outburst, and then I knew the thread had gone twisted.

Since I don’t know when you started posting this image, here is an example of me using it in 2018, might be earlier, I am not going to spend hours looking for the earliest use of it.

https://thefiringline.com/forums/sh...ighlight=residual+blowback+effect#post6576524

Neither of us owns the copy right. I water marked mine in case Bart B (Bart Bobbit) used it. Bart Bobbit used to post here, and his old saw was that the 30-06 could not shoot straight, which is mentioned in this thread:

https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/exposing-some-internet-myths.346192/

I got into a debate with Bart Bobbit, and I posted Camp Perry NM test targets with two hundred round dispersions of NM 308 and NM 30-06. There was not much of a difference at 600 yards. The week that post was created, the target picture disappeared from my photobucket account. I really do not care if people use these images to further knowledge, so I left my account public, incase someone wanted to copy and use. But, I never thought anyone would delete images. After that, I made my photobucket account hidden, and all subsequent photo albums private. And what do you know, almost a decade later, Bart Bobbit was using a truncated version of that picture here!..

Bart B seemed to be a knowledgeable shooter, read enough of his material, every so often, what he claims, is impossible. Or just has to be a flat out lie. That is why I also put him on ignore. I don’t catch all flat out lies, or lies of omission, but when I come to the conclusion the poster is not mistaken, but actually lying, then I don’t want to ever read material the guy posts. Nothing a liar posts can be trusted to be true. There are pretty sharp people here, and they were giving Bart grief for some of his dubious claims, and I have not seen him for a while.


Okay, we have multiple problems here.

1) Where'd the M1 Garand gas system graph come from?

Like I said, I have had you on ignore for about two years, I had no idea you were using these pressure curves. They were out there, in the open literature. There was a time before 911 when a lot more, unclassified Government material was open source, but after 911, more and more information has been pulled behind the firewalls of that Government and Government Contractor only, DTIC website. Government goes through this, for a time Daniel Patrick Moynihan was beating it back, but he is gone.

Did you read the report and notice what was used as a test fixture? And, is a 308 Garand a Garand?

As a comment, nitnoidism is the life blood of the web. All these Nitnoid experts, showing off their nitnoid knowledge, primarily to put others down with their pedantic knowledge, it is the life blood of forums. When I was writing my post, I was more concerned with explaining how gas guns work, than getting into a nitnoid history of the Garand and all its variations. For example, there never was a 308 Garand, the military used the 7.62 Nato cartridge, so the military cartridge was never called 308 or 308 Win, right? And the 30-06 Garand was never called the 30-06 Garand by the military, the receiver heels are stamped Cal.30 M1. And from what I remember, the official literature never called them Garands just rifle, cal 30 M1. However, this military nomenclature is not well known, and it would take paragraphs of nitnoidism to explain this, bore the reader, and so for simplicity, I call the rifle 30 cal M1, a “Garand” and call the 7.62 Nato version, a 308 Garand. Because most people know what a Garand is, and it gets to the point, is simple, even though a nitnoid would rightly say, “there was no such thing”.

Anyway, is the 308 Win Garand a Garand? I looked on my hard drive for the Ackland AFB 7.62 mm Garand I handled, but I only took pictures of the match modifications, but if someone does not know, there were military Garands in 308 Win. But do you accept a 308 Garand as a Garand? What is a Garand anyway?

Springfield Armory calls these M1 Varations:

https://www.nps.gov/spar/learn/historyculture/m1-variations.htm

Notice how many of the use the “Garand” gas system. Is the Tanker Garand, a Garand?

And these are experimental rifles by John Garand:

https://www.nps.gov/spar/learn/historyculture/experimental-rifles-by-john-garand-1919-36.htm

Now I would agree, that the pressure curve of a 30-06 Garand gas system would likely be slightly different than the 308 Win version, but the only difference in the gas system of a 30-06 and 308 Win Garand, is the size of the port hole. I am sure a nitnoid could stuff a Galaxy down the difference in port hole sizes, and revel in the points he was scoring.

(By the way, I don’t blame you for all the bite marks your guard dog made. Normally, he is a good doggie, tries to be helpful to others. I did not mean to get his blood up.)

And then, did you read the details of the report? Lets get into some more nitnoidism. What receivers were used in the early “long action” T44’s? You will get a bonus point for correctly identifying the model. However, even if you reveal it, who the heck knows about that model? I had to look it up, because it is so rare. It is a rifle designed by John Garand, and it was manufactured at Springfield Armory, and I suspect you know all the parts that were common between it and the rifle 30 cal M1. Now, you will get real bonus points, and many thanks, from Garand nitnoids around the nation, if you search your Government databases and identify at what receiver serial number, the T44’s went from the “long action” T44’s to the short action T44’s. Up to the point the short action T44’s were introduced, all the T44’s used in the tests against the T47’s, and the FAL’s, etc, were those earlier model “Garand” receivers, modified to the purposes at the time.

And, what gas system, and barrel was used on the T44 test fixture rifle, used to produce the impingement kinetic pressure curve? I am sure that it was an honet mistake to over look that the gas system was identical to the rifle 30 Caliber M1. The barrel used, was a 7.62mm Garand barrel, which I am sure, was something easily overlooked. After all, who actually reads this stuff?

Now, I could have gone further and deeper into nitnoidism, in the post you are questioning, but would anyone care? At some point, you have to simplify and get on. Is it not easier to just describe the curve as a Garand gas system diagram and not use the words, gas impingement, T44 and, T93E1 ammunition. Who the heck knows what a T93 round is, anyway?

Honestly, I can’t keep track of which gas system is called impingement, and which is expansion. The distinctions are artificial anyway. Other than nitnoids, who is enforcing the lingo? I think of them in terms of “the Garand gas system’, and the “M14 gas system”. And a nitnoid might argue, the curve of the gas expansion system cannot be the M14 gas system, because the M14 did not exist at that time.

All of this is tedious, nit picking, adds nothing to nothing, and surely takes away from what I was trying to do, that is explain how a gas gun works.


2) You show a Caliber .30 Carbine pressure-time curve, then discuss its interaction with the gas system with a totally different different cartridge.

So, let's look at 7.62mm NATO, and the T44 gas system graph you posted, I won't bother to post the pressure-time graph for 7.62mm as I have done so before, and you probably already have a copy.

From the T44 graph the bolt starts to unlock at 2.3 ms. The 7.62mm NATO pressure-time graph (that is the mate to the Carbine one you show) has the chamber pressure at 2.3 ms as 375 psi. So, the force pushing the case out of the chamber is, at most, 65 pounds, most likely less as there will be some friction between the chamber walls and the case.

We can calculate the acceleration and velocity of the case (assume a friction-less case to make life simple) and compare the case velocity due to gas pressure and the bolt velocity and acceleration from the graph. If you do, you will find the bolt has about 50 to 100 times the speed advantage.

So, the extractor does extract the cartridge case.

Let me say, I have not seen your pressure curve charts, but, if you are putting them out, that is great. Really, not being snarky about this. I believe in the increase of gun performance and design information in the public domain. It is my opinion that an educated gunsociety is better for the knowledge. Lots and lots of function problems, and safety issues, could be avoided if people understood the mechanics of their weapons. What data is outside your Government firewalls is piecemeal and fragmentary. And I will admit, I don’t have the full picture. I, along with many others, are piecing together the fragments that somehow, made their way outside the Government restricted databases, and trying to make sense of the data, and applying their own theories about how these things work. Even less falls out of Corporate vaults, if you ever worked in industry, everything is proprietary. Industry wants ill informed consumers who make ill rational purchases.

As to the residual pressure curve, the author of Random Shots, Roy E. Rayle, states on page 186

“After unlock another action occurs which can impart five to ten per cent more energy to the recoiling rod and bolt. This is blowback due to residual pressure in the spent case Significant pressure is maintained in the case for several millisecond after unlocking during the blow down period. This provided a force to the rear whose influence can be noted in the velocity curves of both systems (expansion and impingement).

I am going to claim, that breaking the friction between case and chamber is good for function, and easier on the extractor. If friction between case and chamber defeats the residual blowback affect, then, the extractor is going to have to pull the case out of the chamber, and in time, that will reduce the lifetime of the extractor.

4) I have read every report the US Army published on the development and testing of the FN FAL (T48), and I have not come across this nugget about oiled cases. Could you please cite the reference. The only thing discussed about the extractor was the original one piece extractor with a wire leaf spring was not acceptable because a) it came out to easily, and b) the grip force was insufficient to hold the rim during automatic fire. Extractor life was never mentioned.

Not everything is in the official reports, on the Government and Defense Contractor only DTIC report base. By the way, look how many of those reports were done by Larry Moore. tee hee-hee

From the book mentioned previous, page 64, “near the end of the line Colnel Dubia rubbed his finger over some cartridges, and noted a light, but definite trace of oil, which appeared to come from an oily belt used to move th cartridge from one point to another. Colonel Dubia was able to convince the FN authorities that this might be the reason why we where having so much trouble with extractor failures in the American rifles, which FN was having little difficulty. FN agreed to run some testes with cartridges completely free of oil, and soon discovered extractor failures did go up”.

Mr Rayle was directly involved in th M14 and FAL program, along with many other weapons. The book is worth a read, particularly as it describes a lost world from that of today’s Government and Department of Defense. At one time the Army had its own manufacturing facilities, arms designers, material experts, production experts, and what they could do, the expertise they could bring together, to analyze problems, make changes, make the parts now, run tests on those parts now, to solve firearm issues now, is gone.

I did look on the FAL web site and found a shooter who said steel case ammunition had broken a couple of his extractors. I did find those that claim Russian weapons are designed to rip the round out of the chamber with the extractor. https://www.pewpewtactical.com/brass-vs-steel-ammo/ Maybe so, Russian design philosophy is different from American, and their weapons are amazing designs. However, as someone who has worn out extractors, had extractors break, and replaced broken and worn out extractors, in my opinion, it is best to reduce as much as possible, stress on the extractor. And having experienced it before, a worn extractor will remove the case from the chamber, but that same round will fall off the breech face, and cause a jam because extractor tension was insufficient to keep the round on the bolt face. If there was such a thing as a frictionless case to chamber, and the only function an extractor had to do, was to hold the case against the bolt face, extractor life would be very long. And that is another reason I advocate lubricating steel cases, to reduce case to chamber friction.


3) Lt Col. George Chinn's book is a great source of information, especially if you are planning to sit down and design an automatic weapon. However, if you have to be careful pulling to many of his "rules-of-thumbs" or extracting graphs as examples of "proof of your point of view". The point of that five volume set was to assist engineers in designing automatic cannon for Naval aircraft, as the Hispano had less than stellar performance. All of the graphs, and examples in the books are based on the Navy's 20mm, Mk100 ammunition, which isn't even the same 20mm ammunition used today the M61, and other modern 20mm cannons. Forced extraction of a 20mm cartridge case, that weighs 1/4 pound is very much different from extracting a case that weighs 20 times less.

I will say, we owe Chinn a great debt. Who else is putting out the principles of machine gun design? The series is very non mathematical, very concept orientated. That generation thought in terms of “we are all in it together”. They would never had understood a generation where 70% care not about spreading disease to others. Based on my study of post WW2 history, technology development for small arms had pretty much reached a period of dimensioning returns. Designs have further coalesced around a few mechanisms, the major advances since WW2 have been in manufacturing and materials. However, post WW2 there was a real need for fast firing machine cannons for even faster airplanes. Weapons such as the Oerlikon were the fastest single barrel guns of WW2, but even multiple Oerlikons could not put enough lead on target to down a jet aircraft. It was in Chinn’s period the Vulcan machine gun was designed, and as jets got faster and faster, even that could not put enough lead on target, and eventually missiles took over as the primary weapon of jet planes, and air defenses. Artillery also hit a peak in the 1950’s, and the emerging technology of missiles, killed off the big guns. As you know, multiple rocket launchers can saturate a target hundreds of miles away, and big missiles can hit targets on the other side of the planet. Something that fires a shell only 20 miles, while that is still lethal, it is clearly out classed by something with a range of hundreds of miles. China has a carrier busting missile whose range is greater than fighter jets. I would say, they are sending someone a message about maintaining a safe sailing distance away from their mainland.

5) Properly designed, and manufactured steel cases will not drag any more than properly designed and manufactured brass cases. The problem is: "Is most steel currently available properly designed and made?"

I am certainly not going to vouch for the quality control of either Chinese or Russian ammunition. Chinese ammunition disappeared quickly after the Bush ban of 1993. Considering that we are all using Chinese built computer equipment, I would believe that the Quality of Chinese ammunition would be very good, if we could only have access, but that would reduce profits for American Plutocrats. Russian quality control is probably more of a matter whether the work force arrived sober that day. Russians drink like fish.

However, there are a number of outside sites that address steel case ammunition

Steel-Case Ammo: Bad For Your Gun

https://www.shootingillustrated.com/articles/2018/10/23/steel-case-ammo-bad-for-your-gun/

Is Cheap Steel-Case Ammunition Safe to Use?

https://www.nrafamily.org/articles/2021/4/1/is-cheap-steel-case-ammunition-safe-to-use

I am going to be nitnoid about this statement in the article.

Steel-case ammo was first made in Russia and Germany during World War II to save production costs, because steel is cheaper than brass.

The Germans made billions of 8 X 57 mm steel cartridge cases in WW1. The also coated it with a lubricant to improve extraction. This is almost unknown in the US after the war, and it may be because the US did not occupy the country as it did after WW2.

The Truth About Brass vs. Steel Ammo

https://www.pewpewtactical.com/brass-vs-steel-ammo/

When to use steel cased ammunition?

https://blog.cheaperthandirt.com/steel-cased-ammunition/
 
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Slamfire said:
I did not know you were commenting on my post, until I noticed Gunny’s outburst, and then I knew the thread had gone twisted.
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Outburst??:confused:
This coming from the one that has gone so far off topic in this post that your post have nothing to do with the OP’s questions.
My comments to your post were not an outburst. I was just saying that you should know a little bit more about something before posting it.
 
A Garand is not a Garand when the barrel is two inches shorter. It alters the timing a good bit. Maybe you should read reports instead of just blowing them off.

Taking a qualitative note that there can be a 5 % to 10% increase in energy due to blow back and ". . . the extractor never tugs on the rim. . . " is a pretty big jump.

By WW2 the Germans did not put any lubricant on ammunition, so if they did it earlier in WW1, it was found to be either pointless, or bad for the gun. It is not on any of they drawings (which the Army has). And, Germany and Austria were occupied by the US and quite a bit of ammunition had been produced in US Occupied Zones. Further, steel cased ammunition was produced in France, Belgium and Holland for Germany, and FN wrote a really nice report for the US Army in 1946 on exactly now the Germans wanted it done, and how they (FN) felt the product could be improved. And, the Army has the debrief of the German plant Manager at FN. Similar reports are from Steyr. The French continue to make steel case ammunition for the military to this day.

No mention of any final lubrication. The final finish after a wash, rinse and dry was bonderizing and a coat of lacquer, that's it.
 
I used a lot of steelcase ( 7.62 x 39 )a long time ago--i still have about 1600 left ( @ 8 cents each) Also have approx 3800 reloads of same.
I don't use steelcase in ruger Mini 30 but I due use it in my American Ranch & AR15.
Sometimes it won't shoot in Mini 30---tough primer I guess.
Have fun !
 
lysanderxiii said:
A Garand is not a Garand when the barrel is two inches shorter. It alters the timing a good bit. Maybe you should read reports instead of just blowing them off.
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Back at you. You really should have looked at the report, section 4.0 Introduction clearly states the barrel length for the impingement barrel was 24.0 inches. The expansion, was 22.0 inches.

Am I not lucky to have a copy of this report?, otherwise, it would be hidden with you, behind those Government firewalls, and the whole truth would not have been revealed. Just the parts you want to reveal, in order to win your arguments.

By WW2 the Germans did not put any lubricant on ammunition, so if they did it earlier in WW1, it was found to be either pointless, or bad for the gun.
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Unlubricated and lubricated 8 mm Mauser was issued, and the user requested the lubricated ammunition because the unlubricated cases caused extraction issues.

Why has not the US Army developed and issued steel case ammunition for the M16 or M4? As you know, brass requires copper and zinc, and copper is harder to find every day. We know, that the Army ran steel cases tests post WW2, but walked away from it. But now, there being even less copper around to use, what has the Army done to replace brass case ammunition with steel case?
 
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Slamfire said:
Back at you. You really should have looked at the report, section 4.0 Introduction clearly states the barrel length for the impingement barrel was 24.0 inches. The expansion, was 22.0 inches.

Am I not lucky to have a copy of this report?, otherwise, it would be hidden with you, behind those Government firewalls, and the whole truth would not have been revealed. Just the parts you want to reveal, in order to win your arguments.
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The big give-away that it is not an M1 gas system is the labeling.

fGwtUPK.png

Slamfire said:
Unlubricated and lubricated 8 mm Mauser was issued, and the user requested the lubricated ammunition because the unlubricated cases caused extraction issues.
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I have not come across any mention of oiling ammunition in any German Manual. If you could provide an example where this practice was authorized. We know that is was not placed on the cases at the factory as it is not on the drawings, nor is it mentioned by either the Belgian or Austrian plant workers. Or, are we to believe the German managers, who were so diligent in their duties to record each change in soap specifications for drawing cup operations right up until the Allies took over, just forgot to mention they were putting wax or some type of grease on the cases?

Slamfire said:
Why has not the US Army developed and issued steel case ammunition for the M16 or M4? As you know, brass requires copper and zinc, and copper is harder to find every day. We know, that the Army ran steel cases tests post WW2, but walked away from it. But now, there being even less copper around to use, what has the Army done to replace brass case ammunition with steel case?
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The US has developed steel case ammunition for both 7.62mm and 5.56mm, twice, the second is currently on-going. Testing has always gone well with steel, and there was never any requirement for lubrication to achieve extraction. After testing it has recommended adoption of steel cases, except during WW2.

WW2 - According to the test reports, the reason for a non-adoption recommendation was two-fold, 1) insufficient time to fully complete testing on Caliber .30 and .50 steel cased ammunition before the new ammunition plants came on time, therefore these calibers would be made in brass, and 2) the required cost and lost production time to switch from brass to steel would be unacceptable. Switching from brass to steel not only requires new tooling, but new machinery as well, and the layout of the production floor is required to be changed to accommodate the new work flow.

Some people seem to think that changing from brass to steel just means feeding steel sheets in the front end of the factory instead of brass. It doesn't you need a different factory layout altogether.

1973 - The reason steel was not adopted is economic as well. Basically, the major commercial ammunition suppliers told the Army they would not bid on any contracts that specified steel cartridge cases, unless the Army gave them the machinery to manufacture steel cases. They would not convert any brass case manufacturing lines to steel, as brass is the preferred commercial material. This left the Army with three choices, a) fund supplying all ammunition manufacturers with sufficient equipment to produce steel cases, b) rely only on Frankford Arsenal, which would still require the out lay of considerable money, or c) put the technology in their pocket and save the money required for conversion to something else. Under normal circumstances, commercial production is 5 to 8 times military production, commercial supplier have a lot of leverage in dictating changes in the stuff they produce

You might notice that ammunition that does not have a commercial market gets to be made in alternate case materials: 25mm - Steel, 30 mm - Aluminum, artillery - Steel, tanks - steel.
 
lysanderxiii said:
The big give-away that it is not an M1 gas system is the labeling.
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View attachment 1018185

Those gas port location and port port size are consistent with the location of the Garand gas cylinder, and the gas port of a 7.62 barrel. The barrel was 24 inches long. The report details which rifle the gas system came off, and the barrel used. As that is close enough for Government work, I am calling it a Garand.

If you can find more pressure curve and kinematic studies, and post them, that will be great. Don't expect too high of a fidelity in the copies.

I have not come across any mention of oiling ammunition in any German Manual. If you could provide an example where this practice was authorized. We know that is was not placed on the cases at the factory as it is not on the drawings, nor is it mentioned by either the Belgian or Austrian plant workers. Or, are we to believe the German managers, who were so diligent in their duties to record each change in soap specifications for drawing cup operations right up until the Allies took over, just forgot to mention they were putting wax or some type of grease on the cases?

I doubt there is much on WW1 German weapon practice in your DoD database. Mauser had been working towards a lightweight, magazine fed, semi automatic rifle, but really nothing as good as the Garand existed in that period. So, it is probable you are unaware of the Mauser Selbstlader M1916 which used greased 8 X 57 mm ammunition. Forgotten weapons ignores this aspect of the weapon, which did make it undesirable and unreliable for ground troops.



however, Wiki weapons at least acknowledges this.

https://battlefield.fandom.com/wiki/Selbstlader_M1916

World War 1 was a very long time ago, and metallurgy as a science was still developing. The Germans were ahead in production technology, but still, far behind what was being done in WW2.

Deeter's book on the M98 Mauser has a very long section about the development and issuance of steel case 8 mm Mauser ammunition. Deeter, being German, has more access to German records from WW1, than any one on this side of the pond. The Germans were absolutely resource limited. They had been stripping brass, copper from occupied Belgium and France. The Germans were very methodical in stripping occupied territories of every metal, wood, food, animal resource they could, to feed their Armies. Tell you how they did this. First they made civilians provide them a list of their household goods. Once they had the list, they came over for a visit. Anything not on the list was confiscated, and of course, they probed under the plants in the garden. Then, they came back and took all the listed copper, brass, iron, steel from the household, and gave worthless wartime script as compensation. Malnutrition through rationing by the Germans killed a lot of Belgium and French citizens. If a Belgium civilian was engaged in work that promoted the German war effort, they got better rations. Those that were not helping the Germans were treated as parasites, and their rations were adjusted accordingly. Since German civilians were dying of malnutrition, you can imagine the German military authorities had very little sympathy for those in the occupied territories.

So given that the Germans had to innovate due to resource limitations, they made 8 mm Mauser cases out of low carbon steels. It worked, but given the technology at the time, establishing and maintaining the hardness and ductility of steel cases was not as consistent as brass case production. The sticking case issues that occurred, they addressed with beeswax type case lubricants.

As Chin says in the blowback section of Vol IV Machine Guns, all lubrication methods had proven unsatisfactory.

this Japanese Nambu has an oiler right next to the hopper

0LvBLHk.jpg

LBGIr4u.jpg

The cap is retained by the chain. Having an oiler requires that the solider carries a bottle of oil, which means the Quartermaster has to stock ammunition, and oil bottles. Get rid of the oiler, get rid of the oil bottle.


The US has developed steel case ammunition for both 7.62mm and 5.56mm, twice, the second is currently on-going. Testing has always gone well with steel, and there was never any requirement for lubrication to achieve extraction. After testing it has recommended adoption of steel cases, except during WW2.

WW2 - According to the test reports, the reason for a non-adoption recommendation was two-fold, 1) insufficient time to fully complete testing on Caliber .30 and .50 steel cased ammunition before the new ammunition plants came on time, therefore these calibers would be made in brass, and 2) the required cost and lost production time to switch from brass to steel would be unacceptable. Switching from brass to steel not only requires new tooling, but new machinery as well, and the layout of the production floor is required to be changed to accommodate the new work flow.

Some people seem to think that changing from brass to steel just means feeding steel sheets in the front end of the factory instead of brass. It doesn't you need a different factory layout altogether.

1973 - The reason steel was not adopted is economic as well. Basically, the major commercial ammunition suppliers told the Army they would not bid on any contracts that specified steel cartridge cases, unless the Army gave them the machinery to manufacture steel cases. They would not convert any brass case manufacturing lines to steel, as brass is the preferred commercial material. This left the Army with three choices, a) fund supplying all ammunition manufacturers with sufficient equipment to produce steel cases, b) rely only on Frankford Arsenal, which would still require the out lay of considerable money, or c) put the technology in their pocket and save the money required for conversion to something else. Under normal circumstances, commercial production is 5 to 8 times military production, commercial supplier have a lot of leverage in dictating changes in the stuff they produce

You might notice that ammunition that does not have a commercial market gets to be made in alternate case materials: 25mm - Steel, 30 mm - Aluminum, artillery - Steel, tanks - steel

Very interesting, perhaps things will get a new look. I am aware of telfon steel case ammunition 30-06 ammunition, post WW2. This was discussed in an American Rifleman dope bag article. So, that was looked at. And, there are telfon patents for steel cased rounds, which would have been used in Oerlikon machine guns. I have a Navy Test Report, which predictably disappeared after 911, and the Navy had quite an extensive program to "get the grease" out of the Oerlikon.

The Oerlikon was the most produced machine cannon during WW2, used by the US, Brits, Germans, and Japanese. Might have been used by the Italians and Russians.

w0cxiVk.jpg

You know if it were not for Chinn, I would never have known about the things.

cDobHO5.jpg

Pregreasing ammunition before linking was a pain, I am sure grease will blown into the air and on everything , and of course, grease attracts dirt. Post WW2 the Navy tested teflon coated steel case, fluted chambers, and oilers. The report states the firing rate of the gun was highest with oiled teflon coated ammunition, but for some reason, the teflon development was a dead end. The oiler was carried over and it documented in Chin. The Oerlikon was used by the USAF to Vietnam, as I have a shooting bud, an Army River Rat, who with his other River pirate buds, stole an Oerlikon from an USAF base, and welded it to the deck of their barge!. That Oerlikon had an oiler. Because few civilians own machine cannon, this is not well known.

I do know of Hornady manufacturing steel case 223 ammunition, so perhaps they are facilitating their own factories to met commercial demand. Wolf sells "polymer coat" 223, and that is sintered Teflon, probably the same process and materials used in the early 1950's coatings. I really hope we don't get into another major war soon, but if we do, we don't have the resources that we had in the 1930's, nor the industrial capacity. I read that the US had to contract with Koran ammunition makers to have enough ammunition for Iraq/Afghanistan. And that is a bush war, compared against a war with a major power. Steel case development programs within DoD, would be prudent to have the materials and processes understood, before we get involved in another major war.

I have been reading of steel head 6.8 X 51, or .277 Fury rounds being offered as a military round. The case operates at 80,000 psia, which is above the proof pressures of any brass case round I know of. Have to wonder how it will turn out.

By the way, this was a previous steel head cartridge design.

BEYhxtw.jpg
 
The main problem I've experienced with steel cases is that they don't obturate as well as brass and tend to leave more carbon in the chamber.

This isn't a big deal as long as you continue shooting steel, but if you fire 50 or 100 steel cases followed by brass, there's a good chance that you'll rip the rim off the first case you shoot, leaving it stuck in the chamber. When you pound the case out, the outside is almost black with carbon and very rough.

I've had this happen even with the highly tapered 7.62x39 in an SKS.

Shooting a brass round for every 5 or 10 steel cases fired seems to be effective in preventing the carbon from building up enough to become problematic.
 
I GUESS WHEN I STARTED THIS THREAD I DIDN'T REALIZE THAT THERE WOULD BE A SANCTION COMING ON THE RUSSIAN ARMS AND AMMO.
I HOPE THOSE OF YOU THAT LIKE IT CAN BUY SOME BEFORE IT'S GONE.
I'M SURE THAT SOMEONE WILL START OR INCREASE THEIR MANUFACTURING.
I THINK ABOUT ALL OF THE TURKEY MADE FIREARMS IS A INCREASE OF AMMO COMING?
 
I was thinking the same thing. "This thread didn't age well" Lol.

It makes me wonder if other countries have ammo we can import. Why is it always Russia? Based on the quality of their guns, I would think a country like the Czech Republic would make decent ammo.
 
This thread confirms my suspicions on steel cased Russian ammo. I've tried Wolf in my 1911 (Colt 1991) and my AR (Daniel Defense) I've found it dirtier and have suspected it'd accelerate wear on the chamber and I've observed extraction issues with steel cased ammo. For those reasons I don't use it.
 
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