Mosin 91/30 hard ball

[Beekeeper]

Are there any mosin shooters here that can answer questions about surplus ammo?
I am not allowed to shoot military hard ball at the range I recently found!
So I took a couple of boxes (of 20 rounds) of some Bulgarian surplus ammo I have and pulled the hard ball with the intentions of replacing it with cast.
I accidently knocked a couple of them over( they don't fit my reloading trays because of the large rim).
I found that none of them have the same powder in them.
A couple had something that looks like red or green dot without the dots , a couple had something that was very fine powder and brownish gray in color, and several had what looked like regular ball powder.
They all came from the same lot. I used the powder for fertilizer.Now I am wondering if I should pull them all down and reload with a good powder?


Jim

[higgins]

Go to 7.62x54r.net and you'll find out just about everything you'll ever need to know about 54R ammo. Unless you know that the ammo came from the same sealed can, there's no way of knowing if it's the same lot. If it's not the same lot, there's no assurance it's loaded with the same powder. Given the way the old Soviet bloc operated sometimes, if it was "cleanup" time at the arsenal a variety of powder could have been loaded in a run of cartridges. I've seen European powder loaded with both tubular powder and square flake powder; both types are widespread in Europe. As to the vague term "hardball", there's 54R ammo loaded with bullets that are lead core with a steel alloy jacket, and there's later 54R loaded with bullets that are steel core and an alloy jacket; for a while those were designated with a silver painted tip, but the later rounds were not marked with the silver tip. Back to your original question, if you found that variety of powder in a few cartridges, something might be up. Regardless what the seller tells you, assume all of the 54R surplus ammo is corrosive (even ammo from the 80s) and clean your rifle accordingly. A lot of sellers aren't necessarily lying about it, they just don't know better. Over the past few years, I have fired hundreds of 54R surplus rounds from Albania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, and Czechoslovakia. Overall, it's good accurate ammo in a good rifle. When it was 8-9 cents a round it was not worth reloading for 54R. Fortunately, it can still be had for less than reloading cost if you shop around. For replacement bullets to load in your "remade" ammo, look at the Prvi .311 SP bullets to keep costs down if you decide to use jacketed.

[Ed Barrett]

As far as your plan to pull military bullets and replace them with cast and the same powder you will have a problem since the velocity will be above cast speeds. If your going to replace the the bullets replace the powder charge with 13 grains of 2400 or red dot and use the russian powder in the garden. You could grow some Russian sunflowers. The primer would still be corrosive so you would have to clean your rifle with an ammonia based cleaner right after you are done firing.
A much better long term solution is to sell the milsurp ammo to someone who doesn't reload and get some boxer primed cases and load them over and over with cast boolits for about 5 cents per round.

[Baron von Trollwhack]

If you break down that kind of ammo, look at the powder before you put it in a container. I got some of that 70s Korean '06 corrosive ball from Natchez, rather than the later non corrosive they advertised.

So I started pulling the ball and dumping the powder. Looked and found three different kinds of powder intermixed in my container. Chucked that in the garden for fertilizer. Pushed out the primers and prepped the brass, which was all good along with saving the ball.

Know why US '06 WWII ball was so uniform? They used case lots of powder only and the lot was a BOXCAR. They loaded to specification. Phil Sharp book.

Bvt

[Beekeeper]

The rounds I pulled the hardball out of were all from the same lot and same spam can.
I did reload the powder as I knew the powder load was to hot for cast.
The only reason I did it was I needed some to shoot and didn't have any cast or extra 7.62x54R brass available at the time.
I have pulled a lot of american hardball and had never seen the variation in powders.
I used the bulgarian powder on the lawn, makes the neighbors crazy whenthey can't figure what I am using for fertilizer.


Jim