Wet Ammo

[dale2242]

I was out yesterday snooping around at some known shooting places in the area.
We don`t have an organized shooting range close by.
I saw a butter carton nearly full of assorted brands of loose 22 lr ammo.
The problem was that the carton was also full of water.
I took them home and I am drying them by the stove in my shop.
It will be interesting to see if any of them will be water proof and/or dry enough to fire.
I will be testing them in an old SS gun I have had since I was a child so I can remove any bullets that may lodge in the barrel.....dale

[oneokie]

If you are in no hurry, place the ammo in an air tight container with some dessicant pac's.

[williamwaco]

I have never tried that but I have many times dried out electronics like radios, watches telephones, etc. by placing them near a heat source like a light bulb, top of the clothes drier, etc. Just some place that feels warm to your hand and leaving it there a few days. Sounds very similar to what you are doing.

I am really curious to know the results.

Please let us know.

[I'll Make Mine]

Most if not all modern smokeless powders are impervious to water, as are lead styphnate and lead azide priming mixes (takes a good soaking with oil to kill that style primer) -- though I wouldn't expect a round with significant water inside to fire successfully due to the quenching effect, at worst they should fire fine as soon as the interior is dry. Beyond that, most modern ammunition (even .22 LR) is virtually airtight even without sealants around primer and bullet as are often seen on military surplus.

Very likely you could have wiped those rounds off with a paper towel, loaded them up and fired them on the spot immediately after finding them. Don't get them hot enough to cook off trying to dry them (i.e. no ovens or frying pans, please) and they'll be fine.

[Stephen Cohen]

I was recently given several hundred .22s that went through the 1974 floods in Brisbane. They were dried when recovered, however they suffer so many misfires as to be usless. Hope you have better luck.

[rbuck351]

Most of the 22 ammo that I have gotten really wet has a lot of missfires even if dried for a long while.

[gtgeorge]

I too have found that 22s that have been wet rarely will fire. Are the rimfires using a different priming compound?

[I'll Make Mine]

I would hypothesize that .22 ammunition may be less "tight" than centerfire rounds (I recall it's often possible to twist the bullet on a .22 LR cartridge with little effort, indicating there's not much if any case tension); if so, and they get water inside the case, it might take literally years for the water to migrate back out -- leading to quenching that would cause both a high misfire rate and poor accuracy for rounds that do fire.

Tempting to suggest pulling the bullets from a couple of the bad rounds (or the recently soaked ones) to check if there's water inside. Proceed carefully; pulling bullets from rimfires is much more hazardous than pulling centerfire ammunition.

[Jim]

QUOTE=I'll Make Mine;1960406]I would hypothesize that .22 ammunition may be less "tight" than centerfire rounds (I recall it's often possible to twist the bullet on a .22 LR cartridge with little effort, indicating there's not much if any case tension) .....[/QUOTE]

That was my thought also.

[dale2242]

When I test these wet rounds I would like to pull the bullets on the duds to see if the powder is wet.
BUT, I am more than a little spooky of gripping the base of the case to pull them That`s where the priming lives, you know.
I`m not too crazy about the idea of a 22rf going off in my hands.
I may be able to grip the cases well ahead of the priming with a needle nose pliers in an attempt to pull the bullets with out setting off the priming.
Any ideas about pulling bullets from 22lr cases safely?.....dale

[oneokie]

When I test these wet rounds I would like to pull the bullets on the duds to see if the powder is wet.
BUT, I am more than a little spooky of gripping the base of the case to pull them That`s where the priming lives, you know.
I`m not too crazy about the idea of a 22rf going off in my hands.
I may be able to grip the cases well ahead of the priming with a needle nose pliers in an attempt to pull the bullets with out setting off the priming.
Any ideas about pulling bullets from 22lr cases safely?.....dale

My technique, YMMV;

Grip the shell with a pair of channel lock pliers with the head of the case on one side of the jaws, grip the bullet with a pair of needle nose pliers and with a twist of the wrist, (think twisting a screwdriver) lever the bullet out of the case.

[Castlead]

I just hold the thing and press the lead sideways on a hard surface, rotate a few degrees and repeat until its loose. Takes about 30 seconds and no hard things touch the bang bang maker. I've done many like that and still can count to 11. Attempt at your own risk though and I make no claims of safety doing it like that.

[Stephen Cohen]

I just hold the thing and press the lead sideways on a hard surface, rotate a few degrees and repeat until its loose. Takes about 30 seconds and no hard things touch the bang bang maker. I've done many like that and still can count to 11. Attempt at your own risk though and I make no claims of safety doing it like that.

+1. Another thing to watch for when firing these rounds is head separation and face full of gas, I had two out of five do it before I gave up.

[farmallcrew]

Back when i was young and dumb, now just dumb. That day we shot 22lr and had some that didnt fire so we threw them in out pockets and when we strated drinking some on pulled them all out. So we were saying how cheap they are, well me haveing a brain idea, took my leatherman and pulled all the boolits and made a pile of powder, put the caseing on a nail and heated it with a lighter, BANG and the case goes flying, so lets try the powder, it burned nicely.

So we did find out that either 22lr are made cheaper than cheap or our 10/22's werent hitting hard enough but there was a normal size indent like all the other caseings.

Im going with cheaper than cheap ammo, by the way and alot of the boolits just needed to be thumbed out like a PEZ dispenser, that i really didnt need my leatherman.

[rbuck351]

The other day I decided to pull some 22s that had failed to fire and check for priming compound. I drilled a hole in a piece of about 1/2" thick wood that the round will fit in snugly. Grab the bullet with pliers and pry out. just takes a couple of seconds. I then dumped the powder and held the case with pliers while heating the case with a propane tourch. DO NOT do this with the back of the case pointed at you. Of the dozen or so that I pulled, most made a fair pop and thats it. Two made a bang and launched the case never to be seen again. Another two did not pop at all and a couple kinda went pffzzt. These were range pickups that had firing pin dents in them but only a couple showed signs of wet powder. I'm thinking on trying another handful of fresh rounds to see how consistant the primer pops are on different brands of ammo. I'm thinking they will be all over the map on cheap ammo. Yep,I'm bored and it's to cold here to go shooting.

[GREENCOUNTYPETE]

it is all together posible that i am nuts but . and just didn't know any better

when i go thru the brass buckets i find sometimes a dozen or more 22lr cartridges, I just hold the case with my fingers and grab the bullet with a needle nose pliers the bullet pops off rather easily pour out the powder drop the cases in some old oil

toss the lead in my bucket to smelt later

i figure there is no way my fat fingers are going to den the rim and set it off.

but the block of wood sound like it might be easier on the fingers if you had a bunch to do

[BCRider]

Because the rimfire ammo uses a heeled bullet it's tough to get as good a seal as we can easily get with the long sliding fit under tension such as seen on other center fire ammo. And as noted the bullets are often loose enough to allow the bullet to twist easily in the case. That means that left in water like the OP's bullets were means that the powder in a lot of them will most certainly be wet.

It's also going to take a lot to let that moisture dry out back through that same fine but somewhat loose joint. A month or more is not at all out of the question.

The times I've pulled the bullets out of a rimfire case I only used pliers on the bullet and held the casing in my other hand. It's not that hard if you give the bullet a bend to the side to distort the brass. It pops right out easily.

[RoyEllis]

FWIW, I haven't had any luck drying out wet 22lr ammo, even letting it sit in the hot summer sun for 3 months. At best 30 to 50% will FTF, making me upset so I just pop the bullets out of duds & scrap the case & powder.

[saint_iverson]

It isn't going to blow your gun up unless someone sabotaged a round. At worst a bullet will lodge in the barrel, or likely just a click. They may go off, something to Plinker with, so long as you're not spending more time ramming bullets out of the bbl. Keep a rod handy, regardless. Drying em out? Warm place w dessicant is about as safe an effective as any.

[saint_iverson]

I argueably get poor performance from normal 22s anyway, sometimes as much as 10% misdirected or nonuniform priming. After a few days/wks drying take em out and see what they do... Just don't be broken hearted if many are left on the table when you leave - or throw em in a bucket of water for the next guy?

[gbrown]

Myself, I would think about putting them in a tumbler with something like uncooked rice, oatmeal, or cornmeal and tumbling them for about 24 hours. Pain to seperate, but I've done it several times and had some luck with that.

[dale2242]

The wet ammo has been drying by the stove in my shop for a month now.
As soon as weather permits I will give them a test.
I will test them for accuracy as well as FTF, etc,.
I will report when I finish....dale

[dale2242]

Wet Ammo Test #1
After having dried the wet ammo by my wood stove in the shop for a month I gave it the first test.
I wiped each case down and tried it in my Remington 581. This gun makes a really deep dent in any 22 rf case , so I know it is hitting hard enough to fire viable ammo.
I tried 3 different brands that had been completely submerged in water. BTW, I have no idea how long they had been submerged as I found them in a butter carton in a pit.
CCI lead solids, Federal plated solids, and Super X plated HPs
I got exactly the same results from each brand. 4 out of 5 failed to fire. I only tried 5 of each as a first test.
I then tried to see if they would fire in the hot coals of my wood stove.
Before you chew me out for what appears to be an unsafe practice, let me explain the stove is hand made from 3/8 in. steel plate. There is no way a 22 rf can get out of there.
I only tossed one of each brand in the stove that had failed to fire. These had each been tried and had failed to fire in the gun.
All went off with a bang after about 5-6 seconds in the hot coals.
This tells me that the priming and/or the powder were still wet.
The next attempt at drying them will be in a dehydrator on low setting.
More to follow....dale

[dale2242]

Update.
I dried the wet ammo in the dehydrator for several hours at 120 degrees.
I still only got 60-70% of them to fire. So, the drying did work , to a certain extent.
I`m not sure it is worth the effort unless you had a severe 22lr shortage.
Kinda fun to play with .....dale

[mwk1975]

Thanks for the updates, this has been/is an interesting read.
Mike