Pull Down Powders

[dale2242]

I see hundreds if not thousands of pounds of "Pull Down" powder for sale.
I assume this powder is from disassembled military ammo.
If this is the case, why is there so much of the ammo "Pulled Down"?

[zarrinvz24]

Pulldown or surplus powder is sourced in a variety of ways. It could be that it was declared surplus due to not meeting the spec's called for when said powder was ordered. That does not mean its bad, merely too fast or slow for its intended application. Another possibility is that the weapon system that utilizes this munition has been removed from service, and all ammunition is declared obsolete. When stocks of ammunition are discovered in the back of a warehouse this is what is done with it, and why surplus LC M1 Carbine casings and bullets are available from time to time.

The US Military has storage requirements regarding the conditions of ammunition. Ammunition that is exposed to high temperatures for too long a time is turned in to be demilitarized, because since the Clinton years the US Mil has not been able to sell USGI ammunition to the open public. Before I get roasted, yes, the CMP has sold USGI ammunition in recent years - however that was sourced from the foreign countries that were given these munitions. Much of the M2AP and tracer ammo, delinked M2 30-06 ammo that the CMP sold came from Greece, and was returned to the US by freight paid for by the CMP.

The last source of pulldown powder I can think of is that service ammunition must be as close to 100% reliable as possible. For this reason, the newest ammunition is put in the contingency reserve, and the ammunition that it replaces is expended for training use. Anything that is not used up within the specified shelf-life is turned in and demilitarized.

Now I personally have fired many, many rounds of 1930's surplus ammo, and rarely experienced any issues. However there were some anomalies that I could see preventing the ammunition from active service use. The large numbers of Turkish 8mm Mauser ammo imported in the early 2000's is a perfect example of this. It wasn't stored under 'ideal' circumstances, and overpressure cartridges were commonly reported (velocity was significantly higher than spec). There were hang-fires, there were cracked necks (before firing), and erratic velocity. While I wouldn't want to take ammunition like this into a fight, for civilian purposes it was mostly perfectly acceptable.

Hope this helps you understand the whole process a little better.