Once-fired GI 7.62 NATO

[BruceB]

Back when I was preparing for the arrival of my M1A rifle, I obtained 1000 rounds of UNFIRED Lake City military brass. After sorting it by headstamp (date) I was left with about 700 LC88, and the remainder was a mix of other dates. These mixed cases were traded-off to a friend.

Lately I've been feeling the need of more brass, but was fighting shy of what was on the market due to costs and that bugaboo so widely reported as "FACT": "All them 7.62 cases is fahrd in them macheeene guns with them oversize chambers and yer brass ain't gonna be worth squat!!!!!!!"

Riiiiight. When housedad posted 500 rounds of WCC 7.62 Nato at a good price, I jumped on it. I quickly got a Money Order away, and he shipped the brass, very securely wrapped, in very short order indeed. Good looking cases! They still have their original primers, and haven't been sized or otherwise altered.

Here's the interesting part: I took a big handful of these cases, free of neck dents or other minor distortions, and tried them in an L.E. Wilson case gauge. The cases entered with no difficulty, some going in right to the "flush" position (case head flush with the rear of the gauge). The rest of the cases were just a wee distance from seating completely, usually with maybe the thickness of the rim protruding above the rear face of the gauge. This condition often indicates a minor burr on the rim from ejection or extraction...we'll see.

This tells me that I can expect the service life of this brass to be very good indeed. The initial firing in whatever military weapon was used has not appreciably harmed the brass for my purposes. All the cases I've looked at so far are WCC 05, so the stuff should be fairly-uniform.

Now, to size, swage pockets, and trim for the X-die..... it'll take a little time, but I'll have good cases at the end of it all.

Thanks, housedad.

[bobk]

BruceB,
What others have reported is true. Many years ago I acquired a quantity of once-fire military brass, and most of them separated at the base on the second reload. I junked them.
Bob K

[Larry Gibson]

BruceB

A lot of the surplus 7.62 is indeed fored in M240s or M60s (yes they are still in use). However, there is also a large amount that is fired in M24, M40 and M21 sniper systems every year by the military. Most of the training ammo fired in these sniper systems is either M118 Special Ball or M118LR. Both of which have standard marked cases, just like the M80 ball fired in the MGs. It is possible to get cases fired in the sniper rifles mixed in with the other.

Larry Gibson.

[johnly]

I have a stash of old M852 GI brass. The marking band sure makes it easy to pick out from the regular brass.

I haven't had many problems with headseps in my M1A's match rifles as long as I kept the cases fired in M14 seperated from the others and had dies adjusted for each of the rifles

John

[missionary5155]

Good afternoon
I wonder what the possibility is that FN has closer tolerences in their barrels today than maybe other manufactureres were using 20 years+ ago. I do know our 7.62 co-axual mounted M240 with the 12 inch quick change barrel had a habit of splitting brass around the shoulder -neck area.
Mike

[nicholst55]

Even machine gun chambers vary somewhat in headspace dimensions. BTDT, measured many, many MG barrels for headspace. A new MG barrel in a new MG will understandably normally have tighter headspace than a well used barrel in a well used receiver.

I can definitively state that MGs do, indeed, have longer acceptable headspace dimensions than (military) rifles. IIRC, the No-Go gage for a 7.62mm MG is .004" longer than the No-Go gage for an M14 rifle. Does that mean that your MG-fired brass will always have been fired in a (or some) L-O-N-G chamber(s)? Nope, not at all. Does that mean that the chances are greater that it was, than that it wasn't? I'd say so.

I hope you lucked out and all that brass was fired in either one or more sniper rifles, or in a (relatively) short MG chamber. But I'll bet it wasn't.

[Mk42gunner]

Bruce,

Here are a couple of other options your brass could have been fired in: GAU- (don't remember the number but I think it's 18???) mini gun, or perhaps from an M-14. I know the Navy still had a lot of M-14s when I retired five years ago. It could have even been from one of the 7.62mm AR types.

Larry I am not trying to say you are wrong, but all of the M118LR that I saw up until 2004 was headstamped LC and the date on top and LR on the bottom without the NATO standardization mark.

As long as it is good brass, who cares what it was shot in the first time; take care of the primer crimp and load it.

Robert

[Boerrancher]

This is coming from someone with resent experience with the M240 MG, which fires the 7.62 Nato. The Chambers are tight. The are made like the M-16 with very tight tolerances. This makes very accurate shooters out of them, unlike the old M-60 that has been retired from service that was sloppy when they were new from the manufacturer. The draw back to the precision work is that in desert regions like Iraq and Afghanistan they have to be kept very clean. We kept ours in giant plastic trash bags when they were mounted on the trucks. The gunners got good at ripping trash bags off before firing. There is nothing worse than cleaning off melted plastic from your weapon. If these rounds that Bruce B have were fired in a 240 or 240B I am not surprised that they are as good as he claims.

Best wishes from the Boer Ranch,

Joe

[HangFireW8]

Lately I've been feeling the need of more brass, but was fighting shy of what was on the market due to costs and that bugaboo so widely reported as "FACT": "All them 7.62 cases is fahrd in them macheeene guns with them oversize chambers and yer brass ain't gonna be worth squat!!!!!!!"


I took a chance on ordering such surplus 7.62 a few years back. It came with the extractor mark and side of neck dent characteristic of M700, button ejector type action. It was also all FC commercial brass, so go figure. Fired headspace of mine was also acceptable.

Back to the subject of a MG, if it came from a US Army gun, chances are excellent that the headspace on that machine gun was set to an acceptable headspace by the armorer, and verified by the operator.

However, machine guns eject brass a lot sooner than most systems, and can pull the brass out while it still is sticking to the chamber walls. The result is stretched brass that looks like it came from an overly long chamber.

-HF

[Larry Gibson]

Bruce,

Larry I am not trying to say you are wrong, but all of the M118LR that I saw up until 2004 was headstamped LC and the date on top and LR on the bottom without the NATO standardization mark.

Robert

Robert

That is true of the later stuff. The first few years worth was just loaded in M118SB cases marked LC/yr and NATO symbol.

BTW; the M21 is an M14 just the accurized sniper version is all. However in all my training with the Navy they never policed up brass for turn in. That made us Army guys happy as we 'turned it in for them! Neither did the Marines a lot of the time as they are under the Navy (it may have been policed up but much of it was thrown away). Seems that has changed though, last year as the price of brass went up the Marines were even begining police up expended blanks for turn in. I also never heard of a "police call" for brass on helicoptor ranges where the mini-guns were mostly fired. Other considerations to consider when buying surpluss 7.62 brass is which post did it come from (if you can find out). If it came from a post where Armor is most likely a lot will be out of coax guns. If there is infantry then most will be out of MGs also but usually in better condition than cases fired out of coax guns. If it came from a post where there is spec ops and sniper training then some really good once fired cases may be had.

Not to say that I ever did it you understand but I have heard of individuals who bought once fired LC cases to trade. They had contacts with SF or sniper instructors and would trade the (who knows fired in what) cases for once fired cases out of M24s or M40s. Like I said....I've only heard about it:-D

Larry Gibson

[kir_kenix]

There are still alot of m60's on the road in Iraq. Rules we had to live by is if we were going north of Anaconda, we had to trade them out for Bravos. Anyway, I wish I could have scored 1% of all the brass that we shot on the practice range or gearing up for deployment. Most of it looked just fine too me, even the m60 brass. I never miked any of it, but I couldn't pick out brass that was fired from the old pigs when it was next to 240 brass.

[Paul B]

Hangfire said, "I took a chance on ordering such surplus 7.62 a few years back. It came with the extractor mark and side of neck dent characteristic of M700, button ejector type action. It was also all FC commercial brass, so go figure. Fired headspace of mine was also acceptable."

I'd be almost willing to bet that commercial FC brass was Federal match stuff. I have a buddy in the Border patrol and when they did their sniper rifle practice, he saved all the brass for me, all Federal match stuff. he stopped by thouse and asked me if I wanted some .308 Win. brass. I said sure and he brought in this box stuffed with brass. When I counted it out, there was a bit over 1,100 rounds. I'm a happy camper.
Paul B.

[nicholst55]

Back to the subject of a MG, if it came from a US Army gun, chances are excellent that the headspace on that machine gun was set to an acceptable headspace by the armorer, and verified by the operator.

-HF

Headspace is nonadjustable on 7.62mm machine guns, FWIW. And it definitely DOES grow over time, even in the M240-series MGs. I've replaced enough M240 barrels with excessive headspace to know that for a fact.

But, Like someone said - as long as it's good brass, who cares what it was fired in the first time? :drinks:

[Larry Gibson]

......But, Like someone said - as long as it's good brass, who cares what it was fired in the first time? :drinks:

Especially if the FL sizing is done with an RCBS X-die.

Larry Gibson