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View Full Version : Fun fact about ultrasonically cleaning live ammo!!!



Patrick L
12-31-2023, 02:05 PM
Wasn't sure exactly where to put this one.

Anyhow, in case anybody was wondering, ammo that goes through an ultrasonic cleaner apparently is NOT killed by wetness. At least not my .38 wadcutter loads. Cleaned a batch of brass yesterday and found 1 live round had somehow gone unfired, and went into the cleaner with the brass. Well, I shot it today and it went off just fine. I purposely shot it last, just in case it squibbed or stuck the bullet in the bore, but was not an issue. It was 10th round of a 10 round string, and landed right in center of group near as I can tell. Not something I would advocate doing on purpose, but things happen.

That's the 1 downside to wadcutters. It's just not obvious like a SWC or RN bullet would be. I've tumbled them too!

bruce381
12-31-2023, 02:09 PM
cool thanks for that how long was it in the bath?

elmacgyver0
12-31-2023, 02:38 PM
I made a pocket holster for my mini-NAA .22 LR revolver that holds a spare 5 rounds.
It went through the wash along with the derringer inside of it.
After everything was dried out only a couple rounds would not fire.

15meter
12-31-2023, 04:33 PM
Ammo is a lot tougher than people give it credit.

I was given an old toolbox that had been filled with ammo, 12 gauge and 243, it had sat in a basement that was flooded. From the amount of rust that was in the box I would guess it was there for quite awhile. Touched off a couple of the 12 gauges, with no problems. Disassembled a bunch more. Powder burned nicely. Lead went into the lead pot.

The 243's, I pulled down and recycled the primers into plinking ammo. Worked well, 1-2 duds out of ~80 rounds. Reused the brass and bullets for play loads also. Some of the powder had to be dug out of the case with a nut pick. Don't remember if I did a burn test. It went on the lawn.

Tough stuff.

Patrick L
12-31-2023, 05:14 PM
Bruce it's still a learning curve, but that particular batch did 12 minutes at 60 degrees Celsius.

FAAFO6
01-01-2024, 08:09 PM
A friend of mine was trout fishing in the upper Pecos River during the high spring river run off and fell in (and nearly drowned) while carrying a S&W Mod 19 which came out of his holster. It was five weeks before the water went down enough before we could retrieve his gun using a large magnet. At the time he was using some reloads of mine (Lyman 358477 bullets over 14 grains of #2400) which we later tried firing. I was stunned when 5 of the 6 loads in the gun fired in an absolutely normal fashion after being submerged for over a month.

fredj338
01-02-2024, 03:55 PM
Not sure I would bet on that but I have had a round washed in my pants pocket go bang.

Rattlesnake Charlie
01-02-2024, 04:30 PM
I ran a full magazine of factory Winchester .380 ACP RNFP for my KelTek P3AT through washer and then dryer. All went bang just like they were supposed to.

Electrod47
01-02-2024, 04:43 PM
Scott at Kentucky Ballistics on Youtube just showed a 100 day test where he submerged 4 glocks with loaded magazines in Salt Water, Pond water, Dirt, and frozen in a block of ice. All 4 for 100 days he basically shook them off and fired them off.....only the frozen gun had some mechanical hiccups from the expansion of the magazine etc.

Texas by God
01-02-2024, 06:45 PM
I found some submerged 12 gauge shells in the lake water once. They were two tone from the sun baking them on one side.
I took them home, steel wooled the metal heads and shot all of them from my Topper.
They all went off but the steel shot must have rusted a bit because they had a dusty muzzle blast.


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