Crusty 30-06 Cases

[liljohnnie]

Today a friend of mine gave me a bag full of old military 30-06 brass(around 1500 rounds) that he found in his father in laws basement where it had been stored for 30+ years. Some of this brass is quite obviously unusable but some is only slightly corroded while the rest is in good shape although i think i will anneal the necks before reloading it.If it were to be shot through a strong bolt gun i would not worry too much about some minor corrosion but he wants me to reload it to shoot through his I.H. Garand,that is gorgeous by the way.
My question is how much will a slightly corroded case be weakened. I'm not a metallurgist so am uncertain on how to proceed. If no definite answer is forthcoming i suppose i will ere on the side of caution and he will have to scrap more than he expected. I guess i should mention that the slightly corroded cases clean up with a few brown splotches but no pitting that i can detect with magnification.

Thanks , John

[NickSS]

I have loaded some brass that had some green splotches on them. They cleaned up fine and left black splotches but no corrosion or pits. I have loaded some of them over 20 times with no adverse affect. If there is pitting under the green I would toss them into the recycle bucket.

[NuJudge]

Do you have a feel whether these are once fired or several times fired? Are they military, and if so, US or other?

If known to be post-1954 once-fired US, I would deprime and water wash all the cases, before I did anything else. I would do this because I would suspect corrosive priming in earlier firings being a possibility.

Next, I would run them all through a tumbler. I would worry about those showing significant pitting, but not about those just showing green "rust". Pitting can happen in the absence of rust, but not usually. Pitting involves the electrochemical transport of electrically charged metal atoms from a higher potential site to a lower potential site. Essentially the atoms are being electroplated away from the one place to the other. In the place they are deposited, they are very susceptable to oxidation (rust) because of their huge surface area.

I would not anneal case necks, except if you felt they had been fired many times.

[Bret4207]

I will admit to using brass that many people would toss. The curse of the cheapskate. I'd wash them as was suggested, tumble them and annealing would be a great idea. Trim them and load those that look okay to you. Yes, you' probably get some split necks, but I doubt you'll get anything dangeous from stained brass. Clean the primer pockets too. I like to uniform then, makes priming smoother.

I had a whole bunch of 223 given to me back when I still had the Mini 14. Green and rust and black krap all over it. I ended up putting it in the washing machine in a laundry bag (don't tell my wife) and then hand polishing with steel wool and my drill press as I didn't have a tumbler back then. This was back in my "full throtle" days and I loaded them with 55 gr SP and lots of powder. Split necks, yes. A few split shoulders, yes. No other problems. I wouldn't use some of that brass today, it was garbage, but as with loading Berdan cases with Boxer primers, lots of things can be done if your HAVE to.

[RKJ]

You could put them into a bath of citric acid, that should remove the corrosion and might give you a better look at the cases. I find it at the local supermarket.

[liljohnnie]

All headstamps are either FA 49 or LC 53 with primer crimp in place. Unless the US military reloaded this stuff i would call it once fired. There are some cases that wobble when chucked up in the drill and spun,those are going to scrap because i suspect a shot out barrel with an abundance of headspace was the last to see them.
The reason i want to anneal the necks is i have heard somewhere that brass can harden with time. Whether that's true or not i don't know but annealing is just one more safety precaution that would give me peace of mind. I don't take lightly that my friend will be shooting my reloads and above all want to safeguard him and his expensive Garand.
I'm a cheapskate as well and if it were my gun i would shoot them in a heartbeat. My friend expressed concern that chamber damage could occur if too many "split necks" are shot through his gun,another reason to anneal i suppose but i think i will skip the acid bath and stick to cleaning by conventional means.
Thanks for the responses so far.

[Char-Gar]

Hit the corroded spots on a fine wire wheel, tumble and reload. I have done this many time on many cases. If you don't have a fire wire wheel, use a bit of 400 grit emery paper.

[Dutchman]

There's a very simple rule of thumb for issues just like this.

When in doubt - throw it out.

btw - all cases I discard are first crushed with pliers... like the case neck is crushed with pliers. It then becomes unusable to some scrounger who doesn't know any better.


Dutch

[liljohnnie]

There's a very simple rule of thumb for issues just like this.

When in doubt - throw it out.

btw - all cases I discard are first crushed with pliers... like the case neck is crushed with pliers. It then becomes unusable to some scrounger who doesn't know any better.


Dutch

Good advice. I crush unserviceable cases with pliers too. I was just not familiar with the effects of light corrosion on brass. As Chargar suggests i have wired wheeled several cases and they look fine but does the corrosion weaken the underlying metal to the point where it could be considered unserviceable. In all cases where i had any doubt i did indeed throw them out.
Just arguing for the sake of arguing i guess.[smilie=b:

[Char-Gar]

I am not a science type who can talk metallurgy and such, I am just an old shooter bordering on antique status. I have seen and used all sorta of old cases in various stages of yuckyness. Here are my rules.

1. I will clean and use the cases UNLESS they have been fired with mercuric primers. Those I crush and throw away. You don't run across many of those these days.

2.. For high pressure loads, I used good quality newer brass. I reserve the old and tired brass for low pressure cast bullet shooting. No sense in pushing old guns, cars, cartridges cases or people to the max.

[RKJ]

All headstamps are either FA 49 or LC 53 with primer crimp in place. Unless the US military reloaded this stuff i would call it once fired. There are some cases that wobble when chucked up in the drill and spun,those are going to scrap because i suspect a shot out barrel with an abundance of headspace was the last to see them.
The reason i want to anneal the necks is i have heard somewhere that brass can harden with time. Whether that's true or not i don't know but annealing is just one more safety precaution that would give me peace of mind. I don't take lightly that my friend will be shooting my reloads and above all want to safeguard him and his expensive Garand.
I'm a cheapskate as well and if it were my gun i would shoot them in a heartbeat. My friend expressed concern that chamber damage could occur if too many "split necks" are shot through his gun,another reason to anneal i suppose but i think i will skip the acid bath and stick to cleaning by conventional means.
Thanks for the responses so far.

I agree that I wouldn't shoot them in that Garand either. The "Acid bath" is just citric acid, it's found in Kool aid among other food products. It removes the corrosion and doesn't hurt the brass, (I don't believe it's strong enough of an acid to hurt it) but I haven't had any real corroded brass either. I just wanted to clear up the acid thing.

[liljohnnie]

I am not a science type who can talk metallurgy and such, I am just an old shooter bordering on antique status. I have seen and used all sorta of old cases in various stages of yuckyness. Here are my rules.

1. I will clean and use the cases UNLESS they have been fired with mercuric primers. Those I crush and throw away. You don't run across many of those these days.

2.. For high pressure loads, I used good quality newer brass. I reserve the old and tired brass for low pressure cast bullet shooting. No sense in pushing old guns, cars, cartridges cases or people to the max.

1. Can you tell me how to identify mercuric primers? I'm not sure i have ever seen them.

2. Again good advice


RKJ
Quote:
Originally Posted by liljohnnie View Post
All headstamps are either FA 49 or LC 53 with primer crimp in place. Unless the US military reloaded this stuff i would call it once fired. There are some cases that wobble when chucked up in the drill and spun,those are going to scrap because i suspect a shot out barrel with an abundance of headspace was the last to see them.
The reason i want to anneal the necks is i have heard somewhere that brass can harden with time. Whether that's true or not i don't know but annealing is just one more safety precaution that would give me peace of mind. I don't take lightly that my friend will be shooting my reloads and above all want to safeguard him and his expensive Garand.
I'm a cheapskate as well and if it were my gun i would shoot them in a heartbeat. My friend expressed concern that chamber damage could occur if too many "split necks" are shot through his gun,another reason to anneal i suppose but i think i will skip the acid bath and stick to cleaning by conventional means.
Thanks for the responses so far.
I agree that I wouldn't shoot them in that Garand either. The "Acid bath" is just citric acid, it's found in Kool aid among other food products. It removes the corrosion and doesn't hurt the brass, (I don't believe it's strong enough of an acid to hurt it) but I haven't had any real corroded brass either. I just wanted to clear up the acid thing.
I know that citric acid can be used for removing tarnish,hell we used to use it to unclog toilets when i was in the navy (really). You could also use vinegar too,but i have seen pennies completely dissolve in vinegar and coca-cola (grade school science projects) and i bet citric acid could do the same. Maybe ill take some of the ones that i'm gonna scrap anyway and throw them in the "acid bath" for a while and see what happens.:bigsmyl2:

[NuJudge]

FA 49 and LC 53 are not Mercuric primed. The LC 49 was corrosively primed, and the LC 53 may have been (I'm 1200 miles from home and don't have my reference books, and 53 is close to the date of changeover).

[flounderman]

the primer laquer is red on the corrosive primed cases. anything headstamped 1954 or newer will be non corrosive. if the primers are crimped in, they are once fired military. the only military I know of that were not crimped are national match

[jonk]

I have brass from the early 1900s through the 60s that I regularly shoot and reload.

I would just go for it. Toss any utterly totalled cases. Drop the rest in some citric acid, rinse, and perhaps final tumble.

[liljohnnie]

I suppose i could have done this on my first post but.....
http://i332.photobucket.com/albums/m324/liljohnnie69/Reloading%20Bench/100_0179.jpg
This is what a few of the cases looked like that i consider to be unusable.Deeply pitted and covered with green corrosion over a good part of the body of the case.
http://i332.photobucket.com/albums/m324/liljohnnie69/Reloading%20Bench/100_0180.jpg
Here are the ones that made it next to the ones that didn't. They look very nice for their age and it only took a few hours in the tumbler.
http://i332.photobucket.com/albums/m324/liljohnnie69/Reloading%20Bench/100_0182.jpg
43g of h4895 and topped with a Hornady 168g HPBT Match boolit and we are ready for some live fire.:bigsmyl2:

[jonk]

I think you made the right call. The ones you tossed did look a bit too corroded, even for my cheap rear end.

The others though look just fine.

[RKJ]

Those did look pretty bad, I don't think any amount of Citric acid would have helped those. :) those loaded rounds did look good though. I never heard of using bug juice in the toilets but our DCPO's did use it on the deck drains, it did a great job.

[Sanchez]

Resident metallurgist here.
Those cases are badly dezincified: means the elemental zinc in the brass (a 70/30 alloy of copper/zinc) has been leached-out by chemical activity. Check for small pits (I easily saw them in your pics - especially on those examples from the tumbler), & irregular reddish-brown patches of color.
Upon ignition, these will rupture/leak gas slightly, & usually w/ little catastrophic effect. It's just something to ponder.

Your call of course, but def don't plan on reloading many of those kritters!

[zuke]

I went with Stainless media in a Tumbler's tumbler,Lemmishine,Dove and 4 hour's of tumble time.

http://i807.photobucket.com/albums/yy356/zuke_bucket/DSCF1256.jpg

http://i807.photobucket.com/albums/yy356/zuke_bucket/DSCF1258.jpg

http://i807.photobucket.com/albums/yy356/zuke_bucket/DSCF1257.jpg

http://i807.photobucket.com/albums/yy356/zuke_bucket/DSCF1259.jpg

[liljohnnie]

Resident metallurgist here.
Those cases are badly dezincified: means the elemental zinc in the brass (a 70/30 alloy of copper/zinc) has been leached-out by chemical activity. Check for small pits (I easily saw them in your pics - especially on those examples from the tumbler), & irregular reddish-brown patches of color.
Upon ignition, these will rupture/leak gas slightly, & usually w/ little catastrophic effect. It's just something to ponder.

Your call of course, but def don't plan on reloading many of those kritters!

Thanks Sanchez, I figured there was some sort of elemental change. I'm not going to reload any of the nasty looking ones simply because at least half of the case wall thickness is gone and the other half is probably way too brittle to withstand even reduced loads.
I guess my next question to you would be for cases that have green corrosion on them,how much of the strength of the case is lost? Does it depend on the amount of pitting or has the brass changed at the elemental level causing it to weaken or become brittle? And finally (i know that's 3 questions) if this light blue/green corrosion occurs on the neck of the case (reference zukes pictures) can it be restored to a serviceable condition with annealing or do i need to worry about it at all?
Thanks again.


I went with Stainless media in a Tumbler's tumbler,Lemmishine,Dove and 4 hour's of tumble time.

http://i807.photobucket.com/albums/yy356/zuke_bucket/DSCF1256.jpg

http://i807.photobucket.com/albums/yy356/zuke_bucket/DSCF1258.jpg

http://i807.photobucket.com/albums/yy356/zuke_bucket/DSCF1257.jpg

http://i807.photobucket.com/albums/yy356/zuke_bucket/DSCF1259.jpg

Them's some shiny cases zuke. I had heard that stainless steel media is superior at getting the whole case clean inside and out AND it lasts forever. Other than having to use it wet, is there any other negatives that you can see?

[Sanchez]

liljohnnie,
Have answered-thru per below, after copy/paste from wordpad ('cuz I timed-out!!)
Enjoy!

"I guess my next question to you would be for cases that have green corrosion on them, how much of the strength of the case is lost?"
Ans: If that's a oily, soft green residue on the outside - I'd have to guess that what yer seeing is "verdegris', a chemical compound commonly seen with brass/copper fittings on processed (oiled) leather slings, belts, etc. In this case, it's likely caused from an over-lubed chamber/breech area. It just looks kinda nasty, but as far as I know - has little effect on O/A case strength.

"Does it depend on the amount of pitting or has the brass changed at the elemental level causing it to weaken or become brittle?"
Ans: Ya'll nailed yer own Q here! It's not so much the pitting, but that red "stain" (elemental copper) we see IS an issue & HERE'S WHY: Because the zinc is now gone (ie: brass = approx 70% copper + 30% zinc). Leaching out (chemically removing) the zinc leaves elemental copper. Copper has a bit of strength, but is def not brittle. In fact, copper is just the opposite - very malleable up 'till approx the 1/2 hard range. Regardless: It's scrap bucket time fer them - CAN NOT recommed any further reloading of those kritters.

"And finally (i know that's 3 questions) if this light blue/green corrosion occurs on the neck of the case (reference zukes pictures), can it be restored to a serviceable condition with annealing or do i need to worry about it at all?"
Ans: Per above, am assuming that ya mean the 'light blue/green corrosion' INSIDE the necks here? If so, that blue compound in Zuke's .50 BMG case necks is nothing but copper sulphate, which is a completely different animal! It's caused by reaction to residual bits/traces of (you probably guessed it here) gilding metal jacket material. For the same alchemy reasons as the last answer, this compound won't harm any copper - but will def play heck with the zinc.

"Thanks again."
Ans: My pleasure! It's been a few yrs (OK, maybe a decade) since ANY of that good ol' kollege chem was actually needed for something productive (work notwithstanding, o' course .....) :takinWiz:work

Regards,
Phil T.

[zuke]

Them's some shiny cases zuke. I had heard that stainless steel media is superior at getting the whole case clean inside and out AND it lasts forever. Other than having to use it wet, is there any other negatives that you can see?

None as far as I can see except it's starting to go below freezing here so if I want to do anymore tumbling it'll have to be indoor's.
I threw in some black brass I had actually dug out of the ground at the range and after 8hr's of tumbling they came out a very copper looking bunch.I might keep them for bullet jacket's.
Initial cost was what put me off but if your a target shooter concerned with all the little detail's I can't see you NOT using this system.
It clean's the entire case down to bare brass,like new condition.

[liljohnnie]

Yeah, the price is the determining factor for me i am afraid. I already have 2 tumblers and corn cob is cheap. Maybe when my stuff wears out i'll spring for the better stuff. I'm not overly concerned with spotless brass as long as they are clean enough they're not going to ruin my sizing dies. Those cases are mighty clean though......

[zuke]

I know what you mean, it took me awhile to convince myself over a period of time.
I'll be selling my Lyman polisher and media soon, there's no comparison in finish.

[liljohnnie]

Thanks guys , i don't consider myself an expert on the subject now but i certainly feel like i can make a slightly more educated decision based on the info you have shared with me.

Thanks again ,John

[Shiloh]

THe ones that look loke they have gangrene are history. THe others cleaned up quite nicely indeed!!

Shiloh

[zuke]

Those are shell's from a box full I bought year's ago, and they ALL looked like that.
That there is the before and after pic's.
After a 4 hour tumble,everything come's out looking that good.
I posted them like that to give everyone an idea of what can be done and salvaged.

[zxcvbob]

I can see some little weak corrosion spots in those cases you cleaned up.

Someone gave me a bunch of .30-06 commercial hunting ammo that had been in a flood. I cleaned it up and was shooting it in a bolt-action and some of the ones that looked about like the ones on the left in #21 cracked or split when fired and peppered my face with unburnt powder. Not badly, but it wasn't fun at all. Maybe they were corroded a little worse than yours...

[Linstrum]

I strongly concur with Sanchez, he knows his stuff and those cases in the photo are text-book examples of very badly plug de-zincified brass. You could probably see daylight through the pin holes if you held them up to the light. Take them to the scrap yard and trade them for wheel weights.

I have covered plug de-zincification several times over the years here at Boolits and it should be in the STICKIES section because it does come up fairly often. If there isn't already something there about plug de-zincification, maybe Sanchez could do the honors of adding something to the STICKIES section since he has the metallurgical background.

The International Harvester Corporation Garands were supposedly made to higher standards than the others due to an inspection snafu caused by professional jealousy over International Harvester getting the contract to make them. I don't know how true that is, but the first Garand I ever got my hands on was an International Harvester and it was just beautifully made. Every International Harvester Garand I have seen that hasn't been thrashed has been just gorgeous!


rl862

[liljohnnie]

I was talking to my friend about his I.H. Garand the other day and he informed me that he has never shot it. The person he bought it from said when he got it the only usable part was the receiver. I don't know who the artist was that refurbished this gun but the work is top notch. I just hope i get to see him shoot it for the first time.:bigsmyl2:

[Sanchez]

Linstrum: pm sent.
Thanks !!