Thursday, November 10, 2016

Budget Ammo

If you had the wherewithal, why would you ever feed your gun things like Tula ammo.  Or worse?  Other than maybe as a test to see if the gun will eat it when you are desperate?

The steel case stuff.   If one box or lower quality ammo costs $9 and the Federal costs $13, ok, that is $4.  But if you don't need to pinch pennies that bad, why submit your gatt to the punishment?

Sure, you want to know what ammos the gun likes.  There is that.  I get that.  Or maybe you are a famous gun writer celebrity and are doing it for SCIENCE!  I undestand that too

Steel case stuff isn't the best for your extractor, anyway.  And those brands often stink.  Why do it?  Sure your sports car will run on that Mom and Pop gas station 86 Octane stuff, and you save some money, but...  I don't even like to put that in my old truck. 

And it's not just the combloc steel krep.  Plenty of budget brasses out there, sold cheap and loose in an ammo can at the gunshow.  Maybe you should pop for the extra coupla bucks...

5 comments:

B said...

Why would steel case damage an extractor?

Dimensions are the same for cases made of brass or steel....


Or am I missing something here?

New Jovian Thunderbolt said...

the steel is harder than brass. Ever seen extractor marks on brass cases? The spring steel extractor left those. Steel cases are softer than the extractor, but they still mark 'back' more than brass.

Counter Jockey said...

I buy Tul only for my WASR-. I have a WASR- so I can hold it up and say "Wolverines!" like I did on Tuesday night after Trump won PA. (Several beers may have been consumed by that point)

abnormalist said...

Honestly I run a lot of steel in my AR and only steel in my AK and SKS. They don't even know brass cased ammo exists (and dont you DARE tell them!)

Reason is simple, price and quantity.

On the AR I can replace a barrel and extractor for far less than the cost difference in ammo, and the stuff I like (62gr JSP silver bear about $0.31 ppr) runs so much less than comparable 62gr softpoint that I can build an entire gun from the savings. It puts deer down without issue, so it does exactly what I want for the money.

FMJ? yeah even there. $0.207 a shot for cheap steel, vs $0.30 for cheap fmj (cheapest I can find right now) your $100 bucks different for $100 rounds. The barrel can be replaced ever few k at that price. Since its not like I depend on this rifle for my life, or even for food generally, pin point accuracy isnt required. Even with cheap stuff I can still generally hold 2-3" at 100 yards.

Why pay more when I can shoot more for the same money?

Same argument for reloading my handguns. I can shoot 45 auto reloads for $0.12 a pop, and 44 mag for $0.17 for my cheap ones, and for hunting loads in the $0.22 ppr range. Even crazy hot expensive 300gr JHP runs generally under $0.50 ppr. I can shoot 2-3 times as much for the same expenditure.

Tam said...

Having shot a pissload of steel-case ammo through lots of guns, I think most of the people kvetching about it are all wet.

And that includes the Tamara of eight or ten years ago.