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Old 01-10-2020, 07:54 PM
foxhunter foxhunter is offline
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Default classic case of reloading contamination

after reloading for 50 years I have finally had a case of contamination. shot the xp-100 6 br this morning with several loads. had a couple .50 groups at 100 and was real happy until I shot my deer load. 3 out of 5 loads either did not fire or hang fired.
my first thoughts was empty cases or bad primers, pulling the bullets on the remaining loads was an eye opener. i'll let you judge from the pictures I post, needless to say I have no idea how this happened. the last 2 cartridges I pulled the bullets on hissed at me with escaping gas. there is a pale blue contaminant on the bottom of the bullets and the inside of the cases, primers looked contaminated as well.
one of the cartridges when pulled down's power was a yellow color and the rest was dark gray and some light gray. the powder didn't look like N130 but flakey like bullseye.
think I will have to pitch all the cases out of an abundance of caution.




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Last edited by foxhunter; 01-11-2020 at 02:20 PM.
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Old 01-10-2020, 07:54 PM
foxhunter foxhunter is offline
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__________________
I post here because it keeps the riffraff away.
'Life's Journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in
a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting, Holy sh!t... What a Ride!

Last edited by foxhunter; 01-11-2020 at 02:24 PM.
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Old 01-10-2020, 08:26 PM
Hog Patrol Hog Patrol is offline
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How old and what were the environmental conditions the ammo was stored in?

I've seen that on old military ammo.
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Old 01-10-2020, 08:32 PM
SEM SEM is offline
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powder deteriorated
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Old 01-10-2020, 09:03 PM
Bill K Bill K is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Hog Patrol View Post
How old and what were the environmental conditions the ammo was stored in?

I've seen that on old military ammo.
Same question as Hog Patrol, and also how old or what condition was the VV130 in when you reloaded those case's ? It had to be pretty old or contaminated for this too occur. Bill K
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Old 01-10-2020, 09:26 PM
foxhunter foxhunter is offline
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been using powder from that canister for the past year without a problem. 6 br was loaded about 12 months ago. conditions are the same as all my powders, it is somewhat humid here but not bad
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Old 01-10-2020, 09:33 PM
Hog Patrol Hog Patrol is offline
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Green is copper and /or brass oxidation, exposed to air or moisture. I would surmise the humidity got in to the case when they were loaded.
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Old 01-11-2020, 03:29 AM
qwk qwk is offline
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This is a somewhat common thing with VV powders when you let loaded ammo sit for a while.
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Old 01-11-2020, 04:18 AM
ben lurkin ben lurkin is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Hog Patrol View Post
Green is copper and /or brass oxidation, exposed to air or moisture. I would surmise the humidity got in to the case when they were loaded.
^ this. The white powdery stuff is metal oxides. Moisture or some acid residue somehow got inside those cases. Did you wet tumble these in SS pins by chance? Lemishine is citric acid any residual left on your cases could do this if they weren’t rinsed afterwards.

You can probably salvage the cases by wet tumbling again. Those ss pins do a good job cleaning inside the case too.
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Old 01-11-2020, 12:13 PM
fosters fosters is offline
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I had a somewhat similar thing occur 3 or 4 years ago. During deer season here in SW Missouri, taking a mid day break from looking for deer, and put out the crow call, got out the 17 Ackley Hornet. Had a very successful dead crow count for about an hour and a half...the thing that got my attention was that on one shot the noise level was way more than normal for the 17ah, and the crow blew apart more like a 17 Rem result than a 17ah result.....opened the very hard to open bolt, looked at the empty case, the primer fell out, the primer pocket was huge, and the smell was really bad. These rounds had been loaded for quite some time, with N120, Some loads did the same thing, some did the normal thing.....very puzzling.....so back to the reloading room...

My good friend that loaded the rounds is the most meticulous handloader ever. Dispenses each powder charge in a Herrell's, then weighs on a scale. He got the original 8 lb. plastic bottle of the N120 and got to looking at it. The purple lid had turned white, and the powder itself stunk beyond description. Got to looking at lots of the other 17ah rounds we had loaded and discovered green corrosion around the case mouth on lots of them...pulled bullets, stunk real bad, weighed the powder, all correct weight. Back to looking at the 8lb plastic bottle......no lot number code on the label anywhere at all.....disposed of the balance of the 8lb jug....

We now get the `N120 in one lb bottles and only load what we think we are going to use over the next few months. But going back to the original 8lb jug, it went to stinking and obviously going bad before it was ever loaded. So I have to think that it was a defective batch of 120 form the start. The newer 120 we have is not misbehaving either from smell or when shooting. Somethin's different! Tried to communicate with the mfgr, got nothing...

Back then, whenever it was, I posted about it here on the forum....the whole story is here somewhere....but this is the basics of it.
Steve
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