I kinda stummbled into some bandoleers of 30-06 AP (black tip) rounds. They are in 7 bandoleers each pouch is packed with an 8 round Garand clips and housed in a cardboard sleeve. The bandoleers all have the same lot # on them and the rounds are stamped '45 LC. I kinda figured there were a gazillion old ww11 rounds out there but asking around they are getting more rare I supose? Can anyone tell me if I should put them away or shoot them ? Still good? Corrosive? Thanks

They are definitely corrosive.
I'd suspect they'd shoot reasonably well- most of 'em, anyway.
As to whether you should shoot them or save them, I'll leave that to someone with knowledge of ammo collecting....

Ask the experts here: http://cartridgecollectors.org/

Looks like you've been there already.
Bye
Jack

Corrosive, but clean your gun and so what. Still good?? Most probably. Or you can sell them to machinist, and Schools. In a lathe class at the U of I we cut out the Carbide tip and pressed them into our punches. They work Great!!

THANKS for all the input. Checked around on a few boards and just trying get some info on the rounds, history etc. I had thought before that a very large amount of these rounds existed and were readily avalible, I seem to be mistaken and thats why I came to these forums to ask the people that "KNOW"

Thanks again all and have a great Holiday!!!!

THANKS for all the input. Checked around on a few boards and just trying get some info on the rounds, history etc. I had thought before that a very large amount of these rounds existed and were readily avalible, I seem to be mistaken and thats why I came to these forums to ask the people that "KNOW"

Thanks again all and have a great Holiday!!!!

Going to mention this for what it is worth...just stuff I ran acrss in a differnt search.

Was looking at a discussion from the early 1950's about brass case construction. In the late 1940's, a fast prodcution method for 30-06 using extrusion was adopted for some military cases (the other mehod, more tradtional, is drawing). The debte centered around the crystallian structure of the case heads (with drawn cases being the stronger).

Mentioned is that the AP M2 30-06 load ran aqt 10% higher pressure than the military's max. for M-2 ball. Doesn't sound like a bunch (55K vs. 50K) but it was enough to start some people researching into why some lots of AP ball showed expanded primer pockets when fired.


So i got to thinking. A lot of old-timers (WWII vets) would tell me not to fire AP in my Garnad. I'd done it to no ill effects I could detect (years ago, AP ammo was pretty common) and had a great time punching holes in steel objects. I didn't realoda t the time...but when i did a few years later, I still had some of those empty cases.

Some were a little loose on a new primer...not -falling-out-loose, but noticably looser than other cases...but over the years, I hadn't kept track of which headstaps corresonded to whaich loads (fired off a good number of tracers and ball loads as well as the AP stuff).

SO...why were the old guys so convienced that AP was a bad thing to fire in your rifle? Evidently, in a rifle set up "right and tight" it is not a problem...but a well worn example set up "GI loose" it just might be. The extra 5K pressure reported for AP might make a difference in a well worn gun and if the weaker designed exruded case was true, the combination of worn rifle, extra pressure, weaker head could be enough to casue a problem.

Could the vets have had problems with the primers falling out of the spent cases and fouling-up their Garands? At the worst possible time? When I first got my Armalite AR-15, I shot some new Winchester USA ammo in it. Had a couple of jams and failure to fire for no apparent reason. New rifle, had no experience with it yet. When I got home I took it apart to clean and found three or four primers inside the trigger group. Went back to the range the next day and, sure enough, there was a whole bunch of .223 brass with no primers! Put away all I had of the Winchester USA (which I returned) and fired with other brands with not a problem. Bad batch of ammo? Tight new rifle? Don't know, but haven't had any problems since then. Shoots about an inch 5-shot groups at 100 yards with Federal Match ammo.

The didn't mention primers falling out, believe that ammo has a pretty good primer crimp, so even if they rattled around a bit, wouldn't fall out. Mentioned that the AP ammo tended to drive the action a bit harder when clean and when fould would expand enugh to have the extractor tear through the rim rather than yank the case out.

NOt really sure if the US had specific high alititude air craft ammo or not...know the Germans did and had a color code (which may be useless after some importer mass-cleaned grungy ammo). The 8mm and the guns that fired them eviently needed a bit more kick when the elevation/temperature was so cold.

Your case sounds more like faulty case hardness...the heads were soft. Happens to some amatures when they anneal a case without protecting the case head, but it can be a fatory fault. Mark up another reason that the militray doesn't bother to polish cases...like to see that annealed coloration at the neck.

First off, if you haven't destroyed the OEM packing on them bandoleers and everything is as it was made, I'd suggest hanging onto them because at some point they will bring a very good return. All too often people pass off stuff as "oh, there's a gazillion of those things" then all of sudden the gazillion turns into very few because all the morons destroyed what they had. Rarity bring price.

Example of above is the tens of thousands of arisaka rifles with all the proper markings they dumped into the sea and the general opion held by the American's at the time of "japanese junk". Now, one of those fully marked rifles in good condition will bring a hefty price tag and there's now a lot vets wondering why they were so stupid. Same goes for the people who took mint condition nazi marked mausers and "sporterized" them in essence building a $250 gun out of a now $600 to $1500 collector rifle....but hey, there was a gazillion of them....who knew?

Word of note on ammo collectors, there is a whole lotta counterfitting going on now too. Just informed a couple months ago that a few less than honest ammo dealers are color coding standard ball to make them appear as tracer, AP, high pressure test, match, ect. to bring considerably higher prices. There are at least two web sites I found a while back explaining what to look for on counterfit ammo, not only color coding but also head stamps. I do know most of the counterfit is being sold at shows where it's a cash transaction.

Save that ammo. Anything WWII is becoming quite valuable. I remember when the WWII M1 Garand ammo belt could be bought for $1.00. Look at the price for an original now. I also remember getting the AP ammo for .01 a round. The advice then was not to fire it for the same rasons stated here and just pull the bullets and use the brass for reloading.