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Non-Corrosive 8mm Mauser Ball Ammo
givette
Member Posts: 10,886 ✭
What is a "given" as being [8mm Mauser Ball] non-corrosive? S&B? PMC? Prvi? any particular brand/date headstamp I should seek to have a "reasonable guarantee" of it being non-corrosive? Thanks, Joe
Comments
I shoot mostly corrosive with no problems at all in bolt guns.
Wulfmann
"Fools learn from their own mistakes. I learn from the mistakes of others"
Otto von Bismarck
This barrel is (appears?) unfired. Shines like a mirror. I'd love to keep it looking that way.
What can I do while still at the range vis-a-vis bore protection during the trip home [two hour time lapse], before I am able to do the hot soap-and-water routine? Thanks again, Joe
EDIT:
Remember that brown, oily military bore cleaner? That stuff in the 1/2 pint can that smelled terrible? Was that originally intended for corrosive ammo? Thanks. Joe
BE SAFE!! Buffler
The residue from corrosove priming compounds is a salt. The residue is hygroscopic, that is it absorbs moisture from the air. Wet salty residue in your nice shiny bore can cause rusting fairly quickly under the wrong conditions. I am fortunate to be able to shoot most times reasonable close to home, where I clean thoroughly and promptly.
Many cleaning potions do not dissolve the residue salts. Most anything water-based will. The old-time GI bore cleaner, the kind with the very powerful odor, was formulated for cleaning corrosive priming residues; it was water-based. Petroleum-based solvents don't work to remove the salts.
So a couple water-wet patches first, followed by your ordinary powder-solvent and metal-fouling removal bore solvents will be all that's required. Before you leave the range run a couple water-based patches followed by a couple patches with regular bore cleaners, this will hold you just fine till you get home for a thorough cleaning. There is still a lot of surplus military ammo with corrosive primers, and it is fine ammo, often at great prices, and I get and shoot all I can.
IF using in a semi-auto, the cleaning process is made far more difficult, and needs to include all the gas passages & pistons, etc. For that reason (being inherently lazy) I very seldom will use surplus 8mm Mauser ammo in my Egyptian FN-49!
I have a beautiful Finnish M39 SkY. I was cleaning with a patch of ammonia/water and the stuff ran down the stock for 3 inches and ate the finish right off.
I do what the Marines did in World War 2.
Put a saucepan on the floor with a quart of hot water in it. Put a squirt of dish soap in the water.
Remove the bolt. Put the muzzle in the water.
Put a patch on the cleaning rod, and run it down the bore all the way to the muzzle. Draw it back to the chamber.
You are pumping hot soapy water through your barrel.
Repeat ten times, bye bye to corrosive salts, and lots of other black gunk.
Run two dry patches down the bore and then clean as usual.
And, I'm going to the dreaded E-bay and picking up some MILSURP bore cleaner for the range. Glad to know it's water based. Best, Joe
Yep, the stuff we use to toss?[:0] That's what I've been using in my Garands, but it's getting harder to find. On a side note, I have two M44 Mosins that I've been shooting the really nasty corrosive surplus in. One I've cleaned with Hoppes #9, the other with water, followed with the Hoppes. Couple thousand rounds so far, and no difference between the two.
Joe, on milsurp 8mm ammo, if you are shooting a self loader, Romanian light ball is the best pick. It leaves a black soot in the gun, but it's all sure fire with no surprises, and the easiest on your action.
Yugoslav would be my second pick, but they have thick hard primers that a lot of rifles, both semi and bolt, won't pop without a heavier hammer/firing pin spring.