Split case necks on factory loaded ammo

R

Ricky Bobby

New member
I have had a Win70 in 30-06 sitting in the back of my safe for quite a few years, until this morning! I recently purchased some good glass from another member here and got around to mounting it this morning and did some shooting. I had a blast and I'm looking forward to shooting my 06 a whole lot more than I have in the past! Anyway, I rooted around and found some old Remington factory ammo that I've had for probably 15 years and decided to shoot it up. After all, I'm into reloading now and can always use some brass for reloads! When I started shooting I noticed that one of the ejected case necks was split after I had fired, so I started to investigate. Come to find out, I found 3 more of the loaded rounds with split necks sitting in the factory box. Is this something that is common to find when dealing with old ammo? I can understand the neck splitting when fired, but why would they be split from just sitting in the box unfired? I easily pulled the bullets from the split cases and dumped the powder on the ground, setting these cases off to the side to be pitched later. Now I'm wondering if I should reload the other cases, even if they don't have a split neck? Would they be good to go if I maybe tried to anneal them? Help me out guys, I have never ran into this before. Thanks, Rick.
 
Anneal them. I had that happen once on a run of new brass I reloaded. Can't remember if it was Remington or WW, but it was only with one batch.
 
I figured annealing would do the trick! I have never annealed before, but now I have a reason to try it. If it doesn't work out it isn't the end of the world, it is pretty old brass to begin with(but only once fired). I will have about 70 rounds to attempt the annealing process with. Wish me luck!
 
If it's only 20 cases or so, I would shoot it up for practice ammo and scrap the brass. Annealing could possibly save it, but it's not worth the trouble and I would not want it mixed in with all the good brass I have. The chance that it's all defective is very high. I doubt that it got that way from age.
 
Sodak, it was always stored in a safe with a humidifier. I can't imagine that this ammo went bad from aging! It must have been bad from the very beginning! It was Remington 180gr Core-Lokt pointed soft point ammo. It still had the Sports Authority price tag on it for $8.99 a box of 20. I wish ammo could still be had for that price!
 
There was a run of Winchster brass doing that within the last couple of years (my memory in not the best on actual time)...But it was reported by enough people that I had to think it was just a bad formula used by the initial brass producer...
 
I got some once fired Winchester 22-250 brass that was purchased and shot last year and 10% of it was split in the shoulder area. The ammo was the White box stuff.At first I thought my buddies gun had issues but it was just sorry brass.
 
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