Why aren't steel casings reloadable?

[Mike Irwin]

"Workers at the Eau Clair, Wisconsin plant believe they made cases with EC head stamps, they claim they did not make many of them before they changed to EW. It means nothing to me but this is their story and I am sticking with it."

Headstamp bunters were ground in the machine and maintenance shops located at each ordnance plant.

It's possible that a worker at Eau Claire ground such a bunter by accident.

Chris Punnett, in his book on the .30-06, claims that EC marked .30-06 ammunition was produced at Eau Claire. As far as I know, he's the only person ever to make that claim, and I have never seen ammo so headstamped.

If such ammunition was produced, it was produced unofficially.

The facts were, are, and remain:

Evansville Chrysler was assigned the EC headstamp/production code before United States Rubber became an ammunition contractor.

US Rubber's Eau Claire, Wisconsin, plant was NEVER assigned a headstamp/production code other than EW.

The US government assigned headstamp/production codes as a means of conclusively and uniquely identifying the plant/contractor that produced the ammunition.

The US government did NOT assign headstamp/production codes as a means of placating corporate sensibilities for anyone. Had they deigned to do so, they would have stroked US Rubber's corporate ego by assigning them a headstamp/production code of USR, EUR, or something else that incorporated a sense of the corporate entity.

[44 AMP]

Certain non wearing parts that required precision machining required brass.

I'll tell you another place brass gets used, and that is "wearing parts" in some systems. Gear systems (low speed applications, mostly). Brass is used to BE the "wearing part". Mortars (and other artillery systems) us brass gearing in their traverse and elevation mechanisms. One of the gears will be brass, the other steel. This is because brass wears faster than steel. Sounds foolish, I know, why deliberately make a part out of softer metal that will wear faster???

The reason is actually sound, and rather clever when you think about it. Yes, the brass part wears out first, and when it does, you replace it. With a brass on steel gear system, you only need to replace the worn brass gear. With steel on steel, BOTH gears wear out approximately equally, and you need to replace both of them when worn. My Grandfather's cousin worked cutting the large brass gears that opened and closed the large front doors of LSTs (Landing Ship, Tank -known to their crews as Large, Slow Target) during WWII. I worked on mortar T&E mechanisms in the 70s. That's how they're made, one brass gear (often a big one) the rest steel.

The question on my mind has always been, why did we continue, year after year, to dump megatons of brass into trenches and fields, rather than devising steel components? We would have saved hundreds of millions of dollars to further the war efforts in every other way.

Remember WHO was doing the "dumping". The military. The same people that dump/destroy millions of dollars of serviceable equipment when perceived outmoded, obsolete, or just "not worth the cost of shipping it home".

While I don't have actual numbers, I think its quite possible we destroyed/dumped more planes in the months after VJ day than we lost to enemy action during WWII. Entire squadrons, grenade in the cockpit, bulldozed into a trench, or pushed off the carrier deck into the sea. Compared to things like that, the cost we lose from not picking up our fired brass is meaningless.

[briandg]

Everything that you are saying there is true, I can see that. I've noticed it before.

Brass on steel wear goes even further I guess, steel on steel getting for example a thousand cycles before both are shot is probably terribly inefficient. Replacing brass on steel, since that steel will last through many cycles of brass would in the long run cost more in various resources. I don't know what shop capabilities they had on board the big ships throughout history, but they had to be independent. A ship has to be able to keep itself functioning during warfare at sea. I'm not sure what that would require, but if they had to have a small scale foundry to cast bearings or other pArts, space would surely have been made. The machinist can p a city of a carrier is probably greater than a lot of factories concerning quality of work. Cutting a new set of hydraulic parts to the necessary tolerances doesn't happen at AutoZone.

I've got to argue with you on the last point. Running obsolete and banged up battle tanks into the sea and scuttling a ship is waste disposal.

Otoh, heaving ton after ton of fired brass casings into a scrap pile was a cost of doing daily business. It was being sent and discarded, and every cartridge was a drag on resources.

If the army could have switched from brass to steel, they would have. Four major wars have been fought with brass, and we have not used those opportunities for change.

We used syringes and needles hundreds of times, nothing was scrapped out. But all of that time, we toyed with steel, but never changed.

Since a shopper at Wal-Mart doesn't go through the solid vetting process, steel gets a pass.

I'd really like to see a complete listing of the requirements for military ammo. Temperature ranges that it must withstand, environmental contaminants, flexibility, acceptable performance with out of spec ammo or chambers, that sort of thing.

There must be a reason that steel is unacceptable to the techs at the decision making level or we would have changed.

[briandg]

One of the reasons I referred to non wearing parts was all of the objects I've owned and seen that were made of brass, cast and filed, so forth. The clock outside my door is all brass. Surveying equipment, etc, machining precise brass can even be done by hand filing.

America was honestly blessed by the eastern coal beds and the huge iron mines. The industrial age started here.

I read about steel production in the 1700s, people stacking charcoal and ore in retorts an cooking it up a few tons at a time. It's incredible how far we have gone.

[44 AMP]

I don't know what shop capabilities they had on board the big ships throughout history, but they had to be independent

MOSTLY independent. Which is why there are supply ships and service ships as well. Larger ships have a very well equipped machine shop, and 'machinist mates" to run them. They do stop short of having a foundry, instead they have a supply of blanks (metal stock) that they can machine replacement parts out of, if its something that no premade parts are stocked for. Bearing, and such things would be stocked as already manufactured replacement parts.

Carriers, in particular, are well set up for this, because they are not only keeping the ship running in combat, but the aircraft, as well.

Yes, dumping all kinds of stuff as waste disposal is the term used. Just remember that perfectly serviceable equipment can, was, and is still today declared "waste" and disposed of, along with all the stuff that is actually waste.

After victory over Japan, a LOT of piston engine aircraft were disposed of, declared obsolete (and therefore waste) because jets were the coming thing. Entire squadrons of fighter planes were tossed. On land, generally destroyed, then buried, at see pushed overboard to sink. Multi engine bombers and other bigger planes were usually cut up and sold as scrap, when their utility was at an end. They were often retained in service for some time when the fighters were scrapped, as piston engine bombers could also serve adequately as transport and patrol aircraft, even in the jet age.

If the army could have switched from brass to steel, they would have.

They did "try it out", as info in this thread details, some steel case .45acp ammo was made in 42-43. I have heard of small lots of .30 carbine steel cased ammo also, though I've never seen any.

As far as I know, no other calibers were attempted, as production items. And in 44 we dropped the limited steel case production we did use, and went "back" to brass for all our small arms.

Other nations, (Nazi Germany and the USSR, primarily) used huge amounts of steel cased ammo, and the Soviets kept on doing it, and Russia still does it today. We don't. Why???

PERHAPS, tis because we recognize that brass is a little better, and consider it worth the cost??

There must be a reason that steel is unacceptable to the techs at the decision making level or we would have changed.

With small arms ammo, part of the reason might be simple inertia. OR it might be the hidden costs, like the cost of making and running the machinery to make steel small arms cases, vs the cost of the already existing stuff for brass. Our 105mm tank gun (M60 & M1) used steel cases, and I believe the 120mm in the new M1s uses a semi combustible case with a steel base.

It is possible that changing over to steel cased small arms ammo simply isn't considered cost effective. Clearly the Soviets, and former Soviets have a different opinion.

America was honestly blessed by the eastern coal beds and the huge iron mines. The industrial age started here.

We were blessed in that regard, its true. Also blessed with the isolation of the oceans and no militarily aggressive neighbor countries that posed serious threats.

To be correct though, the industrial age didn't start here, it started in England (followed rapidly by certain areas in Europe). When it got here, we gave it a tremendous boost, with American ingenuity and our natural resource, but historians will tell you the industrial age started over there, then came to America.

[briandg]

Regarding the industrial age you're right. They had metal, tools, factories, and their own engineers and brilliant minds. We took what was available, developed interchangeable parts, mass production,and took Industry to new levels.

Honestly, I think that Asia did the same thing we did. Exploited existing knowledge and the best technology they could gat, then turned their existing resources into trade goods. Looking back into the fifties, every tiny piece of junk was Japanese, and China exported nothing of value. It didn't take long for the Japanese to become a literal world industrial superpower, but now, the mountain has leveled.

I can't really understand what China really means. It generally produces trash. Stuff meant to go straight to the landfill. What durable goods they make are a riddle.

[Mike Irwin]

"Other nations, (Nazi Germany and the USSR, primarily) used huge amounts of steel cased ammo, and the Soviets kept on doing it, and Russia still does it today. We don't. Why???"

I already covered that.

Because the United States, and friendly nations in the western hemisphere, primarily Chilie, have MASSIVE copper and zinc reserves, which FAR outstrip anything that was available in the former Soviet bloc.

During World War II the primary reason why the US began to investigate steel case ammo was because of the threat of German U Boats.

Even before the war the US was importing significant quantities of copper ore into the United States. It was cheaper in a lot of cases (same story back then as today, producing in America costs more than producing in a third world nation), and with the massive upspike in demand for copper for war production domestic production couldn't keep pace.

Brass casings do have certain advantages over steel.

Better obturation in automatic weapons, easier production all around, easier storage characteristics (more forgiving of temperature and humidity swings), etc.

Not tremendous advantages, but enough that a wholesale switch to steel casings has never been seen to be warranted.

There's only one western nation I can think of that currently uses steel cased ammo -- France -- even though NATO standard specifications require the use of brass cased ammo.

The reason France went with steel cases for its 5.56 is because of the action type on the FAMAS assault rifle. It uses a delayed blowback system, which puts FAR more stress on cartridge cases. In the early days of testing they couldn't get it to work with brass cased ammo; there was a very high failure rate where the extractors tore through rims and sometimes the case head came off.

[briandg]

I have a lot of personal questions about the drawbacks to both types. I feel pretty certain that the lack of flexibility with steel, and a certain brittleness of some types, especially when cold may cause trouble. Although steel is always lacquered, if it starts to rust, that's not good. Unless exposed to a corrosive agent, from my experience, brass stands up better. You can see that at a range. Talking in terms of artillery, what pressures are generated at the breech, and would the initial blast seal the case to the chamber? The case mouth has to be heavy gauge, right? What sort of kaboom would it take to force it against the chamber walls, and given the springiness of most steel, how much gas is going to leak back as the pressure is reduced?

Better minds than mine made the decision. I guess that I could dig into some of the books I have from that period.

My book on gunsmithing by James Howe made me literally shiver. The guy had chapters on making tools. Making them by hand. Cutting your mills, checker files, rifling jigs, etc. There wasn't a brownells back then, and one had to make anything that wasn't commonly available. We really are a spoiled lot, need a bedding scraper? It's a click away.

[44 AMP]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't France the only "NATO" nation that never actually formally joined NATO??

I'm pretty sure they weren't actual NATO members back in the 70s, though I don't know if that changed since.

According to what we heard back in those days, France didn't sign on to NATO so they could retain independent control of their nuclear weapons.

Most of us back then figured that no matter the officially stated reason, the real reason was that the French detest being legally required to have to work with, or cooperate with anyone (particularly former enemies) unless they WANT to.

[Mike Irwin]

France was one of the 12 founding members of NATO.

According to Wikipedia...

"France withdrew from the integrated military command in 1966 to pursue an independent defense system but returned to full participation on 3 April 2009."

[F. Guffey]

I find nothing entertaining about shooting steel cases, I want my cases to have imbed ability; reloaders claim there is nothing they can do to cut down on case travel, if that is true I want nothing between the case and chamber but air. And that brings me back to case imbed ability, if there is something between the case and chamber that is not air I want it to embed into the case.

I have steel cases, I have 45 ACP ammo that has brass cases and jacketed bullets, problem I can pick up the ammo with a magnet. I assume the bullets are not lead jacketed, I do not have enough curiosity to peal the jacket. When it comes to full boxes of ammo liker matching sets.

F. Guffey

[briandg]

Regarding that, I can confirm it. I was working with extremely low power loads in 30-06. A medium speed powder, about 30% comparable charge weights. At one point, I started getting a slight whiff of ammonia smell at the breech, and flakes of unburned powder were dropping into the chamber.

The case was not fully obturating and allowing gas to slip past, and unburned powder in the chamber was stamping a leopard spot pattern on the brass.

[F. Guffey]

The case was not fully obturating and allowing gas to slip past, and unburned powder in the chamber was stamping a leopard spot pattern on the brass.

When trying to get involved in a conversation that involves factors I find it a waste of time. anyhow, I do not want anything between the chamber and case when things get serious. When the case does expand the air between the case and chamber has to get out of the way fast, meaning what little air I have between the chamber and case gets out of the way in a hurry. Because I do not live in a sterile environment. Dirt, grit and grime leaving with the air can dull the shinny finish of my chamber, I would like to avoid that because I want 100% contact between the case and chamber; and I want to stop case travel.

Stop case travel; as described by reloaders the case is driven forward by the firing pin and then makes the return trip when fired. As always I am the fan of cutting down on all that case travel.

F. Guffey

[F. Guffey]

I've got to argue with you on the last point. Running obsolete and banged up battle tanks into the sea and scuttling a ship is waste disposal.

Even after the war nothing changed; I made an effort to find one of the old Clippers, the last person I talked to said something like: "You mean the planes named the 'CHINA CLIPPER',. the 'AFRICAN CLIPPER' etc, like the ones I walked the wings when checking the radio antennas?" Anyhow; she was the radio operator on the AFRICAN CLIPPER. I did not think she was heavy enough to walk the wings on windy days and she did not appreciate the suggestion. (Long story). She said the planes were towed out to sea, the plugs were removed and then they disappeared.

I told her that was almost as sad as the story about all of the PT boats, the PT boats were run together and then set on fire. There was a story about the boats being worn out, when I heard that one I told them I was told it was termites.

F. Guffey

[briandg]

Some of that stuff was in the end, junk. Mechanical parts on last legs, obsolete designs, useless for anything but battle. In a lot of cases, really, they weren't even worth towing off to reclaim the metal.

It's a great irony that kids were handling their toys, their bikes, anything that they could scrounge up over to the scrap drives, while over in the war zone, things were being cast aside since there was no point, and eventually, driven into the sea. the metal from my uncle's bicycle may, in fact, be sitting off of the beaches, rusting.

My wife and I sometimes discuss this, for example, when I seriously, really, cross my heart and hope to spit, saw a 1970s chevette going down the road. That thing should have been turned into a reef twenty years ago?

[Mike Irwin]

"It's a great irony that kids were handling their toys, their bikes, anything that they could scrounge up over to the scrap drives"

For the most part, the scrap drives of World War II didn't do much for the war effort.

Much of the metals that were turned in "to build tanks and aircraft" weren't the right composition to be useful for such items.

The exceptions were rubber and tin. Both were critical materials, and supplies of both had been largely cut off by the Japanese, so those items were crucial.

In fact, gasoline rationing wasn't about conserving fuel. It was about conserving rubber.

The real purpose of scrap drives was to foster a sense of unity among the American populace.

[F. Guffey]

My wife and I sometimes discuss this,

I could not have been older than 6 when the war ended, during the war I pulled a little red wagon to dump sights, somehow I would manage a can opener; I would cut the bottom of cans so they could be flattened. After loading the wagon I would pull the wagon to town to trade the metal cans for movie tickets.

Same for paper drives, I would clean out garages at motels for the paper. Poor? I remember one hot day the line at the movie emptied my wagon, no one had shoes so they had to stand on my paper.

On the way home I heard the army/navy store was giving away gas mask, what kid did not need a gas mask? so I got one, they placed it over my head and I took off. It did not occur to me I could have placed the canister in the wagon and I did not consider how annoying a kid can be while dragging the canister with all of that noise.

And then there was that day that made being me fun, it was one of those rare days I had the opportunity to ride the bus home from town. I was sitting one the curb waiting for the bus; and next to me was a big dog. A man walked up to where I was sitting and asked me if my dog bit, I said no. The man then reached down to pet the dog? Anyhow, the dog latched onto his hand. It had to hurt, the man was angry at me; he said to me; "I thought you said your dog does not bite?", it was about this time I explained to the man that dog was not my dog. It just seems to me he should have first determine if that was my dog.

F. Guffey

[Don Fischer]

I think as handloader's we often do thing's we shouldn't in an effort to make some point of handloading easier or less expensive, myself included! I would not even shoot a steel case cartridge in any of my rifle's. If you figure out what a new factory case cost's over the life of the case, it don't get much less expensive than that. I don't shoot steel bullets either. In my opinion. and it is opinion, shooting steel bullet's through a steel barrel with the bullet being groove diameter is asking for trouble. Now I've never done that either so I could be wrong. But finding out I'm right in the first place could get very expensive. Only metal I'll shoot through my barrel's is metal I'm sure is softer than the barret!

[briandg]

Mike, it's amazing the things that come up here. You're right, the contractors would be producing steel by thousands of tons from ore, and a few hundred pounds from Clinton Ohio may have never even made it to the war. I know that scrap eventually works it's way through, but we're a real obstacle.

My sister in law threw away aluminum cans, but she kept the pull tabs. We are an incredibly wealthy nation. Kids scavenge for metals an battlezones.

Right now, GSA auctions has a batch of brass, used le brass, 3,750 pounds. They sell many lots that are much bigger. It's common for them to find a yard full of scrap, and auction off a few tons of scrap FOB where it stands. Sometimes it's just garbage, once in a while it's actually useful materials.

Generally,the auctions are useless. One lot they sold was a half pallet of batteries, used, non rechargeable, etc, listed under electronics, rather than scrap

[Mike Irwin]

I should say that a lot of the scrap collected during the drives didn't end up DIRECTLY contributing to the war in the shape of weapons and the like.

Most of the stuff very likely ended up going into items that were produced for the home front, where content composition wasn't critical.

Where a lot of that scrap iron collected from US sources likely ended up was as galvanized iron plumbing pipe.

A huge amount of domestic construction went on during the war, both for military bases and training facilities and also housing for war workers.

Since copper was one of the most critical war time materials, it couldn't be used in plumbing pipe, so there was a bit return to galvanized iron.

[44 AMP]

During the war there was a law (or at least a regulation) that banned SLICED BREAD.

The idea was to conserve supplies of the high grade steel used in the slicing machine's blades for more important wartime use. No idea if it actually "worked" (made any measurable or significant difference) or not, but after the war, things returned to normal.

[briandg]

That sounds like one of the token gestures.

My grandmother kept the first section of every wartime episode of the Omaha newspaper, and I read them all a few times.

One of the things that stood out most strongly was a photograph of a car that was left running without a driver. It was front page news, and the short article strongly suggested that the traitor be identified and turned in.

Those things were very interesting.

I just learned something new, my aunt and uncle both worked in the Pentagon, as did another two family members. He worked on codes, she worked in a lab that was working on gasoline substitutes, and died in an explosion. She was written up as a genuine hero.

[F. Guffey]

One of the things that stood out most strongly was a photograph of a car that was left running without a driver. It was front page news, and the short article strongly suggested that the traitor be identified and turned in.

I had friends that were creative when parking their car, there were time it was the starter, other times it was the battery. The solution for both problems is a hill with a standard transmission. Nebraska is not know for hills and parking in Council Bluffs IA is a little inconvenient.

F. Guffey

[Mike Irwin]

"During the war there was a law (or at least a regulation) that banned SLICED BREAD.

The idea was to conserve supplies of the high grade steel used in the slicing machine's blades for more important wartime use. No idea if it actually "worked" (made any measurable or significant difference) or not, but after the war, things returned to normal."

It didn't. It was widely reviled, and lasted about 2 months.

It was in part enacted in January 1943 to reduce the thickness of wrapping needed to keep sliced bread from going stale, not to conserve high grade steel in slicing blades.

Simply put, if a slicing machine went down during the war, unless the bakery could find pre-war produced parts, it wasn't going to be fixed until after the war ended.

[Mike Irwin]

My Grandfather, Dad's Dad, was a mechanical engineer and chief engineer at a plant that produced Rayon. He went for his draft notice physical in early January 1942 and by the time he had taken off his pants he was told to go back to his factory, he had been classified as an irreplaceable war industry worker.

His status allowed him to get pretty much unlimited gasoline, which he used to visit his parent's farm about 40 miles away once a month or so.

Great grandpa raised chickens, pigs, rabbits, and lots of vegetables, so he was able to bring back lots of food the family and a close circle of friends that made rationing a lot easier.