223 amo in bulk - Help?

B

boxjeff

New member
I'm looking to purchase .223 amo in bulk for a Mini 14.

Any suggestions?

Is military bulk amo corrosive?
What would good pricing be considered outside of re-loading?
Would I find good pricing at gun shows?
What should I avoid?
What should I look for?

Thanks!
 
AR15.com under the ammo section has a thread of ongoing ammo deals.

What would good pricing be considered outside of re-loading?-- I asked a similar question under the reloading section. It seems like people are averaging $0.26/rd.

Would I find good pricing at gun shows?--- lately does appear so in most places.

What should I avoid?--- depends on what your comfortable with. Some people say avoid steel cased ammo, but then others shoot only shoot it and never have any issues. Try something, if you like it then stay with it. If its a dirty round then make sure you up your cleaning amount.

What should I look for?--- completely up to you. What works the best for your situation.
 
This guy does a pretty good review.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VR3fi1wCSmM


As for the Mini 14... I do not have any exerience with so I cannot say for sure. Logic would say that it should function fine, but I could be wrong. Best bet would be to buy a box or two and give it a try. If you like it then buy more. Its really up to you though. Ideally I like to shoot brass
 
If you want to try steel-case ammo, Wal-mart sells Tula for about $4.50/box of 20. Buy 5 boxes and take it to the range. If you can get through all fve boxes without a problem, you're good to go. Cheaper Than Dirt currently sells 1000 rounds of Tula (500x2) for $219.

That's what I use for practice in my ARs.
 
ammunitionstore.com had wolf steel case 1000rds for about .21 a shot the last time i bought ammo for the kids to plink with. havent looked recently, but shouldnt be much more than that now.
 
I buy a fifty cal can full of brass cased Federal 55gr for $300 every few gunshows. Good stuff for bulk. Wolf is fine for mini's too.
 
Mini's will eat whatever you feed them, although I don't feed my rifles steel as a rule...

I just got an email from Wideners for IMI , M855 (Israeli Military- good stuff) in bulk and 30 round boxes as well on sale. Gonna order some tomorrow...
 
Last edited:
the problem with steel is that it is less resilient than brass(it is highly advised against reloading). it expands more when it gets hot than brass and doesn't shrink down as uniformly. the main reason for steel cased ammo being cheaper is that steel is cheaper than brass. also a majority of people that shoot large amounts of 223 are AR15 owners and steel cased ammo has a nasty habit of exanding too much and snapping peoples extractors off if they aren't careful so naturally there's less of a demand for it. I generally stay away from it myself(I'm an AR15 shooter) but I know whats good for an AR is definitely good for a Mini.

is mil surplus ammo corrosive? yes but only pre-nato ammo so old 30.06, 45 ball, and most any surplus ak47/74 ammo should be dealt with accordingly,
however it's not really an issue if you clean your gun after every use, a little extra work for a lot less money in the long run. on the other hand 9mm and 5.56 should be fine.

what to avoid? you might want to be very careful about people selling never fired lake city brass. it's relatively easy to find once fired(reloaded) lake city(US military) ammo but it's next to impossible to find brand new unless its a defective batch. I made the mistake of getting new lake city ammo and it was loaded so "hot" that the casings swelled in my chamber and got stuck so tight that I broke every cleaning rod I owned trying to force them out.

hope you found this helpful.
 
also, some people confuse Lake City with subsidiaries. the Lake City cartridge company owns Federal, American Eagle and Speer/CCI so all of these companies sell their own versions of lake city's mil grade ammo with their own proprietary stamp on the butt. only military ammo would actually be marked lake city.
 
the problem with steel is that it is less resilient than brass(it is highly advised against reloading). it expands more when it gets hot than brass
Click to expand...

You got that backwards

Brass expands more readily than Steel. And it is less resilient.
 
also, some people confuse Lake City with subsidiaries. the Lake City cartridge company owns Federal, American Eagle and Speer/CCI so all of these companies sell their own versions of lake city's mil grade ammo with their own proprietary stamp on the butt. only military ammo would actually be marked lake city.
Click to expand...

Lake City ammo plant is owned by the U.S. Army or the Department of Defense. It is run by Federal, it used to be run by Winchester.

Most all the LC surplus ammo on the market is over run or reject that did not meet Mil Spec for some reason. Federal takes it, re boxes it and sells it to us. Winchester used to do the same.
 
Lake City ammo plant is owned by the U.S. Army or the Department of Defense. It is run by Federal, it used to be run by Winchester.

Most all the LC surplus ammo on the market is over run or reject that did not meet Mil Spec for some reason. Federal takes it, re boxes it and sells it to us. Winchester used to do the same.
Click to expand...

as derived from the ATK website:
2000
Selected to operate Lake City Army Ammunition Plant, the U.S. Government's only small-caliber ammunition manufacturing facility.

as derived from the federal website:
Federal is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Minneapolis, Minnesota-based ATK
Federal manufactures a complete line of shotshell, centerfire and rimfire ammunition and components.
Nearly 1,000 employees work at the Anoka, Minnesota facility.
The facility is located on 175 acres in Anoka County and spans the border of Anoka and Coon Rapids with half a million square feet of manufacturing space.
Federal Premium® Ammunition is the company's flagship brand and focuses its competitive advantage on cutting edge technology.

Bill Clinton signed a bill saying that no contractor that manufactures us military ammo(even rejected/faulty/surplus) can sell that same round to civilians so in order to get around that, they remove the powder and bullet from casings, therefore it is no longer mil spec ammo only mil spec components, then ATK which runs the lake city plant, ships mil spec components to federal(whom ATK owns) and american eagle(whom federal owns) and they remeasure powder and reseat the bullets therefore it becomes federal XM193 and american eagle XM193 instead of Lake City M193.
which is the exact same round, only "manufactured" by civilian affiliates of an ATK ran facility owned by the military. guess my answer was too vague to be considered truthful. my bad

I will however concede that I was wrong about my steel versus brass arguement, I'm man enough to admit mistakes
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top