8mm surplus ammo two part question

R

Rcinit

New member
What type of 8mm surplus ammo do you like? Yugo, Greek, Romainian etc.... What grain of bullet seems to work best in your mil-surplus 8mm rifle?
 
I like the Romanian.
I like the spam cans. It is funky, it smells like a cross between smokeless and black powder.
I get 3 inch groups at 100, what the heck the stuff is fun to shoot.
 
I usually shoot the 50's Yugo ammo.Alot of people have complaints about it but Ive never had any problems with it.
 
I've been able to get alot of greek 150gr ammo myself. It doesn't have the smell of the Romanian stuff and is a little cleaner. It's still corrosive just doesn't leave the soot.

I haven't shot too much Yugo myself. Mostly stuff one or two other guys couldn't get to work in the 98 mauser's. I think the their 98 firing springs must be weaker than in my M48's. It fires every time in mine.
 
I have only tried one kind as today was the first time I fired my new Mauser,
I fired 15 rounds of Romanian Surpluss, and all went bang but one, it took two strikes, the amunition was accurate though. And my barrel was not all that dirty when I cleaned it. Did have some fouling on the face of the bolt.
Can you reload the steel cased surplus ammo?
 
Anyone fire turk 150gr 8mm ammo? I bought some a while back in 70rd bandolers. Have a few rounds left, want some more.
 
I have fired a lot of the Turk.
Back 6 years ago it was at all the gun shows, 4 bucks for one bando.
The Turk has actually gotten hotter with age, it will thump your shoulder.
 
I fired about 40 more rounds of this stuff yesterday evening out of my 24 27 Mauser. Then started to have trouble closing the bolt, I figured it out, some of the lackquer from the cases was building up, in the chamber, after a good cleaning it started to chamber better.
I didnt think a Mauser could jam, but aparently they can.
 
I don't like any surplus. That's why I reload them. My K98 has never had a corrosive primer fired in her since I've owned her.
 
My favorite 8mm used to be Turk - accurate, cheap, and fast. My favorite now is M75 Yugo, 1990's dated. I found a bunch of it at the Wichita gunshow yesterday for $4 a box! Yippee! Sniper ammo for 28 cents a round.
 
"I've been able to get alot of greek 150gr ammo myself."

I need to correct myself. I've been able to get alot of turkish 150gr ammo myself. Goes bang everytime. It's just not as accurate as the Yugo 196-198 stuff. Which for me goes band everytime in my Yugo M48.
 
I would have to say that the 1970s production yugo is probably the best, but it's hard to find and usually spendy.

OTOH, I do like the 150 grain romanian. I have the occasional failure to fire but a second primer strike usually does the trick. It shoots fairly accurate (2-3 moa or so), but I have found that it's dirty as all get out. I spent 2 hours cleaning all the crud out of the bore one day. Nasty stuff, but it's cheap and it works fairly well.
 
5Whiskey:
About how many rounds require so much cleaning?

As for ftfs on the first strike, it happens very often with the Czech(Croatian?), but seldom with the Yugo and never with green Romanian in my only Mauser (48A).

These Czech boxes are labeled "7,9mm puscani metak... sa univerzalnim zrnom...Barut...12-1955". Above s and c in "puscani" are the flat "u" accent marks.
Pardon me, I just saw on Wikipedia that Croatian also has these accent marks. Don't know whether any Czech 8mm ammo was produced or imported here, but have read that it might be Croatian.
 
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50s yugo is horrible with light primer strikes. 50s production is the most of what's left for yugo... the good 70s production has been mostly shot up or is offered for .60 or .70 cents per round now. I've never shot any czech.

I don't have a rampant problem with LPS with romanian, but definately enough to document. Maybe I got a bad tin last time or something?

Oh, and 40 rounds is enough to:

A: Make my shoulder sore
B: Put a big smile on my face
C: Dirty up the bore big time
D: All of the above
 
5whiskey:

Two hours to clean the crud from the bore?
How do you clean your rifle? Do you put a pan of hot soapy water on the floor, and pull the bolt, and draw the water up through the muzzle with a patch on a cleaning rod?
 
I cleaned with REALLY hot soapy water, and yes by soaking a patch and passing it down the bore. Then brushed. Then swabbed dry. Still crud. Then poured a small amount of the hot soapy water down the bore. Then brushed, then swabbed dry, still dirty. Then I sprayed in some hoppes 9. Then scrubbed. Then swabbed. Patch still dirty. Rinse and repeat, using several different cleaners (from ATF to ammonia). Maybe it didn't take quiet 2 hours, but it was the longest time I've ever spent on cleaning a bore. And it was well over 1 hour.

It's really not that bad these days actually. That was when the rifle was fairly new, so maybe I didn't get all of the cosmoline out of the barrel and it held the gunk in? It did indeed happen, and romanian ammo (in my experience) is definately serviceable but it isn't clean at all.
 
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