Jim Keenan: 1st if what you say is true, then NO reloaders use other ammo to reform into wildcat or needed ammo by annealing and using forming dies. I personally have taken 30-06, .44, 444 Marlin and 7mm cases and made other ammo. They do need to be annealed though prior to doing so and this is usally done with a Bernzo-matic torch with the case heads in water. I have even formed my own copper jackets at home with just copper sheet stock and a hand hammered formed chisel die I made. Then I filled them with lead. If I could do it then damn near anyone with a lick of sense could do it. Some of those Jewish tool makers were very talented and intelligent folks when it comes to making things work.
On this one Jim you are wrong and proven so via world history and documented proof.
The fact the Germans and Arabs and whoever did not realize what was happening to the lipstick cases, it did go un-noticed. The History Channel story showed the one in Palestine (now Israel since 1948). The Holocost Museum shows underground shops in Euro, and Mideast.
Just for giggles I looked at my moms lipstick cases she still has from the 30's and 40's. Of the 7 I checked, 5 were brass, 1 steel or tin and one was aluminum. I measured the wall thickness of the 5 brass ones and they ranged from .105 to just under .035. This is easily enough wall thickness for forming and reforming once annealed. NOT MELTED DOWN. No I did not try to form any bullets out of one, she would have whacked me with her walker.
Bullet cases in my experience over years of reloading and shooting "Stretch" and need to be trimmed. Sometimes they do get brittle and torn when they are stretch too thin, but that is far and few between for such failures.
Have you ever seen new ammo made at the factory? Guess what, they do it a cpl different ways. The way that is applicable here is how they take brass and/or copper billets & plates/discs and take them through a progressive die to form the case, head, neck. In the final forming they use a spinning process with a stylus to smooth out any imperfections. During this whole process the brass hardens (work hardening) and needs to be re-annealed at points for the next operation. It seems to me they work with some mighty thin case walls w/o tearing them. The primer pockets were usually done with a "Nail Header" Machine and then finished off with forming dies/punches.
They, meaning the Jewish people reworked thousands of brass lipstick cases. Once annealed, brass will do just about anything you want. The Holocost Museum is a very interesting, sad and a glorius place to learn about the struggles of humans. The museum display shows the progressive forming that was done on the cases and have many examples on display. Feel free to contact them for the info on the who, what, when and where of the "Lipstick Case into Bullets" story.
The Jewish people were not allowed to buy ammunition of any sort. They were allowed however to buy sundries and house hold goods. The museum states over 30,000 rounds were made from the bottom sections into rifle calibers and the lids were made into pistol calibers and the primers. History Channel only stated it was in the thousands.
I find the History Channel fairly accurate on most subjects. I am sure if they showed a AK and SKS it was in relation to talking about gang violence and not just Bonnie & Clyde. Please feel free to tell R. Lee Ermy to his face he does not or History Channel does not know jack shyte about something LOL. Are there extremly small details wrong of left for the imagination in some History Channel shows, yes, most likely so.
I am sure "STEM" was just a simple typo for STEN. Not all of us are perfect in their writing skills, I know I am not. Could have also meant that the cut down barrel STEMS were used to make other weapons.
Note: I shall chat no more of this issue as it is slightly off subject. So let it be written, so let it be done...* waves hand accross the land to make it so.
