Worst 223 or 556 ammo you've used

D

D Bear

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Can you tell us what has been the most unreliable/dirtiest 223 or 556 ammo you've used? I just bought my AR15 and have only used Federal 223 so far. No issues with Federal, but lack of supply is making it necessary to look at purchasing other brands. thx
 
Maybe Wolf steel case, but other then a little dirty it's not bad ammo. Stick with any major brand of ammo and you should be fine. When you find the ammo you like buy lots of it, and buy lots of mags. It never hurts to have to much.
 
Just order as much American Eagle as you can afford and forget about the rest. That being said most worked fine except Tula in a pistol.

Hunting ammunition is a different story
 
PPU .223 55gr FMJ, reliable but not very accurate. I've even given it to other shooters, much bigger groups were the result. The brass is just fine though.

Pretty sure it's just this 2016 lot, other PPU ammunition has been good.
 
Tula .223 steel cased. Absolutely the worse .223 I have ever shot. Multiple underpowered loads, the worse bullet run out I have ever seen. Holes in the 100 yard target would have looked better with a 12 gauge buckshot load. Seriously. I was lucky to get a 14 inch group. I bought a case of it 5 or 6 years ago. After about 100 rounds I'd had enough. Sold it for a loss at a gun show last Fall. Didn't care about the loss, I would have never shot it anyhow. Just hope I never run across the guy I sold it to. I'm sure he'd have some choice words for me. :o
 
Remington, dirty and accuracy sucked.

Never used any of the foreign steel case stuff but the bimetallic bullets they use are bad for barrel life.

Hornady and Federal have been great.

Jim
 
Double K Wolf steel cased, heavy lacquer will come off in an AR and render it inoperable and very difficult to clean.
Click to expand...
1. You're new, do some reading.
2. Wolf steel case isn't coated with lacquer.
3. Even if it was, it wouldn't melt in your chamber.
4. There have been literally thousands of posts on this and every other gun forum explaining why this is a myth. Don't repeat myths.


https://www.luckygunner.com/labs/brass-vs-steel-cased-ammo/
 
That was probably 12 years ago, I have not looked at it recently but I assure you it was coated with something that came off in my chamber back then at least the stuff I had did, I won a full case of it in a raffle and ended up selling it at a gunshow.The rifle was a Colt carbine that I got when the first flat tops came out.
I live in realville, I don't regurgitate myths.
 
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Double K That was probably 12 years ago, I have not looked at it recently but I assure you it was coated with something that came off in my chamber back then at least the stuff I had did, I won a full case of it in a raffle and ended up selling it at a gunshow.The rifle was a Colt carbine that I got when the first flat tops came out.
I live in realville, I don't regurgitate myths.
Click to expand...
What you think was "Lacquer buildup" was CARBON BUILDUP.
The steel case being less ductile and therefore less efficient than brass at preventing carbon flowback in the chamber.
This isn't a problem when the cartridge has a slope like the 7.62x39, but can present issues with straight wall cartridges like .223/5.56

Decades ago some internet nitwit blamed it on "lacquer buildup" and the internet ran off in glee.... truly believing that instead of taking ten seconds to cogitate on:
1. You won't get "lacquer" to melt off a steel case using a match. Try it.
2. That hot "lacquered"steel case? Why is it not splashing "hot lacquer" all inside the action?
3. Commie guns don't experience such "lacquer buildup" and run just fine.
4. Commie guns get as hot as US guns.
5. Understanding how to clean your gun is important.

In short....it ain't the coating.....it's the STEEL CASE.

My Colt Commando has seen around 2,000 rounds this year, all steel case, some Tula, some Wolf, some Monarch.......not a single stoppage. And I haven't cleaned the chamber or barrel since Thanksgiving.:eek: I run her nice and wet with a silencer too.

9mm steel case? My Glocks and Hi Powers eat it up.
 
I have to say my experience with steel cases is very limited, actually my experience with any factory loaded ammunition is limited.

 
dtt said:
What you think was "Lacquer buildup" was CARBON BUILDUP.
The steel case being less ductile and therefore less efficient than brass at preventing carbon flowback in the chamber.
Click to expand...

Indeed. Double K, if you shoot current Wolf steel cased .223 (which is not lacquer coated) you'll be fine as long as you don't introduce a brass case after a long string of steel. You can also fire a brass round or two every several magazines; the brass expands and pulls out lots of crud on the first round. In my rifles, by the third round the brass looks normal.
 
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I bought thousands of SS109 62 grain steel core penetrator bullets (not loaded rounds) and the best I can get, using multiple brass/powders/primers, is 2-3" at 100 yards. And, that is if I push the bullets at 5.56 pressures. I bought 1000 Radway Green loaded 5.56 cartridges and got the same crappy accuracy. I learned later on that most all ss109 bullets have too much yaw, which adversely affects accuracy. Something about the steel core insert causes the issue. Then, I stumbled on some Midsouth proprietary Hornady 62 grain HP BTs. They shoot incredible < MOA.
 
I never use steel cased ammo in any of my AR's. And every brand of brass cased ammunition I have fired has been satisfactory. As far as being dirty. With AR's that can be blamed on the direct impingement gas system..... Not the ammo. It all shoots "filthy" when you blow the gas back through the action.

In all of my LWRC piston AR's I've found the Israeli IMI to be the cleanest. Especially their M-855.
 
1980's military surplus GUATEMALAN 5.56

90% duds, tarnished cases , packed in military brown cardboard boxes

never buy south american surplus ammo, the weather & storage conditions ruined it

probably sat in some tropical warehouse on a dock for years? I didnt think 1980's ammo would go bad so soon? this was back in 1999
 
FGMM 69 gr
Most inconsistent garbage I've seen for .223/5.56.
Velocity all over the map.
4-5 MoA out of rifles known to be 3/4 to 1.5 MoA in my hands, with the same bullet.
Absolute garbage.
Major disappointment, especially for the price.

...From what is supposed to be one of the most respected product lines around.
 
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