Military ammo stamp ???

[WestKentucky]

Military ammo is marked in a specific way. Location (LC for Lake City is a common example) followed by the year. Awesome. Simple. Cartridges marked LC83 would be lake city made cartridges loaded in 1983. But when and how do they mark the cartridges? Do the cases come to the ammo plant pre-marked based upon when the case was made? Or maybe they swap over to next years head stamp at new year and in January they use up the last-year cases? Or maybe at the start of December they swap to next year and use up remaining inventory of current year cases before swapping to the new head stamp in January. Or perhaps somewhere in the chain of operations the cases are marked as they come through the tools. Just curious, does anybody know how this process actually happens?

 

[.455_Hunter]

I suspect the dwell time for a formed and stamped case until loading is very short. I bet the dies are changed by Jan 2 for a seamless transition with the previous year's cases already loaded before Christmas.

 

[edwardware]

For at least a decade, Lake City has been running SCAMP (Small Arms Ammunition Modernization Program) machines, that are essentially continuous from strip to cartridge. Prior to that I would expect the brass was still loaded very soon after bring made.

 

[Bwana John]

As a war time expedient, some 1943 50cal bmg dies had the "3" ground off to only leave a "4" on the headstamp to denote 50 bmg ammunition made in 1944.

 

[AlexanderA]

I don't know if this is officially done, but it is possible to headstamp loaded cartridges. There was a criminal case against John Patton Straiton (dba "Nordac") wherein he was buying cheap Yugoslav 5.56 mm ammo and restamping it to show Winchester manufacture. Then he sold the ammo, as Winchester, to a Central American country, under U.S. aid auspices. When the ammo was involved in large numbers of misfires, suspicions were raised. His ex-wife turned state's evidence and he was convicted of defrauding the government. After he was released from prison, he became involved in fraudulent activities again. This time he beat the rap by dying of a heart attack (in 2015). (I once had some dealings with him personally when he was a small-time gun show dealer, in the 1970's, before all this went down. No indication then that he would turn out the way he did.)