S&W 686....weird

Those rounds look like the brass oxidized, probably due to moisture in the cylinder chambers at some point. (Carry gun in the rain?)

Yep. Rusty cartridges.

Hmm...

Looks like Verdigris...

Happens a lot to cartridges in leather loops on belts...should NOT be happening inside the chambers of your cylinder...

On the other hand, if it is the chambers that are rusting and coloring the brass, then THAT is a bad thing also...Yes, stainless can, and does rust...Just a lot less susceptible than blued steel...

A thorough cleaning of cartridges and gun are in order...

You didn't happen to fire some corrosive ammo or black powder cowboy action cartridges, did you?

Take the gun OUT of the padded case.
These are notorious for rusting guns, INCLUDING stainless steel guns.

Stainless is "stain-less" not rust proof and stainless guns will rust if left in a case or in a damp basement.

Here is exactly what happened.

"Somebody" left an excessive amount of bore cleaner in the loaded chambers for a very long time.
And the copper solvent part of the excess bore cleaner started eating the brass cases.

rc

I was trying to play nice!

rc

In the old days, police were told to take the cartridges out of the gun and the belt loops at least once a century and clean off the green gunk. When they didn't want to, they bought chrome plated cartridges (yes, an outfit in Texas plated live ammo) so they could keep being lazy.

Jim

I say it was the padded case. They hold moister in and will not let it escape. Even put up clean humidity cannot escape.

rcmodel said:

Here is exactly what happened.

"Somebody" left an excessive amount of bore cleaner in the loaded chambers for a very long time.
And the copper solvent part of the excess bore cleaner started eating the brass cases.

rc

Click to expand...

Bingo. Gun cleaner with ammonia was used to clean cylinder chambers.

Use hoppes #9 if you want to clean with that, then hit up the cylinders and bore with some hornady one-shot followed by a few dry patches and call it good enough. Thats what I do at least. While thats drying I use a sparing amount of triflow lube on the extractor and cylinder pivot. Should be ready to load up in ~2 minutes (once the residual one-shot has dried).

Those are probably safe to fire as long as there is no excessive corrosion into the case wall. Looks like surface tarnish to me. Shoot em and put em in the tumbler! Better luck next go around

Here is exactly what happened.

"Somebody" left an excessive amount of bore cleaner in the loaded chambers for a very long time.
And the copper solvent part of the excess bore cleaner started eating the brass cases.

Click to expand...

You win

My vote is on Bore Solvent also. I did this to one of mine. I left to hoppes #9 in my cylinder and barrel and put shells back in it. It sat for a period of time and my shells looked like the OPs.

I went ahead and shot them, and ran them through my sonic cleaner and then tumbled them. The stains won't come clean and even though they look better than they did I can still pick them out of a batch with no problem. They have been shot several time and nothing bad has happened to them.

I pay more attention to cleaning the cleaner out of my guns now.

RC nailed it

But everyone is right to tell you not to use the padded case

You also should not be storing the gun in its padded case loaded for long periods of time or at all unless you are using it as a ready home defense arm.
NRA safe gun handling rule #3:

Keep all guns unloaded until ready to use.

An empty gun is worthless.

As for whether the rounds are safe to use, without having them in hand to inspect, hard to say. Is the casing "pitted" or look thinner in spots? For six rounds, I'd just discard them and take six more from the box.

Those cartridges look pretty nasty. Possibly, you could take the corrosion off with some crocus cloth, but if you see any pitting, the case is done. Personally, my time is worth money too, and I would just ___-can them.

An empty gun is worthless.

Click to expand...

Let me fix that for you, an empty gun you are carrying for self defense or are keeping at the ready for self defense is WORTHLESS.

A GUN you are storing in a padded case in your safe but not using should always be stored empty for safety reasons.

That's your opinion and you're welcome to it.

That's your opinion and you're welcome to it.

Click to expand...

No its basic common sense gun safety for real gun owners,and it is what I teach folks in the NRA basic Pistol, Shotgun, or Rifle course. It's the NRA's position with respect to gun safety as well.

Some folks here may have 100+ firearms, and it would be dangerous and foolish to store them all loaded. And of course against state law where I live as well. Who cares? Well you would care if an unauthorized visitor or a friend of a relative got ahold of a loaded gun stored improperly and shot themself or someone else with it. The result being your arrest and loss of all gun rights as well as a potential liability suit, or WORSE the DEATH of somone you care about.

If the gun had had to be picked up and fired in a home defense situation, the rounds would almost certainly have fired just fine. Reloading would have been problematic.