Korean 1981 Garand ammo pickup

You might want to check those bullets with a magnet. I have a few ammo cans of Korean 30-06 ammo from 1980 and it is magnetic. I shoot it once in a while out of my Remington 03 a3. It goes bang every time with no issues. Being its probably corrosive I clean the rifle when I get home from shooting.

What is the headstamp? Some Korean ammo is ok, some shoots well but has chlorate (corrosive) primers, some is poor.

Yes, it’s the primers which are corrosive in any ammo. Has nothing to do with powder, case, bullet, etc.

Even if corrosive, it’s fine to shoot. Just clean rifle when you get home. Don’t let it sit. Won’t hurt the bore a bit. People put too much fear into corrosive ammunition. As if shooting 1 round of corrosive with instantaneously melt the barrel down!

PS is said to be non-corrosive. KA is believed to be corrosive.
https://surplusrifleforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=1158

If you want to check on corrosiveness, pull a bullet and dump the powder from a case, drive a common, uncoated steel nail with a polished head into a board, stick the case over the nail, hit the primer with a hammer and another nail and wait a day or two. The effect of corrosive salts on unprotected steel is hard to miss.

As far a dangerous rifle ammo goes, I have nothing to offer about Korean ammo but watch out for the 8mm Turkish stuff!

https://www.forgottenweapons.com/why-we-dont-use-turkish-8mm-surplus/

Hatcher wrote a wholel chapter on Corrosion and Ammunition Developments.

I don;t have it handy, but as I recall, even though other nations had perfectly OK non-corrosive primers, we stuck with the the (potassium) chlorate corrosives, but were going nuts trying to develop a non-corrosive primer.

The "going nuts" part was because sometimes the test barrels would corrode almost instantly, and some would be OK, but sudddenly start corroding weeks later.

Obviously there was another intervening variable involved. Long story short, it was the changing humidity. The test barrels would not rust until the humiidity got above about 50%, and it varied up and down from that quite a bit from day to day, week to week.

Adequate priming compositions were ultimately found, like the familiar lead styphnate... which is now a "bad boy" because they obviously pollute the Erf to the point where no aliens would ever want to take over the planet.

That's how I remember that chapter, so feel free to correct my corroded memory.

And note that this intervening variable (humidity changes) might well explain the vagary about whether a particular ammo is corrosive or not. Might depend on where and when a batch was tested.

Right now the humidity hereabouts (Denver, COmmierado) is about 25% and going down to 14% but will come up and hit 50% about 4AM MDT tomorrow morning.

Terry, "Tireless hunter and killer of intervening variables," 230RN

castile said:

I am not afraid of corrosive ammo. I learned you can not just clean it, it has to be hot soapy water to remove the salts. The head stamp is marked PS 81

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Sorry, the extensive cleaning* was implied. Back in the early 00’s whenever I used corrosive, I would actually use ammonia first. Soap & water is effective as well, as it’s about neutralizing the corrosive salts(i.e., acidic) Soap & water dilutes it effectively.

Dave DeLaurant said:

If you want to check on corrosiveness, pull a bullet and dump the powder from a case, drive a common, uncoated steel nail into a board, stick the case over the nail, hit the primer with a hammer and another nail and wait a day or two. The effect of corrosive salts on unprotected steel is hard to miss.

As far a dangerous rifle ammo goes, I have nothing to offer about Korean ammo but watch out for the 8mm Turkish stuff!

https://www.forgottenweapons.com/why-we-dont-use-turkish-8mm-surplus/

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Many years ago I would use Turkish surplus like it was going out of style in my 8mm Mauser.

230RN said:

Hatcher wrote a wholel chapter on Corrosion and Ammunition Developments.

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You mean this? Page 334 https://archive.org/stream/Hatchers_Notebook/Hatchers_Notebook_djvu.txt

David Hoback said:

Many years ago I would use Turkish surplus like it was going out of style in my 8mm Mauser.

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I recall my dad buying some from a jar Woolworths in the 1980s for a few cents a round -- really poorly-stored stuff that would hang-fire like crazy.

My SWAG is that the problems being seen today with Turkish surplus ammo have more to do with how it had been stored than anything to do with original manufacture. Degraded old smokeless powder has been known to produce pressure spikes.

http://forums.thecmp.org/showthread.php?t=157820

If KA headstamp then corrosive. It is good ammo just clean with hot soapy water after shooting.

David Hoback said:

Yes, it’s the primers which are corrosive in any ammo. Has nothing to do with powder, case, bullet, etc.

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Primers may or may not be corrosive, but some surplus Korean is known to have weak brass and a tendency to have cases split when firing.

IIRC, there were some lots that had cracks in the brass - down near the case head. I would try google to see if you can find the list of known bad lots.

castile said:

The clips are worth three or four bucks each

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Maybe, maybe not.
Typical prices I have seen, for 90% en bloc clips is 50-75¢ each.
Some of the catalog outfits have them priced at $1 or $1.25 each, but they are not saying how many they sell.
(I've seen online listings of 25% clips at $3, but no evidence anyone was buying at the price--good condition, very good condition clips are just too available.)
They were surplussed in barrels of 1000 per each, and for prices between $1 and $10.

The corrosive component in "corrosive" primers is what remains after potassium chlorate (used as an oxidizer) supplies its oxygen atoms to the primer reaction. The remaining potassium chloride is not, by itself, corrosive to iron/steel but, being hygroscopic, will attract water vapor from the surroundings and then the Rust Fest can begin.

Shoot this stuff in a truly arid climate and you can go without cleaning the firearm for a long time. Shoot it in, say, Panama, and the silly thing may already be rusting as the case is being ejected. JK.

BTW, you do not "neutralize" the "salts", you remove them. Since potassium chloride is hygroscopic the most efficient way to accomplish that is with water or something water-based so that the KCl is drawn into solution for easy removal.

re: The Korean .30'06 M2 Ball ammo (from memory when we were all buying up that stuff 15-20 years ago)

KA features corrosive primers (and some claimed that it is a bit more accurate) and PS, non-corrosive.

Some Lots of the PS have some potentially serious "brass" issues. Here is a 2009 list that I found via Google ...

PS 2-027 (one positive report based on unknown number of rounds fired)
PS 2-033 (BAD? - one report - unspecified problem)
PS 2-035
PS 2-083 (one positive report based on less than 200 rounds fired)
PS 2-088
PS 2-089 (one positive report based on 200 rounds fired)
PS 2-090
PS 2-093
PS 2-094
PS 2-096 (some black corrosion, otherwise positive report on very few rounds fired)
PS 2-097
PS 2-098
PS 2-100
PS 2-101
PS 2-102 (one positive report based on 200 rounds fired)
PS 2-103
PS 2-104 (two positive reports based on a few hundred rounds)
PS 2-105 (one positive report based on a few hundred rounds)
PS 2-106
PS 2-108
PS 2-122
PS 2-123 (report of one dud round out of 400 rounds fired)
PS 2-124
PS 2-127
PS 2-128
PS 2-134
PS 2-135
PS 2-138
PS 2-142
PS 2-144
PS 2-145
PS 2-146
PS 2-147
PS 2-148
PS 2-149
PS 2-151 (maybe OK - based on VERY limited information)
PS 2-152 (VERY BAD - DANGER - numerous reports of ruptured heads!)
PS 2-154 (VERY BAD - DANGER - multiple negative reports splits and ruptured head)
PS 2-155 (BAD - one report of splits 3 out of 352 rds)
PS 2-156 (BAD - multiple report of serious splits)
PS 2-157
PS 2-158 (VERY BAD - DANGER - Nasty split cases...all the way to the head of the case)
PS 2-159 (one positive report based on 400 rounds fired)
PS 2-161
PS 2-162 (one positive report based on 300 rounds fired)
PS 2-165 (maybe OK - multiple positive reports - one report of infrequent and minor gas leakage around primers...NOT blown primers)
PS 2-169
PS 2-171 (one negative report of blown primers)
PS 2-173
PS 2-174 (one positive report based on 200 rounds fired)
PS 2-177
PS 2-179
PS 2-181
PS 2-183
PS 2-184
PS 2-185 (one report of blown primer and one unspecified negative report)
PS 2-186
PS 2-187
PS 2-189 - questionable? in one box out of 40 approximately 10 rounds with a strange blue color around the head of the cartridge extending down approximately 3/8"
PS 2-192
PS 2-193 (some of this lot badly corroded, otherwise positive reports)
PS 2-194
PS 2-195
PS 2-198
PS 2-202
PS 2-204
PS 2-205

HTH.

I have fired that stuff through my Garand. I clean that rifle after I fire anything through it. No issues.

The powder makes great grass fertilizer, just don't drop it all in one spot.

I lived in Arizona(very DRY)for several years. Corrosive ammo was STILL corrosive.

Corrosive ammo is perfectly fine. Cleaning is no more difficult or time consuming and any other ammo. All that's needed is to dissolve the salts. Ballistol, Windex, plain old water - any of them is fine. Literally just spray some down the barrel from an open breach with a straw, wait a minute or so, give it second spray, run a couple patches then clean like normal. Such a common thing with milsurps that really don't think much of it anymore.

The Korean M2 ammo has been good in my experience. Brass seems decent, however primers are bot sealed and staked so takes some effort to deprime. Definitely want a pocket swager, way too slow to ream a bunch of them.