Found some 9mm at a decent price. However...

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At $7 for 50 (Tula, I assume the RAS is the same stuff in different boxes) I was shooting 1000+ rounds a month of it -- steel plates at 10-15 yards. I laid in about an 18 month supply while it was cheap. Will last a bit longer than I'd expected since we've had so much rain these past six weeks I haven't be able to shoot at all in almost a month :(
 
I’ve certainly shot better 9mm ammo... I’m sure I’ve shot worse. It wouldn’t ever be my first choice in normal times, but under the current circumstances you didn’t do too bad at all for plinking ammo. :)

Stay safe.
 
I've been regularly finding brass cased Blazer and Federal in 9mm and .40 in addition to various Russian steel cased ammo. But .380 and .38sp have been non existent for several weeks now.
 
So far my Chrono testing of 9mm and .380 has shown Wolf and Tula to be a little hotter than most target ammo like Blazer, Federal, and Win white box.
 
Had some RAS 7.62x39 a while back and it shot just fine.

Local place had American Eagle for $19.99/50 in stock last week.

No primers though
 
Steel-cased ammo? After at least 8,000 rds. of it in my imported AKMs plus the Czechpoint VZ-58.....about Two rounds had any issue (low powder loads). And steel is Not an issue.
2,000 rds. of Russian Silver Bear .223 went though my Mini 14 with absolute perfect ops. And the mag. was an OEM used by the previous state agency (KY was on the stock's sticker).

With Wolf 9mm, so far possibly one round was too weak (to fully operate the slide) in approx. 200 rds. The large plastic bottle didn't press its attack ;), allowing us to escape.
All of that is Far better than with Win. White Box 9mm——-- and WWB has No steel case :confused: .————

* This Will Be On Friday's Test o_O....clean the accum. residue from your chambers now and then, which allows your guns' extractors to Work Very Well.
 
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For the last year Wolfe and Tula steel case has been fairly abundant around here (Central Texas) and on line but at 3x the pre COVID price. I need some ammo for my SKS but balk at those prices for steel case. Slowly but surely brass case ammo, 9 mm, 45 APC and 380 APC has been showing up on Academy shelves at about a 80 to 100% markup pre COVID which I can live with.

May have to bite the bullet, so to speak, and buy a couple hundred rounds of steel 7.62 x 39 for my SKS. Willing to wait a little longer though.
 
Saw 50 round box of blazer aluminum cased ammo for that same price.

I'm optimistic enough that I didn't bother to get the guy to get into the case but here's hoping

Those garbage aluminum cased rounds are great for practicing malfunction clearing.
 
I’ve never had a problem with the Blazer aluminum cased ammo in 9, 40 or 45 in any pistol I ever shot it in.

Those are keepers. Ive had nothing but issues in an fn45 Beretta m9 and various glocks
 
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The Soviets have been pumping out billions of rounds of steel case ammo for decades.

They're good at it, and the shells go bang when needed.
 
I've only been buying Russian ammo. It's the only ammo that hasn't gone full retard on price. I haven't purchased any handgun ammo during the shortage, but I have purchased 8k rounds of x39. Been shooting it out of my AKs and my x39 AR at .32 cpr. I've purchased and shot Tula steel case 9mm and 40s&w for years back before Walmart stopped selling ammo. The one and only gun that had an issue with it was a Kel Tec PF9 that I owned back in 2012.

@DTL Lighten up Francis. According to the Left and their media, Russia got Trump elected and saved us from antigun President Hillary. Trump was even impeached for it. <sarcasm>
 
I’ve been seeing prices slowly drop. As mentioned Blazer is now starting to show up at several vendors. So while not great it seems like things are improving.

Personally, I’d rather see more primers and powder available. Cheap ammo is nice but I’d rather have good cheap ammo even if I have to spend time making it myself! (Plus I find reloading relaxing)
 
Hey Styx...has nothing to do with Trump or the liberal media, Russia is and has been for some time a threat to America.
 
Hey Styx...has nothing to do with Trump or the liberal media, Russia is and has been for some time a threat to America.
I don't get into politics or care about that stuff. The ammo company doesn't make political or military decisions. They're just a business trying to sell an item I need and want for a small profit. My original comments about Trump and the media was support to be a sarcastic joke.

No argument about your preference or reasoning for it.
 
I’ve certainly shot better 9mm ammo... I’m sure I’ve shot worse
In all honesty, I completely agree with this.

I've been shooting steel-cased 9x18 Makarov ammo for over a decade now, and never had any complaints. Ever. Always felt it was consistent, never a dud.

In 9x19 Luger, I settled into shooting Sellier & Bellot, Fiocchi and PPU (with Blazer Brass if I wanted soft loads). I stopped shooting Winchester White Box because it seemed inconsistent and sub-par compared to those brands, and I grew to actively avoid Remington UMC- just considered it crappy junk. It's the only brand I've ever had noticeable squibs, where I've had to pull the barrel and make sure the bullet wasn't still there. This is experience learned since at least the year 2000.

I never was forced to pick, because there were always options (until the past year); but if I DID have to choose, I probably would have picked Russian steel over WWB and UMC.

I picked up a case of Tula 9mm a year ago, and have been shooting it. Runs just fine in my guns.
 
In all honesty, I completely agree with this.

I've been shooting steel-cased 9x18 Makarov ammo for over a decade now, and never had any complaints. Ever. Always felt it was consistent, never a dud.

In 9x19 Luger, I settled into shooting Sellier & Bellot, Fiocchi and PPU (with Blazer Brass if I wanted soft loads). I stopped shooting Winchester White Box because it seemed inconsistent and sub-par compared to those brands, and I grew to actively avoid Remington UMC- just considered it crappy junk. It's the only brand I've ever had noticeable squibs, where I've had to pull the barrel and make sure the bullet wasn't still there. This is experience learned since at least the year 2000.

I never was forced to pick, because there were always options (until the past year); but if I DID have to choose, I probably would have picked Russian steel over WWB and UMC.

I picked up a case of Tula 9mm a year ago, and have been shooting it. Runs just fine in my guns.
I’m the same way, I’ve shot just about all the Russian imports through 9mm and 5.56 rifles over the years. They served the purpose I bought them for; a fun afternoon punching targets we had set here and there :thumbup:.

Stay safe.
 
Funny how things have changed, isn't it? The original post is, paraphrased:
Hey, I've found some Russian steel-cased ammo I would never have considered buying before, for only twice the price I used to pay for brass. Yay!

OP, I mean no harm or insult ;). Just thinking about your post, it reminded me of how much of an ammo snob I used to be (and we all were). Once, there used to not BE a good price for steel 9x19. It could have been $2 a box, and I probably would have ignored it. Same thing, frankly, with a number of brass-cased ammo; I remember seeing super-cheap Brassmaxx (or whatever it was), and never giving it a second thought. Heck, like I said in the post above: Winchester, Remington? Meh. At least I tried WWB and Remington UMC, as well as a lot of others, and came across a fair bit of my prejudices via experience. *Not the steel-cased, as like I also said, I loved it in 9x18.

All that's out the window now. I have my stash and that's what I will shoot, but if prices come down again, I don't know that I will be that picky anymore. It's blasting ammo, it all seems to run fine (if it's got decent QC at the factory). I've slung a good bit of steel .45acp downrange, my 1911's love it. Same with the 9mm Luger, haven't come across any of my guns that choke on it. Same with .223 and .308; and obviously x39. Funny enough, my C308 happily devours Red Army 308 without any fuss, while the only failures I've had with that gun came from Armscor brass (the softer case has gotten hung up on ejection a couple times). Picked up a couple AR's and have almost exclusively shot Tula and/or Silver Bear 223; they run great. And the steel x39 seems to be the clear winner of this shortage- the price has gone from about $200 a case, to about $400 (as compared to every other caliber, which has at least tripled, it seems). That seems to be the lesson for everyone- get an AK, SKS, AR in x39, or something similar. Like cockroaches, x39 will (has?) survive the apocalypse. So I pieced together an AR in x39, and tweaked it to run steel fine.
 
Interesting, every one of the shops around me, around 5 or so, I have been to in the last week hunting for shotgun shells and everywhere I go I see Red Army Standard ranging from $17-19.99.

I would have bought some but I just picked up a case.... in any case it looks like availability and price is coming down a bit.
 
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