Ammo In A Hot Vehicle

[rugerman07]

How safe is it to leave ammo in your car on a hot summer day? Any chance of it going off?

 

[TAB]

If it was hot enough for your ammo to go off, you have better things to worry about.

 

[MaMa PyCb]

unless your car seats are made of burning termite, i don't think you have to worry too much.

 

[General Geoff]

Not unless your car gets to broiling temperatures.

 

[Fish828]

yeah, unless your car is somehow 450+ degrees, i think you'll be okay.

 

[209]

Just leave the windows open a bit and leave some water for the ammo, you should be fine.
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Wait, never mind... that's tips for dogs. (And, FYI, PETA disagrees with that tip)

Seriously, as the others have said, you'd likely have parts of the car melting before the temperature would be high enough for the ammo to be a concern.

 

[RPCVYemen]

Search for another thread on Mythbusters. They played with ammo in an oven. Nothing cooked off until right around 500 degrees.

I do recall some issue/warning about some ball powders, but it's pretty vague. No that they would cook off, but that being stored in temperatures above 120 would do something to the composition of the powder. Anyone else recall this?

Mike

 

[customizedcreationz]

Yeah I dont think that the temp inside a car will get hot enough to cause any damage.

Now the Mythbusters putt a .22 round in the fuse box, that was interesting.

 

[Cannonball888]

unless your car seats are made of burning termite, i don't think you have to worry too much.

Burning termites stink! You'd have to have your car professionally cleaned.

 

[Neo-Luddite]

Over time, high-heat long term storage of some powders may damage them depending on their chemical characteristics--in general making them less reliable. If you aren't storing your powder for years in a tin shack in the desert don't worry.

As for the car, as said no big deal--HOWEVER--DO NOT store ammo on the floor or trunk directly above your cars exhaust--especially the catalytic converter. Believe it or not, this actually came up once in my life years ago. The converter operates at hi temps and, should it be damaged, it can make the floor pan very hot very quickly--usually starting the carpet on fire as well.

 

[MakAttak]

My first thought was, "if you stole a car, I think you have more to worry about than a little ammo"

Then I read your question.

Yeah, unless your hair catches fire when you sit in your car, I don't think you have anything to worry about.

 

[eric.cartman]

You have nothing to worry about.
I've been leaving a gun in my glove box for a while now, on hot Florida summer days... 95+ degrees. All say in the sun. No shade.

No kaboom so far

 

[Rob G]

Just leave the windows open a bit and leave some water for the ammo, you should be fine.

Okay now that was pretty funny. Seriously though you'll be allright. The temperature in my car here in TX averages about 120F during the day when I'm at work for about 4 months straight and no explosions yet.

 

[Soybomb]

Not a chance it will go off but it can lead to increased pressures if fired while still hot so use caution.

 

[Sheldon J]

Just watched a video on U tube of Mythbusters, testing ammo here in a oven to see what happened when it cooked off.
Long story shot it took well in excess of 400 degrees to make the stuff go pop.

 

[CWL]

Simple logic would tell you that if gasoline doesn't ignite while sitting in the sun, you probably don't need to worry about the propellants in your gun.

If it was so easy to cook-off rounds, then there wouldn't be so many weapons in Iraq, Iran, Isreal/Palestine, etc.

 

[Superlite27]

Nice one CWL!

if gasoline doesn't ignite while sitting in the sun, you probably don't need to worry about the propellants in your gun.

I love poetry.

 

[COMSG]

I had a bad experience with some .38 Special handloads which spent a summer on Ft Campbell, KY, in the trunk of my car. The loads were a pretty mild charge of Unique behind a 158 semi-wadcutter. When I got around to firing the first few out of the box, in a S&W 19, my first reaction was WOW. Recoil was intense, and muzzle blast was really serious. After 3 rounds, the gun locked up. I had to have a smith get the 19 going again.
I did pull the bullets from the rest of the box, and verified charge weights. The weights were perfect, but I did not trust that powder any more. It was safely destroyed.

Bottom line, extended time in high heat can definitely affect how a round reacts when fired.

 

[jackmead]

Have you been watching Mythbusters again?

 

[larry_minn]

COMSG Thats rather strange. Are you sure of powder type? Also I have been told some powders can "break down" by a combo of heat AND vibration/impact. IIRC something about the "flakes" breaking apart to expose more surface area for a faster ignition...
Thing is (assuming) you loaded to .38 waddcutter specs) you (should) have had a large (gap) before it would bother a .357 rated gun.

 

[Blackbeard]

I'd bet it could affect the performance of the rounds, but it won't set them off.

 

[frogomatic]

If it was hot enough for your ammo to go off, you have better things to worry about.

+1

yup, at that temp, everything that isn't metal is melting or on fire.

 

[tg_26101]

larry_minn, heat will temporarily affect the properties of powder. back in my USPSA days, when random rounds were fired for velocity to be sure no one was cheating on power factor, on cold spring mornings we would throw the ammo up on the dashboard and run the defroster on the way to the range to be sure we met power factor with our standard handloads.

in cold weather, the velocity would drop from the cold ammo, using the same loads that were fine on warm summer days. similarly, when heated, the ammo could increase pressures to the point of becoming unsafe. this was with ball powder, and shooting across a chrono, there was a different velocity depending upon temperature of the ammo.

 

[Jeff F]

I've got a bunch of the POF surplus .303 that I leave in the truck or out in the hot sun before use, seems to light right off when its hot. Shot a little of it this winter and it was click-bang or click-.....bang. Its best not to store ammo in extreme heat for long periods of time, but then again I had a box of .357 rounds that were forgotten in my truck for three years, and it gets pretty hot in the summer and cold in the winter an they all went off and felt consistent.

 

[dakotasin]

fwiw... i had some federal 30-30 factory loads in my truck, and left them there maybe 3 years, maybe longer, who knows? anyway, when it came time to finally shoot 'em up, every one of them had pressure issues, but nothing too awful serious. the primers backed out, and poi was not what was expected...

i don't think it is good for the gun or ammo to spend extended periods of time in a hot car, but i don't think it will hurt 'em enough to get worked up about.