Old Frankford Arsenal Brass & Ammo (.30-'06 in this case)

[DannyLandrum]

Question for you gents....

My uncle just gave me some old Frankford Arsenal loaded ammo - 173 gr, with box, with brass headstamp of "FA 58 MATCH". That's great - but not really the issue in question.

Also, in the package he sent was an opened Frankford arsenal box with 20 spent cases, but the headstamp on them was different: "REM - UMC .30-'06 SPRG"

I also have some old brass from him, from this same era (50s) which is marked simply: "REM - UMC .30-'06" without the "sprg".

So the questions are (related):
1. Is the brass WITH the "SPRG" that was in a Frankford box actually match grade brass? I.e. Did Frankford use some Remington brass in addition to their own FA Match-marked brass, or is this just a case of my uncle putting randomly shot brass back into the Frankford box for storage?
2. Is there any reason to believe the Rem brass with the "sprg" is higher quality (or different) than the Rem brass from the same era withOUT the "sprg", or are they "mixable" for reloading purposes?

I'm going to weigh them of course, but my uncle cannot recall, so I thought I might get some input. I don't want to waste time trying to work up an accuracy load with just average-quality brass - but if they're mixable yet not match, I could at least work up a reasonably-good fun range load. I don't waste time mixing brass on rifles ("only accurate rifles are interesting", yadda yadda)..... I do that only on handguns.

Thanks.

 

[FROGO207]

Heck those things are just as old as I am.
As far as I have seen the Match brass always has been marked as such. The commercial brass was probably put in that box for storage. The SPRG only indicates a different time/machine of manufacture. Those commercial cases are likely all the same for reloading purposes but the military ones might have a different weight therefore internal capacity. If they have no signs of case head separation or visible problems they are all GTG.

 

[Blue68f100]

All the brass I have the the 60's is better than most a made today. The only way to tell would be to weight them out, dry and water and see. I would look at annealing them too if there is no record of it being done.

 

[DannyLandrum]

Thanks guys - that helps me a lot!

 

[hps1]

Question for you gents....

My uncle just gave me some old Frankford Arsenal loaded ammo - 173 gr, with box, with brass headstamp of "FA 58 MATCH". That's great - but not really the issue in question.

Also, in the package he sent was an opened Frankford arsenal box with 20 spent cases, but the headstamp on them was different: "REM - UMC .30-'06 SPRG"

I also have some old brass from him, from this same era (50s) which is marked simply: "REM - UMC .30-'06" without the "sprg".

So the questions are (related):
1. Is the brass WITH the "SPRG" that was in a Frankford box actually match grade brass? I.e. Did Frankford use some Remington brass in addition to their own FA Match-marked brass, or is this just a case of my uncle putting randomly shot brass back into the Frankford box for storage?
2. Is there any reason to believe the Rem brass with the "sprg" is higher quality (or different) than the Rem brass from the same era withOUT the "sprg", or are they "mixable" for reloading purposes?

I'm going to weigh them of course, but my uncle cannot recall, so I thought I might get some input. I don't want to waste time trying to work up an accuracy load with just average-quality brass - but if they're mixable yet not match, I could at least work up a reasonably-good fun range load. I don't waste time mixing brass on rifles ("only accurate rifles are interesting", yadda yadda)..... I do that only on handguns.

Thanks.

The FA 58 is GI M72 match. The brass is a bit softer than GI M2 brass but very good brass and has no crimp on primer (as does the M2). It is loaded to a muzzle velocity of 2640 fps.

I had a bunch of 1962 LC match ammo that didn't shoot well in the '90s, so decided to pull the 173 gr. bullets and seat a 168 gr. SMK. In pulling a few bullets I discovered that some made a cracking sound as the bullet broke free and some didn't. Figured the bullets had "welded" to the case neck over the years due to electrolysis on some but not all, resulting in varying case neck tension, so set up my seating die to "bump" the 173's a few thousandths of an inch and the accuracy on that lot of ammo improved to match ammo expectations.

Your other brass is just civilian brass someone stuffed in the match boxes. The SPRG just stands for Springfield. As for quality of brass, the match brass is better than the civilian brass IME.

Regards,
hps