Remington UMC ammo...

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Chris17404

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Hi all,

I went to the range yesterday and shot 200 rounds of Remington UMC 9mm 115 grain FMJ through my Sig P239. When I was done, both my gun and my fingers were covered with little brass shavings! I assume this was from the shell casings (loading and firing). It seemed pretty excessive if you ask me. In fact, as I was cleaning my gun last night, I could *not* get many of the shavings off the Hogue wrap-around rubber grips. I did *not* experience this with the WWB 9mm range ammo I shot the week before.

Has anyone else experienced this with Remington UMC ammo? Any suggestions as to how to get the brass shavings on my rubber grips?

I guess the one "good" thing that came of this is... there was a bright gold fingerprint along the right side of the frame of my P239... right where my trigger finger should be when not ready to shoot. I guess it's good to verify I'm doing something right. :)

Chris
 
Interesting, I prefer to shoot UMC as it is slightly more accurate for me than the WWB. The only ammo I refuse to shoot due to being dirty is any of the Russian steel cased ammo...inaccurate and stinks IMO.

I have a Glock FWIW and no rubber grips. The brass does not look overly worked over or anything when I retrieve it (building up stockpile and then will quite buying factory except for defense).
 
I've found the UMC rounds i've fired to be the dirtiest crap i've seen shot in person, right behind some aguilla super high velocity .22's i once had the misfortune to get an entire case of. I dunno how remington justifies the extra price over WWB. The only time i've ever had a FTE on my beloved s&w659 in over 20k rounds was when i'd fired only 100 UMC's through it...and then i had A SECOND ONE in the second box of 100. That's right, 20k+ wwb through the gun without issue, several hundred mixed american eagle (federal) and other SD ammo (winchester, gold dot, hornady, etc.) tested without ever a single problem, and in 200 UMC's i had 2 FTE's..the chamber was so nasty and dirty after only 100-120 that the cases were sticking and the slide felt sticky to rack. Your mention of shavings from the brass makes me wonder if the cases were expanding/oversized, though... Cleaned the entire thing at the range after the first FTE and the second came after only 60-70 more rounds - on a totally clean gun :rolleyes:. I also noticed the powder from UMC's has a nasty rank smell to it that isn't present when firing WWB or wincleans. I mentioned the ordeal to my brother who told me he bought some .38spc UMC's once and also thought it was horrifically dirty, refused to run it in his revolver because it was "so dirty the cylinder started to rub/stick after only 100 rounds" - YMMV!
 
Wow!

Maybe I got a good lot or something?

Only Wolf and the like has made me gag from the odor of the powder...

Though I have yet to have a FTE, FTF (feed) or FTF (fire) with any ammo in my G17. 2000 rounds so far, half WWB and half UMC with some Wolf tossed in (which I almost detailed stripped the pistol after shooting).

Doesn't matter since I will be reloading soon.

Price difference is minimal at 7.17 per 50 WWB and 7.37 per 50 UMC.

I have shot only the UMC in the GREEN packages.

Did you shoot the ones in the Yellow packages? Is there even a difference?
 
i have shots hundreds of rounds of yellow box UMC in .45 acp without any problems....not sure of the difference between the green and yellow boxes tho...
 
I've shot the Yellow box Remington UMC .40 caliber in 165 grain out of my Glock and it didn't leave any brass around my gun. Maybe it's the grain?

Try using a higher grain.

Regarding cleaning out the brass, try CLP and leave the gun soaked for 15 minutes.
 
I've had good results with the 115gr JHP 100rd packs of UMC that Wal-Mart sells. Weapon is a Taurus 24/7 Pro. Didn't seem any better or worse than other target ammo like CCI Blazer or WWB.
 
I have shot green box UMC Rem 9 mm without problems. Same with Fed. Americ. Eagle and Magtec blue box.

I was told to avoid WWB. Others never have a problem.

Probably just depends on the batch and the gun.
 
I shot through 150 rounds of UMC yellow box yesterday through my XD 9 and didn't suffer as much as a hiccup. I didn't notice anything particularly dirty about the gun afterwards when I cleaned it up either.
 
Thanks for the info, guys. It may in fact have been a bad batch. FYI... I was shooting the green boxes of 50. I'll still use up what I have left (about 400 rounds or so) then switch back to WWB I think.
 
I have shot a lot of REM-UMC ammo in a variety of weapons, with NO ill
effects on the firearms. Anytime, ammo is loaded there maybe tiny bits
of brass that come from resizing the cases, expanding case mouths, or
even seating and crimping bullets. In any case, this should not be any
where near what I would call "excessive"~!:)
 
I have noticed the brass flecks from the UMC. best way I found to get it off your grip is to roll up a peice of duct tape and kinda blot the grip with it. you can use making tape if you are afraid of the adhesive coming off. you can also use compressed air and blow them off.
 
I have used both Rem UMC and Win white box for target practice and noticed the brass flakes from both.

Independence and Sellier & Ballot seemed a little cleaner, but bear in mind that ammo can vary from lot to lot depending on who supplied what (who was the cheapest bidder for components) when it was coming down the manufacturing line.

PMC is the cleanest "cheap" ammo I have found but they are undergoing some kind of ownership change and the local supply has been dwindling for the past couple months.
 
I shoot UMC's out of the yellow mega-pak almost exclusivly because that is what i can get cheepest around my area. Never had a issue with well over 10,000 rounds of it threw my Glock model 22.

The only ammo i can buy cheaper is FIOCHI. And that stuff, in my experiance, is very dirtys and DOES produces alot of brass shaveings. But no malfunctions in shooting the 2 cases of that i bought either.
 
I shoot UMC yellow box once in a while. I don't notice any advantage over WIN USA, which is cheaper here, so I don't buy it often. The only ammo I've had problems with is S&B 357 SIG and UMC 9mm. The UMC worked fine, but I would have consistent pierced primers with my Beretta 92FS. Not a warm fuzzy feeling. I've never tried UMC Leadless (in the green box).
 
I've shot a lot of UMC in 9mm, .38 special and .357 magnum. I think it's great stuff for the price. Some other practice ammo has not been so good:

S&B .38 special brass routinely pops my sizing die out of kilter, so I don't reload it and won't buy it anymore.

Magtech .357 is stinky as hell, and smokey.

And I don't shoot cast bullets anymore. They're filthy.

When I need to replace my .38 brass, I'll buy more Remington UMC from Natchezss.
 
I've had no problems with UMC.

I do find that WWB is really dirty compared with about anything else that I've tried, so, for that reason alone I tend to avoid it when I have the option.
 
My G17 is almost exclusively fed on the 100-count bulk packs of WWB. I'm sure I've had a failure of some type in the past, but I cannot honestly remember a single one.

I'd be using it in one of my self-defense mags filled with FMJ if I didn't find a good price on some NATO-spec 9mm FMJ instead...
 
Its been my experience that the 115gr JHP UMC is more accurate in more of my guns then WWB. I use it as my practice ammo and I keep a couple hundred rounds on hand for a "rainy" day. I have experimented twice with the round in Waterjugs and wetpack and the UMC performed really well. Usually as good and sometimes better than other "premium" rounds. I have no qualms at all about UMC for my carry ammo. The only detractor is that the ammo is a little smoky and it has a bit of muzzle flash. I think the premium Remington stuff is probably better in those respects but the UMC is cheap and it really works. I attached a pic of the results of my waterjug test. The Rem UMC is the middle round. The left one is Federal 9BP and the right one is a Federal EFMJ that filed to expand. CHeck out my thread "unscientific 9mm/38 special wetpack test" to see how it stacked up against some other ammo types.
 

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I used to buy the Rem UMC 9mm mega packs and thought that all the dirty after effects were just part of shootin' cheap ammo, until I started using WWB.

The WWB was noticebly cleaner and I think marginally more accurate for low budget range ammo.
 
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