What to do with some elses reloads

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I'm in the same situation. A friend passed away last year and his wife gave me several thousand rounds of .45 ACP reloads he had made. He was a chemical engineer so I would assume he knew what he was doing when he reloaded all this ammo. I was working on what to do with them, so I pulled 10 rounds out of a box of 50. They were reasonably all the same load, and it looked to be within safe limits, so today I took a couple of boxes out and tried it out. Out of 150 rounds, I had 1 squib and two duds. Pulled the bullets and the powder was unburned, so I assume something was wrong with the primers-- oil or something.

So, I have decided to not try to shoot any more of them. I'm going to try to pull the bullets and reload them with my known safe load. I have about 2,000 rounds, so it will take a while but I have the time and there's no rush. No way I would sell them to anyone else and risk them having an accident.
 
Box them up and send them to me for testing....... I did have a Kaboom in a glock 19 with some reloads that was gave to me so do be carefull.
 
medalguy said:
I'm in the same situation. A friend passed away last year and his wife gave me several thousand rounds of .45 ACP reloads he had made. He was a chemical engineer so I would assume he knew what he was doing when he reloaded all this ammo. I was working on what to do with them, so I pulled 10 rounds out of a box of 50. They were reasonably all the same load, and it looked to be within safe limits, so today I took a couple of boxes out and tried it out. Out of 150 rounds, I had 1 squib and two duds. Pulled the bullets and the powder was unburned, so I assume something was wrong with the primers-- oil or something.

So, I have decided to not try to shoot any more of them. I'm going to try to pull the bullets and reload them with my known safe load. I have about 2,000 rounds, so it will take a while but I have the time and there's no rush. No way I would sell them to anyone else and risk them having an accident.
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Damn, squibs are no joke. Esspecially if you dont catch it..
ANYWAY. So someone has given you unknown ammo for free with no knowledge of what they are as far as the entire lot goes, But safe to test out/shoot a few and see how it goes.... But selling them and informing the recipient that the contents of the rounds are unknown and please do not shoot them is worse, than just pulling the rounds and reuse the components?
Granted in this situation you knew where the loads came from, an educated man that probably "knew what he was doing." And even pulling a few to be on the safe side, then to ultimately find out they are not. But that did not stop problems with the ammo, so seems irrelevent. HMMmm..? Interesting when you look at it from this point of view. At least to me it is... Reason why I say sell it if you can. THen it would be Over done with Gone. IMO.
Dont get me wrong sir, I am not implying anything in a negative nor positive notion. I am just simply looking at what is really the safest course of action, without having to do a lot of extra work with unknown ammo. Is it to use/ shoot the unknown ammo, or sell it and tell the person you sell it to, to Please ONLY use it for components, ONLY, and they are not recomended to shoot due to the unknown load? I would think the later one would be safer, and much easier, esspecially if you did not want to pull all of them and choose to sell as I would.
Of course one could say rid of them through some means of safe disposal, buy why waste good components when someone wants to buy them? I may just be a cheap skate and too lazy to pull that many rounds... LOL..
This is just a thought and my opinion and hoping to stimulate the topic a little more.
 
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I wouldn't mess with the headache of pulling that much ammo, really 3k rounds would take me at least 20 hours of my life. You could just take it to a range that rents firearms and shoot it there with their stuff while wearing gloves. Of course, there is the old piece of string and a tree trick. Tie if off, pull the trigger with a string a safe distance away. I guess I would keep it to pull and save the primers, brass, and bullets. Powder is cheap enough,for target rounds, that you would be money ahead. Really depends how much time you have. Maybe you can pawn it off on somebody for $100 or so. That wouldnt be a horrible deal for someone who knew they had to dismantle the ammo.
 
LOL.. Imagine shooting 3k rounds with a string? :what: Not that, that is what you meant. I just happened to think of it that way at this moment in time... And well, that momment has passed...:uhoh: and Ill never get it back...
 
Damn, squibs are no joke. Esspecially if you dont catch it..
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The very reason I got rid of a Dillon 550. The first squib that press gave me I checked everything to make sure the press was working correctly. The second squib I called Dillon asking for advice. On the third squib that press was boxed and sold and a new 650xl with powder check die was ordered. I will not put up with equipment that I can't trust what it produces.

Since then I also no longer use flake powders such as Unique in progressive presses.

Unless I knew the person that loaded the ammo or someone could vouch for them I wouldn't shoot it.
 
I once paid through the nose for 300 rounds of .30 Mauser that a local dealer acquired from an estate sale. Brass was unavailable, I was desperate to shoot a Bolo C-96 that had been given to me, and I didn't know at the time about forming brass from .223. Every round was reloaded and had been meticulously documented on a card in each box. I pulled every round and re-reloaded it myself. The guy had done an awesome job, every round was consistent, every primer fired, but there was no way I was going to scatter my German jigsaw puzzle all over the desert because of someone else's powder or bullet anomaly.

I used to disassemble reloads for a local gun shop that ended up with them on trades. I got a collet puller and whatever components I could use out of the deal. The other components went back in the bins at the store. I got time, better spent pulling components than watching TV. Send the stuff to me. We can work this out.

mike
 
I do not shoot other people's reloads.

Someone got hurt shooting one of my wimpy 223 reloads, as the case was stretched by a machine gun before I got the brass.
The guy ran out of ammo while shooting rodents, scrounged around and found some of MY ammo. My Ruger #1 would have protected me from the gas, but the guy has a Rem700, got gas in the eye, and had to go to the doctor. Now he will not use anyone else's reloads OR anyone else's used brass.

I got that brass as part of 7 gallons of 223 brass for $62. It had every brand of brass under the sun.
 
joed said:
The very reason I got rid of a Dillon 550. The first squib that press gave me I checked everything to make sure the press was working correctly. The second squib I called Dillon asking for advice. On the third squib that press was boxed and sold and a new 650xl with powder check die was ordered. I will not put up with equipment that I can't trust what it produces.

Since then I also no longer use flake powders such as Unique in progressive presses.

Unless I knew the person that loaded the ammo or someone could vouch for them I wouldn't shoot it.
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No doubt about it. Speed is nice when building large quantities, however saftey seems to becomes the second priority on the list when getting a progressive to run fast. I load all on a single stage. I can do 150 pistol rounds per hour at a steady pace while triple checking the charges, whether through the final visual check or weighing every 10th round or so... I am using the lee pro auto disk for pistol and hand weigh each rifle load. As far as rifle goes, I can only do about 50-75 per hour but hey, It fun and relaxing, and nice to have ammo that is accurate when even out just blasting away....
 
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That's why, when I fill an ammo can with reloads, I always put in a label that lists all componenets, and the powder charge. When I croak, it will all go to other shooters that know me well, and trust my work. The added benefit is, when I opent the can next year, I'll know what the load is...
 
How was the other equipment? Was it in good order, neat and clean? If so I would take a chance, it may be better than your loads. Was the equipment Dillon or Lee products? We all know nothing good was ever loaded on Lee equipment.
 
" We all know nothing good was ever loaded on Lee equipment."

They don't need any help.
 
How was the other equipment? Was it in good order, neat and clean? If so I would take a chance, it may be better than your loads. Was the equipment Dillon or Lee products? We all know nothing good was ever loaded on Lee equipment.
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What kind of absolute garbage is this? :mad::barf:
 
XxBulletBendeRXx said:
Sell Them on the internet or wherever you feel comfortable. Disclose the info you have obtained by pulling a few. If you didnt pull a few then disclose that and let someone else do it, pocket some change and buy what you want to reload for yourself. Just be honest with the purchaser and no hard feelings.
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I would not do this. As soon as you sell them you are the responsible party. it does not matter what you said. It matters what some slime ball Lawyer can convince a Jury of. I would not want my future to depend on who has the better slime ball.
 
I won't shoot reloads with an unknown origin ......
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Me either. EVER.
There are a very few people that I trust to shoot their handloads. These are people I know personally and have loaded with them and observed their practices and methods. I know they do things the right way. Anyone else, no way.
 
What to do with some elses reloads
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That would completely depend on whether or not I knew the person who reloaded them and how comfortable I felt that they did a meticulous job. If yes, then I would shoot them, if no, then you get out your kinetic puller and pound away
 
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