Can ammo go bad?

[Ducman]

send them my way, I'll take the risk and test them for you. PM me for address.

[Turbinator]

However, most milsurp ammo are sealed at the case and primer so even though there may be evidence of exposure to moisture on the outside (corrosion, discoloration, etc.) the cartridges may be just fine and safe to shoot. Through the 80's-90's I bought tens of thousands old milsurp rounds in all sorts of calibers and aside from a few hard primers, most fired properly and none were unsafe to shoot, even ones looking like this and worse:

You know, I'm glad you posted that picture, because I have some milsurp that looks like that, that I've been afraid to shoot. If you've had good luck, then maybe I'll get a long string, find a big tree, hide behind it, and try out this ammo I have. Nah. I might actually give these rounds a try sometime at the range.

Turby

[Mssr. Eleganté]

You know, I'm glad you posted that picture, because I have some milsurp that looks like that, that I've been afraid to shoot. If you've had good luck, then maybe I'll get a long string, find a big tree, hide behind it, and try out this ammo I have. Nah. I might actually give these rounds a try sometime at the range.

Turby

My first order of Turkish surplus 8mm from Aim had a couple of bandoleers that looked just like that. They had advertised it as "bright and shiney" so I called them to let them know they had send out a couple bandoleers of corroded ammo. Aim apologized and sent out two more bandoleers of really nice looking Turkish 8mm.

I didn't know what to do with the corroded stuff since it looked way too scary to shoot. When I posted a picture of the ammo on a C&R forum everybody laughed at me and said the ammo looked fine. They said to just clean it up with 0000 steel wool and shoot it. They were right. The corroded stuff shot fine with no issues at all.