Dirty ammo

[Levetti]

I found some old .38 special ammo in my garage, but it is covered in nasty blueish-green crap. I don't know how old it is or any other info (could be reloads, but i'm not sure) is it better to just use the brass or is it worth the risk to try to shoot out of my .357? The primers look good and some of the ammo doesn't have the blue crap. Can I just wipe them off? I need advice, I don't want it to blow up on me. Other places online say to just reload the brass after its been tumbled.

dirtyammo.jpg

[sk8804]

looks like corrosion to me.

[WTSGDYBBR]

There not going to blow up if you wipe them off. I have tumbled live ammo before.

[Levetti]

looks like corrosion to me.

Does corrosion on the brass affect the powder inside at all or just the brass itself? should they be fine after a wipedown or is it better to just not shoot it at all? After wiping some of them the brass looks really worn and almost like its been eaten away.

[Oceanbob]

Shoot 'em up. Slowly. Not rapid fire. Should work just fine. If you want them clean, tumble them in walnut shells.

[chknlyps2]

Steel wool will rub that stuff off pretty well and if there are no pits in the brass it is fine to shoot and/or reload. I found some old .32 WCF for my friends grandfathers lever action. The ammo looked like yours and cleaned up well but half of it the primers were duds. I have not pulled the bullets yet but I think some of the moisture that caused the corosion seeped by the primer or bullet over the years and fouled the primers.

Edit: Forgot to add that if you get a FTF wait a couple of seconds before you eject incase you get a hang fire.

[sk8804]

Does corrosion on the brass affect the powder inside at all or just the brass itself? should they be fine after a wipedown or is it better to just not shoot it at all? After wiping some of them the brass looks really worn and almost like its been eaten away.

wipe it off and shoot them, that is unless there are deep craters eaten into the brass. They will be fine if it just looks like scuff marks when you wipe it off.

[Levetti]

Thanks everybody for the replies, I'm going to shoot them this weekend. All of them cleaned up pretty nicely except for one that does have some pitting in the brass.

[PRCABR4Christ]

I shot about 1k rounds today, and most of it looked exactly like that, had 1 FTF the whole day, go ahead and shoot it