Steel Bullets cause fires

[foesgth]

Smokey says...

when i shoot on blm i have a 10lb fire extinguisher with me....

Carrying a fire extinguisher is a good idea. However they run out. A full sized shovel will not run out of dirt out on BLM land, doesn't need to be recharged, and has other uses. Don't leave home without one or both.

[RandyD]

I used to supervise shoots for the Infantry Training School at Camp Pendleton, and numerous times I witnessed 5.56 ball ammo start fires when there were no metal targets down range. I think fires are a result of several factors such as dry weather, type of ammo used, what vegetation is downrange and whatever the bullets strike. I know of one range in the Eastern part of the State of Washington that will no longer allow steel targets to be downrange, due to a fire that started and burned some crops and buildings.

[SanPedroShooter]

Oh boy... I just bought 500 air pulled M855 projectiles. I am going to get a shovel and a fire extingusher.

[Mssr. Eleganté]

I reloaded some pulled surplus bullets that had bi-metal jacketing (steel alloyed into the copper jacket)...

Bi-metal = "steel alloyed into the copper" in the same way that the walls in my house = "plaster alloyed into latex paint." Bi-metal is actually just a pure steel jacket plated or "washed" with a thin thin thin coating of copper. You can scrub the copper off pretty easily with a 3M green plastic scouring pad.

[Scratch705]

pssh, maybe tracer rounds

and ignorant people like this is what will cause Burro Canyon to be closed forever if the range keep getting set on fire by people that don't believe the simple fact that steel core/bi-metal ammo does spark fires in dry vegetation.

[Yemff]

Does anyone have a video of steel core bullets sparking off rocks or know where I can view one?

first post to revive a thread thats 5 months old...

[Peter.Steele]

pssh, maybe tracer rounds

I never believed it until I was shooting my Mosin in a rocky canyon at dusk. Eventually we stopped even trying to hit targets and just started shooting at big rocks, just to watch the sparks. (No, there was NO vegetation to catch fire ... it's a large range / training complex, the owner is religious with the herbicide.)

[PsychGuy274]

It's not actually the "sparks" which cause the fires. It's the spent bullets with the steel cores or jackets. When a steel core or jacketed bullet hits a rock or other hard object it usually stays intact and it's kinetic energy is converted to heat making the steel hot enough to ignite a fire if it comes to rest on anything which could burn. Lead cores or copper jacketed bullets usually splatter and fragment enough when striking hard objects so they tend to not convert enough kinetic energy into enough heat to cause fires.

This is some good info right here, thanks!

[CriticallyStressed]

Bi-metal = "steel alloyed into the copper" in the same way that the walls in my house = "plaster alloyed into latex paint." Bi-metal is actually just a pure steel jacket plated or "washed" with a thin thin thin coating of copper. You can scrub the copper off pretty easily with a 3M green plastic scouring pad.

Thanks for the info, I was unaware it was more of a composite rather than a true alloy; which of course only reinforces the point, we must be exceedingly careful shooting bi-metal ammo in any areas with flammables.