Corrosive, safe or No-Go Index?

[BubbaTheKid]

I tried the search function but did not come up with anything concrete. Is there a British .303 Head Stamp & Corrosive/Non-corrosive and/or safe to shoot ammo index/list chart? I have a box of "POF 67 7" Head Stamped British .303 I picked up in the early 1990's for the day I got my first Enfield. Being older and somewhat more informed I'd like to know what this is before I shoot it off. For example I know not to shoot British Manufacture Kynoch "K-53" & "K-54" .30-06.

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[Beerhunter]

For example I know not to shoot British Manufacture Kynoch "K-53" & "K-54" .30-06.

Why not?

[Bear43]

POF ammo is corrosive. A general rule of thumb is to treat all surplus ammo as corrosive that way you never have a problem. Like Beerhunter I am also wondering why you say not to shoot the Kynoch .30-06 ammo? I love getting a hold of their .303 ammo but that surplus is getting pretty rare anymore. Oh, and one other thing about POF ammo, it is known for bad primers which cause delay fires. Dangerous stuff if you are not ready for it.

[BubbaTheKid]

K 54? - CMP Forums

Basically 30-06 ammo made by Kynoch in 1953 & 1954 had a manufacturing flaw which results in the cases splitting or case head separation. No dtaes or lot numbers are known to me at this time. In a M1919 Machine gun for example it isn't a big deal due to the nature of that piece. In this day an age people are buying the belted M-2 Ball on the cheap, delinking/debelting and shooting it thru rifles. In a 1903, 1903a3 it isn't a big deal if you don't mind the occasional face full of soot via the Hatcher hole when the case fails. I don't shoot this stuff myself. In an M-1 Garand, the case failure is more catastrophic, usually exploding the stock. There's a link inside the link above of this very thing happening to my Buddy Wayne who "picked up K-54 at a gun show and debelted it to shoot in his M-1". That's how I came to know of it and am putting the word out in the shooting community a appropritate. There's also a link to jousters.com with a reference to an old Hand Loading Digest article on the 1st or 2nd edition pertaining to this. I have not been able to find that volume.


I found a YouTube video of a guy shooting POF 68 and it hang fires "click - pause - boom". It's a cordite charge, corrosive and from Pakistan. No word ont he case quality for reloading yet. I may just go ahead and shoot this off, clean as appropriate and pick up soem Privi Partizan for future.

[Bear43]

Those are the delay fires I mentioned. It's not bad when you expect it, scary when you are not. Don't expect to reload it unless you have access to Berdan primers.

[Beerhunter]

Basically 30-06 ammo made by Kynoch in 1953 & 1954 had a manufacturing flaw which results in the cases splitting or case head separation. No dtaes or lot numbers are known to me at this time. In a M1919 Machine gun for example it isn't a big deal due to the nature of that piece.

That's the only gun that used 30-06 in the UK (armoured vehicles like Saracen, Saladin and Ferret shipped them) and so I guess it wasn't an issue here.

[Peter Laidler]

Armourers were/are taught to treat all ammo as both corrosive AND errosive