Factory ammo -- is it sometimes bad stuff?

[earlmck]

I bought a box of Remington 357 ammo in 1966 so I could shoot my newly acquired Colt Python right away. This ammo was a 158 grain lead semi-wadcutter bullet, loaded to full power, and produced the worst leaded bore I have ever experienced.

That was the last box of factory handgun ammo I ever bought. I can't swear to it, but it is possible it was the last factory center-fire ammo of any kind I have bought, though I have shot some factory stuff other folks had bought and (other than that one bad experience with the revolver) it always seemed real fine.

So the other day one of my buddies gave me a cardboard box containing all manner of miscellaneous ammunition, including some 38 special reloads and about half a box of Remington 357. I was intending to shoot these up at my next outing when the old memory got tickled and I remembered that baaad experience back in my younger days. Closer inspection of the ammo (headstamped REM-UMC) so it is a few years old... showed a dead-soft, pure lead bullet. I pulled a few and found them to be 158 grain, dimpled base bullets pushed by 14.5 grains of small-grained flake powder that I didn't recognize as anything I've ever used.

I thought to myself "Wow, those have to be the same loads that leaded me up so bad when I was a young guy. I'll bet they don't make those anymore!".

I'd have bet wrong: I looked and Remington still catalogs these things under their "Target" ammo. 1235 fps out of a 4" bbl they say. And playing around in QuickLoad it looks like you can achieve that velocity, but not exactly easily. Norma 123 does it with room to spare and Lil'Gun with a slightly compressed load.

Anyway, my thought is that I am amazed that Remington would still be producing a load that would have to lead your bore very badly (unless Remington has changed sometime in the past 50 years and is now using a harder lead bullet). Any of you more experienced folks out there know if Remington really is still producing magnum loads that are guaranteed to lead up the barrel?

Now I'm not knocking lead bullets: my main .357 load is a 180 grain LBT plain-base bullet at a bit over 1200 fps out of my 6" bbl. But that baby is fairly hard, water-dropped wheelweight alloy. I wouldn't try anything like it with a pure lead bullet, having scrubbed lead out of bores a number of times in past years as I worked through pretty close to every mistake a reloader can make.

[Griff]

I believe that ~1400fps is the threshold for leading with pure lead. But, like you, I don't buy ANY lead factory ammo. I used to buy some 44Spl when I had a 44Mag mdl 94 Winchester. But that disappeared into the black hole of stolen guns in mid-'74. Every Magnum round I've ever fired was a jacketed one, as those will reach 1400+ in a 20" carbine.

[Buck Elliott]

I had the same experience, a couple years earlier, with Rem-Umc .357 ammo in my then-new Colt SAA.. Plus, the additional "blessing" of cracked/split cases.
As a result, I swore off Remington ammo for decades..
A couple years ago, I ran across a local dealer who had 'bulk' Remington nickeled .45 Colt cases, and I decided to give them a try. The idea was to use them for cartridge belt carry, without the eventual mess of verdigris. . The are loaded heavy, but the several (50 or so) I've fired so far seem to be holding up well, and I haven't lost one yet.. If they prove to be good go one or two reloads, I'll consider it a success.
I still prefer FC, Hornady or Winchester brass for general, long-term application..

[Rusty]

There was a time when I was carrying a S&W M27 and my duty ammo was Remington 158 gr. soft points.

Then I moved on to a S&W M58 and I carried big Green's 210 gr mid range LSWC load. Since then they really haven't had much that I wanted.

[Pete44ru]

.

I've never shot any kind of pure lead boolits through any of my guns, long or short - I'm definitely a JSP/JHP person.


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[Larkbill]

Your experience sounds the same as mine with some Federal white box I bought to have something to shoot and reload in my first .357 Contender barrel. Very hot and massive leading. Why do they load something like this? Sell a guy something cheap that works poorly and he may never come back. Since I never shot anything but jacketed in this and my .357 Max for Silhouette I never had that problem again.