Steel vs brass 300 blackout

Unless it's a precision gun, all my other rifles eat a healthy diet of brass and steel. Barrels are cheap enough that I don't care.
 
If it's hard to find, that sounds like a perfect reason to make your own. You use spent .223/5.56 cases to make the 300 Blackout case and go from there. Plenty of info online (as well as methods) for doing this (the case conversion). It's not difficult and once the cases are necked and sized, you're pretty much set. ;)
 
If it's hard to find, that sounds like a perfect reason to make your own. You use spent .223/5.56 cases to make the 300 Blackout case and go from there. Plenty of info online (as well as methods) for doing this (the case conversion). It's not difficult and once the cases are necked and sized, you're pretty much set. ;)


Exactly!! Make your own. One of the coolest cartridges to load for. Tons of bullets available from cast and plated to jacketed and monolithics.
You can make some cheap awesome plinking ammo.
 
I understand all the arguments in favor of reloading. I don't reload. May never reload. The start-up costs are prohibitive, and with the amount of shooting I do the cost savings would take years, maybe a decade, to recoup. Not to mention time, space, a marked lack of the requisite OCD, and most importantly, desire.

So the original question applies, specifically, with one useful update... On a lower-end gun (PSA) is steel ammo going to generally work? This will be 100% a truck gun, 10.5"barrel, pistol, "minute of thug" firearm. I plan to verify function, maybe 10 magazines, zero holo sight, clean it, and pack it. Pull it out occasionally (every 2-3 months) to verify function and zero. Not hunting, not competing. I have different home defense plans.

So, is steel good, or is steel bad?
 
I understand all the arguments in favor of reloading. I don't reload. May never reload. The start-up costs are prohibitive, and with the amount of shooting I do the cost savings would take years, maybe a decade, to recoup. Not to mention time, space, a marked lack of the requisite OCD, and most importantly, desire.

No, they really aren't. The startup costs are literally the cost of one decent gun. I have ADD and I've never blown up a gun. I'm about to dive back in because once you
start doing it, it really pays for itself especially on handguns. Now if I didn't get to shoot enough to justify it, then that's a whole other problem. Payoff is rapid, for
handguns, and before you know it, it's paid for, and you're loading 2000 rounds and getting the third case of 1000 rounds for free. And that's using primo shit, if you skinflint you can probably get better return than that, even. On certain cartridges like .357, .44 mag, .500 S&W, .45 LC, .460, etc, your ROI is even more rapid because the commercial ammo of that stuff is so
rapey.

Now, if we're talking difficult rifle cartridges, then yes, your ROI sucks and its painful. That's a different ballgame and requires more resources to do properly.

As far as desire goes, unlike a lot around here I never "reloaded for fun" (to me, that's mostly bullshit) At the time I got into it because I literally had to- I was a dumb ass and didn't stack it deep before Obamascare 1. This left me in a bad place for ammo. So I could either chuffle around looking for overpriced ammo that didn't exist, or I could just say f*** it and reload, paying less than yesterdays prices. The fact that you make better ammo 8 out of 10 times is just frosting on the cake.

Now if you don't shoot anywhere near 1000 rds/caliber a year in at least one common caliber, then I guess it gets less appealing, I get that. If I didn't shoot at least that much I'd probably sell most of my guns though and do something else.

To get back to your original question.... with .300 Blk right now get whatever you can get your hands on. That shit is unicorn tears. I'm with the mexican girl on this one...

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For what it’s worth. I got my first 300blk upper a couple weeks ago. have been ordering the reloading components. but also just ordered 1500 barnaul steel cased 145gr. my practice range is in the woods too so policing my brass is a pain. I’ll end up doing both but wanted something in hand while I collected the reloading gear.
 
Well, over the last couple of days I've ordered 1500 rounds total. 500 brass from Freedom (in Idaho?), and 500 each steel from 2 different vendors, 500 Wolf Polyformance 145gr and 500 Barnaul 147gr, all should be here this week. My 10.5" upper arrives tomorrow or Wednesday, can't remember.

So a strip and clean and then out back to see what happens. Since I have that AWESOME bench @zboys sold me a while back, I'll shoot some, clean some, shoot some more all without having to make the loooooong trek from my backyard to the basement 50ft away. Range report to follow...
 
300 blackout is HARD to find. I've seen a little steel case, polymer coated. I've used steel in my WASR, heard it was a bad idea in 5.56 AR's, but ok in 3o0 blackout. What says NES? BTW, looking at 145/147/150 grain...

Shouldn't be an issue at all.

There was an ammo brand out there at one point that had a film or ..........I don't know, a shellac? (for lack of a better comparison) that would stick in the chambers once it got hot.

Outside of that, run what you got
 
I’ve never seen 300 steel! I shoot steel in all my 556 rifles, no issues at all. Well, other than it sometimes being underpowered. Once on a 20” rifle in single digit temps the steel would short stroke, brass, no issues. Issue didn’t occur with a 16” carbine. So depending on brand you may get some underpowered stuff, maybe. This was Russian golden tiger 223 IIRC.

That being said, with a pistol upper you should have no short cycling issues even with weak ammo!!
 
Lee, I'm glad you escaped all the useless restrictions we have here but for several reasons I'll probably die in this shithole. My thought is that you won't shoot that gun enough for the steel vs brass question to apply. I'd go by reliability first and cost second.
 
Well, over the last couple of days I've ordered 1500 rounds total. 500 brass from Freedom (in Idaho?), and 500 each steel from 2 different vendors, 500 Wolf Polyformance 145gr and 500 Barnaul 147gr, all should be here this week. My 10.5" upper arrives tomorrow or Wednesday, can't remember.

So a strip and clean and then out back to see what happens. Since I have that AWESOME bench @zboys sold me a while back, I'll shoot some, clean some, shoot some more all without having to make the loooooong trek from my backyard to the basement 50ft away. Range report to follow...

I am interested in how that Wolf works out for you.
 
I've used steel cased ammo for years. For casual use it is fine.

The only time I've ever had difficulty was when I was taking a carbine class at Academi. The gun got very hot and the coating on the steel was causing the cases to stick in the chamber.

When the gun wasn't hot, the steel worked fine.

When it was hot, a couple of twists with a chamber brush and a switch to brass solved the problem.
 
I've never used steel in my 300 blkout only because I only use subs and I do not think there is a load out there that is steel cased subsonic.

I've always used steel in my 223/556 rifles along with brass. Only after about 5,000 or so rounds without a cleaning did the bolt in my 10.3 get stuck in the chamber from dirty slut tula 223 and from being dry. Did a quick mortar, wipe down and oil right there and it was back up and eating the steel. i love beating the shit out of my 10.3 DD barrel/BCM BCG/Aero upper.
 
Did you clean EVERYONE out of 300 ammo???? LOL

I was on Brownells a few minutes ago. Was ready to add some S&B 200gr and. . . . poof, it was gone. I suspect EVERYONE's getting a limited supply. Like even Brownells and TSUSA are getting one or two cases.
 
No, they really aren't. The startup costs are literally the cost of one decent gun. I have ADD and I've never blown up a gun. I'm about to dive back in because once you
start doing it, it really pays for itself especially on handguns. Now if I didn't get to shoot enough to justify it, then that's a whole other problem. Payoff is rapid, for
handguns, and before you know it, it's paid for, and you're loading 2000 rounds and getting the third case of 1000 rounds for free. And that's using primo shit, if you skinflint you can probably get better return than that, even. On certain cartridges like .357, .44 mag, .500 S&W, .45 LC, .460, etc, your ROI is even more rapid because the commercial ammo of that stuff is so
rapey.

Now, if we're talking difficult rifle cartridges, then yes, your ROI sucks and its painful. That's a different ballgame and requires more resources to do properly.

As far as desire goes, unlike a lot around here I never "reloaded for fun" (to me, that's mostly bullshit) At the time I got into it because I literally had to- I was a dumb ass and didn't stack it deep before Obamascare 1. This left me in a bad place for ammo. So I could either chuffle around looking for overpriced ammo that didn't exist, or I could just say f*** it and reload, paying less than yesterdays prices. The fact that you make better ammo 8 out of 10 times is just frosting on the cake.

Now if you don't shoot anywhere near 1000 rds/caliber a year in at least one common caliber, then I guess it gets less appealing, I get that. If I didn't shoot at least that much I'd probably sell most of my guns though and do something else.

To get back to your original question.... with .300 Blk right now get whatever you can get your hands on. That shit is unicorn tears. I'm with the mexican girl on this one...

View attachment 369524

Oh I bet it's cheaper and no matter what being self sustaining is great.

What has kept me away has been the consideration of the time it takes, which I just assume has gotta be 30 seconds a shot (or a couple hours a week I don't have at my normal shooting rate).. but maybe its quicker than I think? How much time does it take, say loading .308 ?
 
I've never used steel in my 300 blkout only because I only use subs and I do not think there is a load out there that is steel cased subsonic.

I've always used steel in my 223/556 rifles along with brass. Only after about 5,000 or so rounds without a cleaning did the bolt in my 10.3 get stuck in the chamber from dirty slut tula 223 and from being dry. Did a quick mortar, wipe down and oil right there and it was back up and eating the steel. i love beating the shit out of my 10.3 DD barrel/BCM BCG/Aero upper.

My experience mirrors yours. Just a bit of chamber cleaning and it always ran fine. It wasn't until I used it in a carbine class that I had trouble. I still use it if I'm practicing shooting short range relatively quickly. Used that way, the terrible accuracy (>4moa average of 5 shot groups, not cherry picked 3 shot groups, out of my LMT with a 1-4 scope) isn't a big deal.
 
My experience mirrors yours. Just a bit of chamber cleaning and it always ran fine. It wasn't until I used it in a carbine class that I had trouble. I still use it if I'm practicing shooting short range relatively quickly. Used that way, the terrible accuracy (>4moa average of 5 shot groups, not cherry picked 3 shot groups, out of my LMT with a 1-4 scope) isn't a big deal.

I've actually been quite content with the accurancy of Tula 55. Out of my DD MK18 10.3 1/7 (which is not ideal for 55 anyways), I have no problem consistency making hits on a 3 inch and 6 inch AR500 plates at 100 yards with my XPS2 no magnification, both benched and offhand (prone, kneeling and standing) with a little bit of movement and mag changes. I don't think I can go back to paper targets after shooting AR500 LOL
 
Using Steel Polymer cased rounds in my Steyr Aug, The cases would get
stuck in the chamber. If I run a Mag of Steel Cased then a Mag of Brass
Cased, The Chamber stayed clean and no more stuck cases.

When I resized my .223 cases to .300 Blackout. I ran them thru my Dillon 650
at 1700 cases in 1.5 hours. Make your own case lube with a 10:1 mix of
97% ISO Alcohol to liquid lanolin. Same stuff Dillon sells at 16:1 mix.

I got a case trimmer that goes in a hand drill or a Drill press to finish the cases.

Malodave
 
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