What's the right way to dispose of live ammo?
 

Is there a right way to dispose of a couple boxes of unspent 9mm rounds? The problem is that I sold the gun to a pawnshop 10 years ago when I no longer wanted one in the house, but of course, could not figure out what to do with everything that accompanies handgun ownership, (cleaning kit, hideout holster and ammo) so it just went into a cardboard box to be forgotten for 10 years.
Had I been thinking at the time I should have gone out to the firing range one last time and shot it all of for free.....but didn't.
I did not at the time {or now}wan't to just throw it in the trash, someone could find them, use them in a homicide and the casingswould be covered in my prints(not good even though I don't have a record!:D )
And there's the fact that they are 10 years old and the gunpowder could be getting unsafe, sogiving them away to said firing range for the propriertor's personal use, well might be unsafe.
Any suggestions?

call you local law enforcement agency, I’m sure they would take them off your hand, or tell you who could.

10-year-old ammo is perfectly safe and useable. I'd find a friend with a weapon in that calibre, and see if he wants it. I've used rifle and pistol ammo which predated the Korean War without problems. The only issues you commonly run into with old rounds are corrosion-related; bad seals, popped primers, that kind of thing, but that's usually on -much- older stuff.

Thanks Dilbert and Dunedan for the info!

No problem. Just for safety's sake, give the ammo a once-over before you fire or dispose of it. 10 y/o isn't much, but it's better to be safe than sorry.

Into my neighbor's yappy assed little dog?




Just kidding. just kidding.
Sorta

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Get in line, pal...

Y'know, I have this ex-wife...:lol:

Truly. I wondered about your first statement and I thank you for amending it.
Depending on the storage conditions, results could vary fatefully(fatally). :thumbsup:

Naah. Most problems with old ammo relate to corrosion gumming up the works in your gun, or loose primers (pushed outwards by water intrusion) getting dislodged and getting stuck. I had a round of Indian .308 do that to my FAL a year or so ago.

The only potentially dangerous or permanently damaging problem which I've ever heard of from old ammo is pierced primers, which can cause all kinds of damage, esp. if the gun, like some ARs, has a Titanium firing pin. It can also injure the user through burns. On some old and unsafe designs, like the infamous Carcano, such a rupture could potentially be fatal, owing to the exposed striker and firing pin, but I doubt anyone would be crazy enough to use old ammo in a Carcano...come to think of it, I'm not sure anyone would be crazy enough to use -any- ammo in a Carcano!

Now problems with old -guns-, on the other hand, can easily get you killed.

Either give it to a friend or just put in a container that looks harmless and toss it in the trash. Thats just my two cents.

On second thought, if you live near me I'll come get it for you!

Rent a 9mm and dispose of it downrange.

I like the last post myself; nothing bettr than nocking out a bunch of rounds. Besides that, pitch it and forget about it. Figure out a way to stash it in the trash. Once in the truck, it will get smushed together with a half eaten steak or eggs and its good to go!

Actually, Bill might be onto something there, let's see; how quick can I get to Omaha?

:lol: :lol: :lol:

By the way---- I was surprised to see such interest in this thread, reassuring me that I am not a thread killer after all!

OK then it's gonna get wrapped up tight and mixed into the trash so it doesn't look like anything, I guess this just confirms what I planned on doing anyway....

I agree with everybody else.. find somebody to take it off your hands...

I wouldnt just throw it away though... they could get set off when the trash is compacted and start a fire... if you do throw them away put them in a 3 liter coke bottle or gallon milk jug and fill it with water... hopefully the powder will get soaked....


or if you like to live dangerously start a fire in your fireplace and toss it in...

that didnt have much to do with the age of the round, it had everything to do with that fact that its Indian ammo... dude, that shits bad, dont put it through semi auto guns, its notoriously bad, the inconsistency in charge weights is frightening.

and some people will say soak it in water, that wont work, bullets are designed to be water tight, some people will recommend soaking it in penetrating oil to deactivate the primer, penetrating oil does work for a while, the penetrating oil will eventually evaporate and the round will once again become live.


I say just shoot it
barring that, manually disassemble the bullets, clamp the empty cases in a vice and detonate the primers, just dont screw it up or you'll hurt yourself :lol:

Actually this wasn't the de-linked MG chow that's such a problem...it was quite nice ammo, actually, loaded for the .308 Ishapore Enfields. Cupro-nickle jacket, came on 5-round strippers in bandoleers. Not the most accurate ammo we had, but close, and very consistant. That shed primer was the one problem we had, from months of shooting this stuff.

Later on, we bought a bunch more of what was advertised as "Indian rifle ammo" for about the same price, thinking it was the same stuff.

Boy were we wrong...this was right when the bulk stuff first showed up, so nobody knew how bad it was yet...ugh.

Good luck finding a range that will let you use your own ammo in a rental gun.

hmm, since someone already said fireplace.....
i have a father in law..........








that was a shooting instructor and he agrees that they should be safe.

I am currently using up some .22 rounds that my dad gave me. about 30 years old we reckon. The manufacturer went belly up in the eighties.
Using them at the pistol range. Simply checking each case as I load it, and the sus ones get their heads ripped out... Not winning any medals for accuracy though.....

NEVER throw ammo in the bin.

.

I believe that will send bullets all over your living room at high velocity..Not funny! (Maybe that's just in movies, but I doubt it.) In the Military it is called "cooking off" and it's really bad; As in "My Humvee was hit by an RPG. My legs were hamburger but I was alive. Just as I was thanking God the rounds in the back started cooking off and I had the worst three minutes of my life cursing God." Correct me if I'm wrong, but no jokes please. Firearms and jokes that could be misinterpreted aren't funny.

That's just a movie thing. Without the barrel and chamber to contain and direct the force of the burning gunpowder, all you get is a loud bang. It'll scare the crap out of you, but nothing worse than that.

Where a "cookoff" can be a problem in a military situation is if a full-auto weapon, the gun itself, gets hot enough to start setting rounds off in the chamber: it's also obviously an issue with ammunition large enough for the explosion itself to be dangerous. Large amounts of small-arms ammo getting caught in a fire could, of course, reprodce this effect.

Either way not a cool thing to suggest! Thanks for the clarification.

After re-reading the thread I think I misinterpreted some posts.. Fob Magi wrote only to toss them in the fireplace "If you want to live dangerously", then Phant84 wrote further down "Since someone already said fireplace....My father-in-law said they should be safe." He meant that since someone else had already mentioned living dangerously firing the old cartridges was less dangerous than throwing them in a fireplace. I thought he meant that his father-in-law said it would be safe to throw them into the fire. Whups, forget I posted in this thread. :shakehead:

well I wouldn't say its not dangerous... you are still unleashing >500J of energy, your not gonna launch the bullets anywhere near muzzle velocity (and therefore a small fraction of muzzle energy) but this will still send the bullet and case (and hot ash) flying at lower speeds, which might still be capable of injuring you. I mean its probably the equivalent of throwing bottle rockets or some other firecrackers in your fireplace.

sorry I got it off topic, but Bill O'Rights stole my witty reply and I wanted to be funny too :/

lol

I will say this, i have shot many hundreds of rounds that have been WW2 surplus and slightly newer, from late 1930s war surplus(German, American, etc) to brand new ammo and so long as none of the bullet casings have cracks in them and are not sooooo corroded that when you chamber it you won't get it back out, the proper way to dispose of ammo is to SHOOT IT or give it to someone that will! if the ammo is in decent shape, many gun stores will buy it from you! (well depending on what state you are in, I don't claim to know all the states' firearm and ammunition laws). But it is worth finding out, why just throw it away or destroy it when you can have some fun or make a couple bucks off of it?

Combusting or setting off live rounds in any fashion outside of a gun's chamber or i should say in any manner that would put you physically near the combustion area is an EXTREMELY BAD IDEA. Granted, the projectile, bullet, itself will not be propelled at the velocity that it would if it were leaving a firearm muzzle, but you still run a pretty damn good risk of turning the case into a fragmentation device capable of causing serious injury. Keep in mind that the Vietcong did that to our troops during Vietnam, and the round no longer caused a small hole but would rather blow you foot off! Again, miniature grenade' without the timed priming fuse! BAD NEWS!!!:no:

well toe popper booby traps (which I believe you are referring to) don't work using fragmentation of the casing, rather by actually firing the round through a bamboo tube packed into dirt that contains and focuses the energy of the round into he projectile. This causes much more damage than an uncontained round would.