Thread: Military Surplus

Hello,

Was at reloaders (Auck) this morning. Got some mil surplus ammo (7.63x39)
The guy at the shop mentioned that I should not be using this for hunting.

Now I know that I can grind the tip of the bullet till i can see the inside and then this should be fine or soft enough for hunting.

Just wanting to know other peoples thoughts....

Im not in the know when it to comes to things like this but... wont that distort the accuracy??

not really. besides you just have to grind only a little bit of the copper till you can see the inside metal (unless its solid copper, which i doubt). idea is that the bullet should open up on impact. used to work with the 303 surplus. guess it should work for this caliber too. had given up shooting/hunting for a while now. so not really up to date these days.

762 and accuracy don't go together
Yes it will make the bullet expand a little better, don't go back to far.

Have done it before?
Have you done it with this ammo before?
Do you know if they are actually copper jacket or?
For a round like the 7.62x39 there is really no excuse for buggering round with solids when soft points are cheap and plentiful.

I made a drill jig for my old man back in the day for just this purpose.

Basicaly you dropped a military 303 round into the jig and drilled a 1/8" hole 3/16" deep into the tip to make the projectiles into hollow points.

It worked well and these modified rounds took countless deer pigs and goats over a decade or so until they were all used up.

Cant see why it wouldn't work with the above Milsurplus rounds.

As for accuracy .... if you can still acheive minute of Deer accuracy your going to be successful hunting with them.

Cheers
Pete

The reason people used to mod the old .303 ammo is because they didn't haver the choice back then.

A lot of the cheap 7.62x39 rounds are just ''copper washed'' i.e. they don't have copper jackets, just a copper plating on the outside. The core material is often a steel core and wont mushroom no matter what you do to it...and they ricochet like buggery!

Good for rounds down range in an AK or the like just for the shits and giggles, but not ideal for hunting as already been advised by the gunshop. By the time you add up all the hours spent drilling holes in the ends etc...you could just by the SP version for a little more.

kj

It's probably lead core with a soft steel guilding jacket. I'd imagine it would work, but you can get Barnaul soft points pretty cheap. Be careful not to cut the jacket back to far. FMJ pills have no base IE: the lead is exposed. It's possible to have the lead core shot out through the jacket and have the jacket left lodged in the barrel. Not ideal when you fire the next shot. There is probably a tiny chance of this happening but it only needs to happen once. A meplat trimmer might be the go if you are intent on modding them.

Barnaul SP and Highland are so cheap it is mad to even think about trying this these days - just take it to the range and blaze away

The barnaul stuff works fine, shot several Tahr with it, never a deer though.

Originally Posted by kimjon

The reason people used to mod the old .303 ammo is because they didn't haver the choice back then.

A lot of the cheap 7.62x39 rounds are just ''copper washed'' i.e. they don't have copper jackets, just a copper plating on the outside. The core material is often a steel core and wont mushroom no matter what you do to it...and they ricochet like buggery!

Good for rounds down range in an AK or the like just for the shits and giggles, but not ideal for hunting as already been advised by the gunshop. By the time you add up all the hours spent drilling holes in the ends etc...you could just by the SP version for a little more.

kj

I thought steel core projectiles have been banned in NZ since the early 90's, but I could be wrong on this.

cdexter
check the projectiles .......... cut one in half with a hacksaw just to make sure it hasn't got a steel core.

If it is steel core then dont use it for hunting as it wont kill humanely or for shooting steel targets as you will get ricochets.


Cheers
Pete

Problem with the SP x39mm rounds is that the SKS has no feed ramp, just a little ledge the projectile hits to point it into the chamber. When the SP hits this ledge it gouges the shit out of it, sometimes enough that the round ends up pointed vertical hanging half out of the chamber with the case dented by the bolt. There is talk of carefully taking the very edge off this ledge (like .25mm chamfer), but if you go too far you're in deep shit as the round won't make it into the chamber at all. Bascially, the SKS wasn't designed with SP rounds in mind.

Have been meaning to try HP rounds, might be a bit better as the point is sharper. If anyone has, let me know.

Why are you assuming its an sks?

Originally Posted by P38

I thought steel core projectiles have been banned in NZ since the early 90's, but I could be wrong on this.

cdexter
check the projectiles .......... cut one in half with a hacksaw just to make sure it hasn't got a steel core.

If it is steel core then dont use it for hunting as it wont kill humanely or for shooting steel targets as you will get ricochets.


Cheers
Pete

Not sure, but I'm most likely out of date on issues regarding this stuff as I haven't owned an SKS/Ak for long time.

kj

Not banned AFAIK. Pretty sure the Yugo 8x57 surplus is steel core, it punches through steel like wet tissue paper. Regular soft points and FMJ only dented it.

I wouldn't bother mucking around with modifying FMJ for hunting. Even if the jacket is copper (which is unlikely) it won't expand much at 7.62x39 velocities. Even the norinco soft point stuff available a few years back drilled straight through animals. It does work when drilling out copper jacketed 308 projectiles, but you have to drill at least a 1/8" hole 1/4" deep to get much expansion even at 2800 fps muzzle velocity. I suspect you would almost have to cut off the whole front half of a 7.62x39 to get much expansion on game. The jackets on FMJ projectiles are very thick. Unlike hunting SP ones.