Brass, Aluminum or Steel?

[majdad93]

Hi Again, Colt Fans,

Anyone have thoughts on cartridge preferences for target shooting? I have on hand both brass and aluminum ammo. I bought the aluminum when they used to have great sale prices, but it seems lately it's as pricey as brass. The aluminum, of course, is non-reloadable, but the initial cost savings I felt offset that.

I also tried some steel in the past, but it seems that with my Officer's ACP, I had some "stovepipe" and FTE complications. I find that steel ammo is usually cheaper, but they, too, are non-reloadable. Also, any thoughts as to whether steel casings are harder on the pistol's extraction and ejection components than brass or aluminum? Would like to hear anyone's thoughts and experiences. Thanx!

majdad93

[Kid Sopris]

I Won't use STEEL in AMERICAN made Guns...ESPECIALLY RIFLES. I also don't see any advantage of using a non renewable resource. (Aluminum).

I have seen Ruined Chambes of COLT AR-15's from folks using the Russian Steel Case Ammo, not to mention the Failure to extract or eject.

[dfariswheel]

The point is this.
The Soviets specifically designed steel cased ammunition to work in their weapons, and designed their weapons to use steel cased ammo.

Western firearms were designed with NO thought whatever give to using steel cased ammo.

The Soviet weapons have more tapered chambers and matching ammo with more tapered cases. This allows the use of the less flexible steel case with high reliability of feed and extraction at the sacrifice of at least some accuracy.
Western firearms have less tapered chambers and matching ammo with straighter cases. This gives excellent feed and extraction with BRASS cases with better accuracy.

The problem comes when you shoot steel cases in Western straighter walled chambers. The less flexible steel cases tend to not extract as well from the straighter walled chambers and that stresses the extractor.

For Target shooting neither aluminum or steel cased ammo is accurate enough for any real Target Match use. At best it can be used for plinking and informal target shooting.

What it comes down to is YOUR results in YOUR firearm. Some firearms will shoot steel ammo with no problems, some firearms of the same make and model may fail to operate well or suffer damage.
As for aluminum, disposable ammo, it's loaded to lower levels then brass cased ammo because the aluminum can't usually be loaded to the same level as brass ammo without too high a risk of case splitting. Even so, aluminum ammo will have a certain percentage of split cases.

So, for practice and plinking if your firearm will handle aluminum or steel cased ammo, go for it.