Shooting Romanian vs PPU "Sniper" ammunition

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bbrown
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Shooting Romanian vs PPU "Sniper" ammunition

Post by bbrown »

This last weekend I had my Wiselite-made S/A M53 out with the F/A big boys (MG-42 included). I shot both 150g Romanian steel case as well as some of the 196g PPU brass case "sniper" 8mm from the late 1990s from Wideners.

As usual, the Romanian shot reliably. No issues at all. Other than the usual stinkyness. Shot to point of aim at 100 yards.

The PPU ammo also shot reliably. After shooting a few rounds of the PPU, however, my colleagues noticed that the primers were backed out very slightly and there was a little extruded rim around the dent in the primer. Is it valid to interpret that as saying that the PPU has softer primers than the Romanian? One of my colleagues said that the S/A bolt may also have a slightly larger opening in the bolt face than the F/A one. I don't have the tools to check that.

Anyway, would it be fairly safe to continue to shoot the PPU in the M53?

As a side note, I also tried out a suggestion from the MG-42 owner. He routinely shoots 7.62x51 NATO ammo out of this F/A MG-42 with just a .308 barrel, still using the 8mm top cover, feed tray and booster assembly. So, I loaded up two rounds of Winchester x51 NATO (2014 headstamp) onto a belt and tried it in my S/A M53, just changing to a .308 barrel.

Not gonna do that again, at least with this S/A bolt. I got a double and a puff of smoke. No damage to the gun, but the primers were pierced, the firing pin was stuck in the out position, and a little piece of primer had got into the firing pin hole (which is what kept the firing pin protruding). I would have thought that the Win x51 NATO would have had harder primers. (Assuming that's what happened, the primers got pierced from being too soft.)

I tried the same thing in the F/A MG-42, same Win x51 ammo and a .308 barrel. Shot just fine, no issues at all (other than the big grin on my face).
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Re: Shooting Romanian vs PPU "Sniper" ammunition

Post by JBaum »

Is your firing pin protrusion within spec?
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Re: Shooting Romanian vs PPU "Sniper" ammunition

Post by junglewalk »

I don't worry about primers that are backed out a bit when shooting 308. It happens in mine sometimes, when I belt my handloaded 308 tracers in the 308 belts. (& I'm using regular rifle primers in the civilian cases)
...In the case above, a primer may pop out & subsequently gum-up the works a bit, till you find it inside & remove it; (that was why the early Germ/WWII 15 rd boxes that had punched primers were marked "Fur MG", to assure MG gunners punched primer rounds were in the box//by mid-war most factories making 7.92m ammo were punching primers on all production 7.92 ammo, &^ no longer marking the boxes)
........In regard to primers & firing pins on the 42, I have found the hardest primers to be on Pakistani live & blank 308 rds (headstamped,'POF'), and eventually flattens the tip of post - war firing pins. Wartime firing pins I find are more resistant to 'POF' primers & do not flatten as easily. Crazy huh?....the above is from my own personnal experiences.
(I find bits of primer sometimes in my F/P channel in my bolt-head too)
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