Has anyone ever done this ?
I have a thousand rounds of 8mm Mauser Mil Surp
and was just thinking of different ways to
hunt with it besides grinding off the points
to reveal the lead core tips.

There is nothing new about this, and with match bullets it is often referred to as mexican match ammo. I think you'll find this much tougher to do simply because most of those bullets were crimped in place decades ago. Your results will vary depending on the brass quality, so you'll probably wind up pulling down the entire lot, resizing each case, recharging each with the recycled powder, then seating then new bullet. It's the easiest way in the long run. Problem is you'll still be dealing with those old corrosive primers.

prevent

Of course it's practical and safe to pull military bullets and replace them with modern soft points for hunting. Just be certain that the new bullets are of the same or less weight.

But, having said that, here are some things you need to think about. 1) The original ammuntion may be loaded with corrosive primers. Unless you clean the barrel, meticulously, after firing them you are inviting a ruined barrel. 2) Military ammunition is not noted for its accuracy and you may find it better to simply buy modern factory loaded hunting ammunition for the few rounds that you will fire at game.

Finally, "grinding off the points to reveal the lead core tips" is a BAD idea under any circumstance. Doing so will expose the lead core both front and rear and could potentially result in the core shooting through the jacket leaving the jacket lodged in the barrel. You will probably discover this only when you fire the next shot and it will then be too late. I know that hollow-pointing full jacketed bullets is done by a lot of shooters, and they get away with it, but DON'T DO IT.

Ray

Things I've done but do not necessarily recommend.

Pulled & Replaced FMJ military loaded bullets with PSPs of the same or lighter weight.

Pulled FMJBTs, reduced the charge and replaced the bullets backwards and used them for hunting. Worked OK.

Of more resent times with 8mm Turk ammo, pulled the bullets, reduced the charge and replaced the FMJs and also replaced many with PSPs. The bolt handles on some of the MOD.98s lift hard with the Turk ammo.

Pull Fmjs and remove powder replacing it with modern powder. Than replace some of the FMJs and some PSPs.

Test the Turk powder in other calibers but only after determining an equivalent modern powder burn rate and starting low.

By all means, as has been previously been pointed out, --Clean the rifle thouroughly and soon after it has been fired.

A number of gun buddies of old use to grind of 30-06 FMJ tips and use them for hunting. I'm innocent on this one but I did see a buldged barrel with a jacket pressed into the rifling. So it does happen.

One of my inertia bullet pullers gave up the ghost when Turk bullets were being pulled. RCBS replaced it at no charge with just a phone call. One of my Mid Way pullers is now showing stress cracks.

In short( too late ), you are not treading in dangerous territory "If" you apply the normal common sense you use while reloading. roger

Old age is a high price to pay for maturity!!! Some never pay and some pay and never reap the reward. Wisdom comes with age! Sometimes age comes alone..

Buy yourself some new 8x57 brass, load it up for your hunting and use the milsurp for plinking and blasting ammo. That's really about all it's good for.

Goodness gracious. It's not like the Marine Corp didn't fire thousands and thousands of rounds of corrosive primed ammo for practice long after they stopped making the stuff. Top Secret Info: After using corrosive primed ammo, put rifle in cleaning cradle, muzzle down, put bore guide in place, push a few patches of hot, soapy water thru bore. Follow with a few patches of hot, clear water. Patch out water and clean as usual. Not rocket science.

If the cartridges were all the same head stamp, I'd pull the milsup bullets and weigh 5 or 10 of the charges, dumping the powder in a common container. Then I'd pull the rest of the bullets and dump the rest of the powder into the container. Maybe dumping it into a small glass or something to make sure it looked like the same stuff before adding it to the bulk container. Then I'd make sure the ammo would fit in the chamber of me rifle and I'd see if I needed to resize the necks of the cases. If they would fit the chamber and I felt they needed to be resized, I'd take the depriming pin out of my resizing die and neck size the cases. Then I'd chamfer the mouth, and charge about 5 cases with a charge about 3 or 4 grains less than what was originally in the cases. I'd shoot that and see how the cases looked. I'd gradually work up, if I could, until I was at the original charge and maybe above if I had a good load book and a Chrony.

It may sound tedious but you could end up with a lot of good ammo for the price of a couple of boxes of bullets.

If the ammo has steel cases I say don't fool with it at all. I have replaced the bullets from 8MM Yugo heavy ball (196 grain) with 185 grain Remington PSPCL's with good results. I once did this with some chinese steel cased 308 stuff using Sierra 150 grain Gamekings and locked up my mausers action, no damage . The process worked fine when I went to 130 grain Speer HP's though.

I would just shoot the Military Ball for practice and plinking, and either load or just buy some factory hunting ammo.

The easies way to deal with milsurp ammo is to use your seating die RE-SEAT the bullet to a slightly shorter length...something like one turn down on the seater. That will break the seal on "MOST" ammo...not on all...sometimes it just collapses the case...you have to experiment a little at a time.

Then...use a collet type of bullet puller to pull the bullet. I've done it this way many times for short runs, up to 100 or so. I never found it particularly satisfying messing around with trying to turn crap grade chuck steak into filet mignon. I usually used military ammo just for target practice and being more into accuracy than just noise, the cases stayed on the ground...unles it was Lake City stuff... and most of the milsurp rifles were destined to be rebuilt into sporters anyway so the OEM barrels were of little consequence.

But the process of mucking around with the ammo was for learning so the information obtained was of value.

'Njoy

Bumping the bullet down in the milsup is a good suggestion and since we're not trying to salvage the bullets, I just put the cartridge in the press (without a die in the press), run the cartridge up far enough for me to grab the bullet firmly with a pair of side cutters and then lower the ram. You quickly develop a feel for how much pressure it takes to ease the bullet out.