Anyone care to guess what happened to these, .308 Federal Case. They were picked up at the range and feel as if they were fire formed to a chamber with rifling's cut in. They were also very sooty all over as you can see in the rim and neck area. They were nearly completely black from soot.

Anyway would like your thoughts!

They were certainly probably shot in a Heckler&Koch semiauto; the longitudinal streaks are due to the particular chamber they have, made to ease the extraction. H&K are famous to overstrain the cases and I personally would not reload them.

quote:

Originally posted by wildboar:
They were certainly shot in a Heckler&Koch semiauto; the longitudinal streaks are due to the particular chamber they have, made to ease the extraction. H&K are famous to overstrain the cases and I personally would not reload them.

I will not be using them but, I had to grab a few and bring them home for inspection. Still though after cleaning I did not have a clue. They are in my brass scrap bucket now.

Thanks for the reply.

They were fired in a fluted chamber, one guy at our range shots a Century Arms CETME does same thing.

For her pleasure! Seriously, ti looks they were fired in an HK 91. Lou

They're reloadable, no problem. They're usually good for about 3 reloads before the necks crack. Otherwise they're perfectly safe.
Paul B.

Yikes! Just look at the insipient head separation!

Even my HK P7s in 9mm and 40S&W have the fluted chambers . Yes they can be reloaded though the rifle cases at least can't be loaded very often.
Check that cleaned up case by cutting it in half to see if there is any thinning of the case.

quote:

Originally posted by swheeler:
They were fired in a fluted chamber, one guy at our range shots a Century Arms CETME does same thing.

You are right, I forgot about the CETME . They are almost unknown here.

Wildboar; the guy was blasting away at the range and asked if I'd like to try it, said sure and I burned up a magazine full. This CETME wouldn't be my first choice as a hunting rifle, but wouldn't mind one if I was in a firefight. Since I have a couple 308's I picked up the brass when he left, was going to clean them up and load them, but they were all berdan primed so they went in the scrap bucket It was FUN to shoot though.

quote:

Originally posted by 303Guy:
Yikes! Just look at the insipient head separation!

I sure don't see it but my x-ray vision glasses are in for repair. I do however see the bright expansion ring, and if the cases were tumbled longer it would not show up as bright. You would either have to section the case or run a chisel point wire hook inside and see if you can detect thinning IMO.

quote:

They were certainly probably shot in a Heckler&Koch semiauto

Yes. I think so too. H & K did a nice semi-automatic sporting rifle the HK 260 or 270, I think, in .308 and other calibres. Fluted chamber was an option on those too if I recall correctly.

The SIG AMT and 510-4 are also fluted. My AMT works fine with reloaded ammo ... but I tend to limit the number of times I reload the cases to 4 just in case.

The cases shown in the photos above would worry me a lot because they also seem to show evidence of case head separation (as noted by one of the previous responders.)

I would section one or more of the cases and decide from there.

Heckler and Koch or a SIG-AMT fired those rounds. No problems reloading that brass either. Clean it good and use plenty of case lube. I've been doing that since 1975.