The only 30 M1 carbine ammo that is corrosive that I have has a pinkish sealant for the primer. Only a handful of rounds that have been put up in a plastic freezer bag with a note inside as to it's contents. The French is so bad you can hear the barrel rusting and corroding. Not that bad but why shoot it when you don't have two. Which begs the question. With all of the M1 Carbines being re-imported from Ethiopia just what did they shoot in them?. Supposedly many were in good condition. The loose rounds were range pickups at the range so no box. Headstamps were just LC 52. Frank

 

The only 30 M1 carbine ammo that is corrosive that I have has a pinkish sealant for the primer. Only a handful of rounds that have been put up in a plastic freezer bag with a note inside as to it's contents. The French is so bad you can hear the barrel rusting and corroding. Not that bad but why shoot it when you don't have two. Which begs the question. With all of the M1 Carbines being re-imported from Ethiopia just what did they shoot in them?. Supposedly many were in good condition. The loose rounds were range pickups at the range so no box. Headstamps were just LC 52. Frank

Precisely.

I still have 350 rounds of the French stuff sitting around, and about 250 rounds of the Chinese-made LC52.

My solution to shooting this stuff has been to harvest the components and load the bullets and powder into Boxer-primed cases.

I then package up the corrosive-primed brass, mark it clearly as having corrosive primers, and leave it in the 'brass box' on my next trip to the local range. Perhaps there is SOMEONE out there who might not mind using the corrosive primed brass, but my shooter carbine is too nice. I don't want to anymore..

 

The chances of you running into corrosive 30 carbine are really slim. if you have concerns clean the rifle with hot soapy water and then clean the normal way…would not take more than ten minutes longer.

 

More than 10 minutes.

I would tear the rifle down and clean the gas hole and the area of the operating rod. WIth good ammo, I never tear down the carbine. That is the whole reason 30 ammo was non corossive. Right? If I had any idea about the LC, which I did not, I would never shoot anything so marked. Brand new ammo Fiocci or PPU was $20 a box/50 , pre-crazy. The USA GI surplus I saw in the same recent pre-crazy times cost more than factory fresh!

 

Legit US LC52 was made, easy way to tell US made ammo has a silver colored primer, at least the samples I have...Chinese has a brass colored primer. Extractor grooves were slightly different too. If boxed, I believe the french had a suffix -A on the label for non corrosive rounds but from the 1950's I had issues with anything french going off. Would avoid any RD60 Dominican republic ammo also. NWM 59-60 was good, NC and boxer if I remember, in the yellow repack boxes. German, Taiwan?, Korean PS all ok. Just watch for reloads which may look resized or US military with soft points.

 

I was told that any & all of the M1 CARBINE MFG. in ww2 was the only ammo not to have mercuric corrosive primers in them. that they were not corrosive.is that true or an URBAN LEGEND?

 

I read and believe the same regarding 30 m1 being non corossive. I would be surprised if it was the ONLY non corossive - dont know. The issue here is the chinese clone ammo could pass for US GI ammo. LC, Lake City. That LC GI ammo came in little brown boxes, marked accordingly. I assume the Chinese is packaged different. I never purchased loose random rounds. I was given some at my club and I shot those and assumed they were non corrosive. I was right. I did not even look at the head stamp. I actually though it was all good!

Now we have a panic, no photos of chinese ammo. No pics of the packaging. Almost like thanks for nothing. Another covid from china?

 

If in doubt, pull a bullet, dump the powder, fire the primer so the residue lands on bright steel. Allow moisture access to that steel, see if rust forms. If one has known corrosive/non-corrosive primers to use as controls on the same piece of steel, not a terrible idea.

 

The fake LC 52 Chinese is berdan primed. Pull a bullet, dump the powder and check for two little off center flash holes instead of one centered flash hole. I had 4 boxes that my father bought years ago. I just pulled the bullets and reloaded the powder and bullets into new boxer primed cases. In case you didn't know, it's the primers that are corrosive, not the powder. Problem solved.

 

I know of a M1 carbine that was destroyed by the Chinese LC52 ammo. The lugs on the bolt were sheared off and the lug seats in the receiver were sheared off as well. I shot a box of it once not knowing it was Chinese counterfeit stuff and my M1 carbine developed cycling issues after use. I had to clean out the gas port to get it to work again. If you have the stuff I would recommend not shooting and pulling the bullets to reload with a new case and charge of known powder.

 

People sure read a lot on the Interweb. I read that you can shoot 7.62x39 in an M14...... AND that if you just shoot a 50 BMG bullet next to a bad guy, his arm will blow off just from the sonic boom..... ( by the way, both pretty false )

The US Govt did not load corrosive primers in 30 carbine ammo. Period. The Chinese LC is very corrosive. It will ruin a carbine. Here are the photos I have of it. All the French Ammo I have seen sucked - brittle brass, Corrosive and badly stored. ( carbine, 30-06, 9mm). the Chinese ammo is, as noted berdan primed so you can pop out a bullet and see the berdan primer holes. the bullets are sealed with a black sealant and tough to get out. I have been pulling the bullets from a bunch I got stuck with by unscrupulous seller. ( repackaged in commercial boxes) . Oh and no mater what some one selling the ammo tells you the US govt did not load GI ammo with Soft point bullets.

I have the same pic of the Chinese boxes and pics of the headstamps. If anyone wants berdan carbine brass I have a deal for you -

Corrosive ammo report for your info as well.

 

You really don't need to replace the powder. I just used the powder as is and they shot great and at the right velocity give or take a few FPS. But if you worry about it, weigh 10 or so rounds, take the average, reduce the average by a couple of 10ths and use.

 

Exactly. I measure the charge every 5-10 cases and save the powder. I found they are consistently 9.7 gr of some weird looking spherical powder. I will just use the same powder, test it at 9.7 and see how they come out. Adjust as needed. I have probably 500+ rds of the stuff.....

 

glad to see my photos(above) are helping others!!

One thing I've noticed about the sealant is that it seems to be more sloppy in application and a lighter shade of red than the real LC ammo.

Another way you can tell the Chinese from the US "LC 52" is by the details of the cases.

 

Beware of French and Chinese.

 

What is the French head stamp?

 

why are they allowed ti use the US, LAKE CITY HEAD STAMP? and I know because they are CHINESE. but really?

 

Anyone remember the psudo city 'USA' Japan? I dont blame the chinese, it is we who dropped the ball. We did have someone working that issue, but; he is gone now.

 

When the Chinese copy something, they copy everything, down to the markings! I remember a Chinese vendor displaying counterfeit automotive parts at the SEMA show. They copied the parts all the way down to the GM serial and casting numbers, which is what got them busted.

 

You have to be selective about this stuff.

Back when Rolls-Royce decided to put automatic transmissions in their cars, they received permission to copy what they felt was the best transmission on the market at the time, the GM Powerglide.

There were a couple internal surfaces inside the Powerglide transmission that were pretty rough-machined and did not 'meet RR's standards', so they took it upon themselves to machine those surfaces to a higher degree of 'smoothness' (RMS finish).

The resulting transmissions would not work properly. They went back to the original spec, and THOSE tramsmissions worked perfectly.

True Story.

 

OOPS!

 

Probably clandestine ammo sent to someplace with 30 carbines or with m1 carbines to supply to revolutionaries. Who's going to worry if the case is US boxer or Chinese berdan. Shoot a guy with a M16, FAL or AK and who cares if the piston rusts up. Insurgant/revolutionary lives are cheap. Carbines left in Korea or Vietnam?. Same with copper plated steel cased Radway Green "7.62/308" and the Chinese knockoff M14's. French ammo had a 4 segment headstamp, frequently a "VE 51".

 

so true! if it rust's up who cares? just retrieve another one!

 

I can only imagine the unknowing buyer coming across this stuff at a gun show.

 

This is more common than you think-