Page 2 of 4 FirstFirst 1234 LastLast
Results 11 to 20 of 34

Thread: Reusing Racked Cartridge

  1. #11
    Site Supporter
    Join Date
    Nov 2012
    Location
    Erie County, NY
    Not a home procedure but for matches. You have to clear the gun if you still have ammo after a run. So I keep a mag in my pocket and take the cleared round and put it in that pocket. So from the typical match, I get about 5 rounds. After a couple of matches, I have a full one that I use in another match - so just run through the gun once.

  2. #12
    Site Supporter
    Join Date
    Mar 2011
    Location
    SC
    This is going to sound pretentious and I have never been in this position in my life until the last month or so.

    I’d say this is where a carry gun and a practice gun shines.

    I shot about 350 rounds through a carry gun for sighting in and reliability testing (with weapon light attached) and about 50 JHP this is a brand new Glock 34 Gen 5.

    I loaded all new JHP in that gun’s new factory magazines, cleaned the WML from carbon, replaced the weapon mounted light’s batteries with fresh batteries and put it in the safe next to my bed. It gets transferred to a holster when I leave the house.

    I think this is probably my new way of doing things. I’ve never done it before, but decided it was time. The Buffalo shooting was the breaking point for me. I needed a full-size handgun for carry, and I needed to start carrying a spare magazine again. I needed to start dry firing again too.

    This gets me out of cycling carry ammo out of carry guns, etc. for a citizen that’s probably easiest if it was duty weapon and I was an officer. I’d follow the advise above.
    God Bless,

    Brandon

  3. #13
    I don't really keep track of how many times I just eyeball it. If it looks the same sitting next to an unchambered round then I don't sweat it. Occasionally I'll shoot it if I feel it's been a long time.

    The other thing you can do is strip the next round in the mag and replace with the previous chambered round. So you insert the mag, chamber the top round, drop the mag and put the previous chsnberer round as the top one. You're using 2 rounds now but it's not the same one over and over

    Sent from my moto z4 using Tapatalk
    Last edited by 4RNR; 06-09-2022 at 11:50 AM.

  4. #14
    Member feudist's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2012
    Location
    Murderham, the Tragic City
    Stipulating a dollar a round duty ammo, if you only chambered a round twice and unloaded twice a week to dryfire, then assuming 600.00 for a pistol a spare dryfire pistol would pay for itself in 12 years.
    "Hey honey..."

  5. #15
    Site Supporter
    Join Date
    Mar 2011
    Location
    SC
    Quote Originally Posted by feudist View Post
    Stipulating a dollar a round duty ammo, if you only chambered a round twice and unloaded twice a week to dryfire, then assuming 600.00 for a pistol a spare dryfire pistol would pay for itself in 12 years.
    "Hey honey..."
    That is one angle on it.

    The additional angles are - your carry gun isn’t going to see the thousands of rounds and wear/tear of your practice gun (neither is your carry ammo).

    If you break your practice gun you’re not SOL waiting on parts / maintenance.

    Most classes ask you to bring a spare and lots of professionals including the founder of this forum swore by it.

    I’ve been here a decade and it only took me that long to finally do it, and a grocery store full of people being shot at and thinking I’m a father with kids. I need to get my stuff sorted out.

    I think some swear by three of a gun. One carry/duty (if it gets confiscated/broken), one practice, and one spare. I’ve heard it said a “pair and a spare” here a number of times.

    It’s not for everybody, but… I figured just add it in there. I did say I was coming across as pretentious.

    ETA:

    To further beat this dead horse.

    It also means I can simplify going through the risk of unloading/loading a gun and keep no bullets in the segment of the house where I dry fire, etc.

    All of these are great selling points to the wife.
    God Bless,

    Brandon

  6. #16
    Site Supporter Casey's Avatar
    Join Date
    May 2012
    Location
    South Florida
    Agreed with the dedicated carry and practice guns. I've been doing that for many years now. Carry gun gets at least 500 rounds through it (including a couple magazines of defensive ammo), then gets test fired annually, but otherwise stays loaded

    I try not to re-chamber a round more than a handful of times. Usually the bullet starts getting dul from exposure to skin oil, and that's my sign to toss it in the practice bucket. I do like the idea of Sharpie marks. I've yet to experience a failure to fire with my carry rounds even after getting rechambered a few times. And I typically shoot my carry ammo every year when I do my ammo exchange. This provides peace of mind that what I was carrying would have worked, had I needed it.

  7. #17
    Member
    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    south TX
    I use the 4 Sharpie mark method, but also visually inspect the round prior to it going back in the magazine. A few rounds have shown some setback at 2-3 marks, and those get immediately tossed into the training/teaching pile.
    "It's surprising how often you start wondering just how featureless a desert some people's inner landscapes must be."
    -Maple Syrup Actual

  8. #18
    Site Supporter
    Join Date
    Aug 2011
    Location
    TEXAS !
    Quote Originally Posted by dgchunk View Post
    Hi. Is there a rule of thumb on how many times a SD cartridge can be racked, ejected, and then reused? I have one handgun that I use for concealed carry, home defense, and training. This means I’m regularly racking a cartridge when the gun is in self defense mode and ejecting it a few days or a week later for dry firing and/or range time. FWIW I use Federal 124g HST in a Glock 45. Thanks.
    There is no "rule" but at work we recommend no more than 3-4 re-chambers for pistol and not re-chambering duty rifle rounds. The previously mentioned "sharpie' method works.

    While setback can be a concern, a bigger concern is damage to the internal structure of the primer.

    You can see the slight dimple on primers when live rounds are cleared from AR type rifles.

    Several years back there was a law enforcement teletype warning regarding an incident in the Atlanta GA (Gwinnett County ?) in which an officer who cleared and re-chambered the same round daily for nearly a year got a dead primer when he needed to fire at a suspect. It ended well but subsequent examination of the cartridge revealed the repeated re-chambering had knocked the "anvil" inside the primer out of position, causing the failure to fire.
    Last edited by HCM; 06-10-2022 at 10:55 AM.

  9. #19
    @HCM is usually “spot on”, and he is here also. I believe it was a Gwinnett PD officer-or at least Atlanta metro area. The circumstances were as he described: several hundred chamberings of the same duty round knocked the primer anvil out-no bang. Officer reportedly did a tap/rack and prevailed.
    I try to follow the 4 sharpie mark plan. A couple of weeks ago, fired a full mag of duty jhps that had been through this process; all fed, fired and hit the targets when I did my part.
    As mentioned earlier, I’d be comfortable w/single digit cycling coupled with inspection. Regarding 5.56 rounds, a chambered round (w/mark) is NOT rechambered repeatedly.

  10. #20
    Member
    Join Date
    Feb 2011
    Location
    S.W. Ohio
    Pistol rounds, 3-4 and it’s done.

    Rifle rounds, after I’ve cleared the rifle and am setting it back up to stow away, I strip off a few rounds from the magazine, put the chambered round in the mag and then reload the stripped rounds. Once all the rounds in that mag have a dimple on the primer from being chambered, that mag got switched out for one of the spares loaded with virgin rounds. The magazine loaded with once chambered rounds would then be used for training eventually.

User Tag List

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •