match loads from surplus battle packs?

marduk185

take my karma boom
Full Member
Minuteman
Feb 3, 2009
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tantric thrust
hey yall, very new to reloading have a lot of questions but heres one. since components seem like a myth lately thanks to darkness, it ocurred to me that if one were so inclined they may be able to bullet pull some surplus NATO type rounds and reload with a 175 SMK for an improvised "m118 lr" type load. curious does this seem feasible and practical to yall who are experienced reloaders here? i have squirreled away a bunch of "battle pack" 7.62 nato stuff for use in an fal but wondered about upgrading it in a pinch of no primers or powder. im guessing id have to identify the powder type and reduce charge to compensate for heavier bullet. any thoughts welcome. thanks and i apologize if this has been covered elsewhere.
 
Re: match loads from surplus battle packs?

At one time shooters pulled the issue match (with 173 projectiles ) and used 168 Fed match. This started around the 68 Olympics (held in Mexico City) and that may be why these "reloads" were called "Mexican Match" !!

Depending on what surplus ammo you have and what projectile it has would depend on just swapping.
 
Re: match loads from surplus battle packs?

I've taken crappy Turk suplus 8mm that was corrosive, pulled the bullets and powder and reloaded them into some decent shooters from a battle mauser.

I took the time to weight 25 charges (all over the freakin place btw, +.- 1.3 grains!!!)

I picked the mean charge, seated the bullets til they were about 10 thou off the lands and shot them. Open sights at 200 yards I was breaking 12oz beer bottles from the boards about 8-9/10

I didn't even replace the bullets, just made the powder charges uniform and loaded it back into non-corrosive cases.