Green ammo!

[RicW 67]

I read in the Independent today that the British Army have commissioned BAE to supply a million rounds of new ammo for trial in the 5.56. These rounds will be lead free. Solid steel core, copper jacketed, designed to tumble on impact. The Army have said that there are real worries about heavy metal pollution. The new rounds will be longer to maintain the weight, will thus have a higher BC and be more accurate, and maintain lethality, at longer range. If these rounds work as hoped, a similar round will be developed for the 7.62 x 51.

 

I think there is someone in the MOD reading my posts on here!

 

Ric.

[coldweld 65]

I read in the Independent today that the British Army have commissioned BAE to supply a million rounds of new ammo for trial in the 5.56. These rounds will be lead free. Solid steel core, copper jacketed, designed to tumble on impact. The Army have said that there are real worries about heavy metal pollution. The new rounds will be longer to maintain the weight, will thus have a higher BC and be more accurate, and maintain lethality, at longer range. If these rounds work as hoped, a similar round will be developed for the 7.62 x 51.

 

I think there is someone in the MOD reading my posts on here!

 

Ric.

 

They don't seem to worry about depleted uranium round's though ? Is that not a heavy metal ??

Edited June 8, 2010 by coldweld

[RicW 67]

Damn right it is and a bloody sight worse than lead. I just get intrigued by all the excuses they come up with!

 

Ric

[matt_hooks 188]

Sorry for the thread drift, but I heard a thing on Radio 4 earlier today about sea eagles in Japan, and how they are being killed off by lead poisoning because they are eating deer shot with lead bullets.

 

I always thought that the bio-availability of lead from solid lumps of pure metal lead, rather than oxides, sulphides/ates etc. etc. etc was very low, and if the deer is shot with a single lead bullet I can't understand how the birds are poisoned.

 

I was recently involved in the cull on the Isle of Rum in Scotland, and sometimes we had to leave carcasses on the hill if they fell in inaccessible places. There is a large white tailed and golden eagle population on the island, but I've not heard of any cases of them suffering lead poisoning. Am I drawing incorrect parallels between the two situations? Do the Japanese use shotguns for deer for example, which would provide a much greater surface area and hence bio-availability?

 

As for steel cored, copper jacketed rounds, it is almost impossible to get a similar weight in a similarly chambered weapon. Lead is so much denser than steel that a steel/copper bullet would need to be considerably longer than a similar weight lead bullet, and so would quite probably not chamber properlyin weapons designed for lead bullets.

[trooperman 73]

Hi RicW i can tell you there is more than a few government bodies reading the shooting forum threads that's another way that big brother knows what is going on in the legitamate fire arm owners life.

 

 

paul

[JonathanL 4]

This sounds pretty implausible to me. Lead is far denser than steel so a bullet would have to be much longer for a given weight. Range would be severely reduced as, realistically, you wouldn't get anywhere near the weight you wanted so it would lose velocity much quicker. The contamination argument doesn't really wash either; lead bullets have been used for hundreds of years and billions were fired in very concentrated areas (like the Somme) and we don't seem to hear about long-standing contamination problems.

 

I wonder if this is actualy some specialty round for a particular job like piercing metal or something.

 

J.

[RicW 67]

I think it ties in with my thread about "5.56 up to the job?" At the ranges in Afghanistan, no it isn't. It never was a long range round, and the Forces need to adopt either a modern version of the 7.62 x 51 or, as has been said, a 6.5 like the "Grendel"

 

We shall see.

 

Ric.