Factory versus Reloads

Factory versus Reloads

As an Instructor I always recommend my students use quality Factory Ammunition. Yes I know all you reloaders are going to write in and tell me that’s a load of rubbish. Before you go lighting up my mailbox let me explain my reasoning.

Over the years I have taught hundreds of classes. I have seen pretty much every type of malfunction over and over again. Let’s review some of them and their consequences.

1. Misfire. I have seen hundreds of Misfires and they are about 50/50 Factory/Reload Most of them were a gun fault not an ammo fault.
2. Squib Load. Always a dangerous malfunction and hard to recognize especially in rapid fire shooting. I have seen this maybe 10 times and never in Quality Factory Ammo. (That does not mean it can’t happen in Factory Ammo I just have never seen it). It is usually the result of an insufficient/zero powder load usually seen in smaller calibers. In all cases bullet lodged far enough down barrel to allow next round to chamber. Fortunately the students spotted the malfunction and no damage or injuries occurred. However in almost all of these cases the student was unable to complete the course as firearm was disabled. In a defensive shooting you may not notice it and destroy your gun or even if you do notice it your gun is disabled.
3. Case Separation. This is when the head stamp separates from the barrel of the case upon ignition. The head stamp is ejected but the case barrel remains in the chamber stopping future rounds from chambering. I have seen this three times and always with Reloads. Brass does not last forever eventually metal fatigue will cause cases to fail. In all three cases I saw firearm was rendered inoperable.
4. Failure to go into Battery. This I have seen dozens of times usually it is a dirty chamber and you can simply pull back the slide and eject the cartridge. On two occasions both with reloads the slide would not pull back to eject even with a great deal of force. Result on both occasions was an inoperative firearm. On the range it’s annoying in a defensive situation possibly fatal. On the first occasion the round was slightly oversized. On the second occasion the cartridge case had a bulge in it. On both occasions inspection of the shooters remaining ammo revealed same defect in multiple cartridges.
5. Failure to Cycle. I see this often with cheap foreign factory ammo. It is not made to SAMMI Standards and is designed to run at a lower pressure. Before you run out and buy 2000 rounds of that bargain basement Russian ammo buy a small batch and make sure you can run your gun on it.

So in summary I want my students to be able to complete the training they are paying for in the safest manner possible. By sticking to quality Factory ammo I can go a long way to ensuring that. Like shooting reloading is a skill that takes time, patience and practice to master. Using reload ammo for your personal practice is fine as long as you are aware of the possible problems and don’t mind your gun possibly being out of commission for a while. If you are spending good money on training courses it makes sense to use quality factory ammo. For your defensive ammo remember it needs to be 100% reliable in your gun.