lightweight ammo?

I know the topic of firearms has been beat to death lately, but has anyone used CCI Blazer ammo? I've seen their spent aluminum cartridges at the shooting range and noticed how light they are compared to brass. I've read a few user reviews and there are a few complaints about feeding issues, but I use a revolver, so it's a moot point to me.

The weight of the spent case is pretty modest compared to the other cartridge components, although it all adds up... Wouldn't you save just as much weight by selecting a lighter weight bullet?

Don,

My reason for packing a sidearm while backpacking is to protect me from four legged critters. Therefore I'd carry a revolver like a .44 magnum, not my Glock 17 9mm. As for bullet weight, that would be fairly heavy and something built to stay in one piece all the way through a bear's skull.

Because such a bullet would likely have a thicker copper jacket and possibly a copper partition it would not be quite as heavy as a bullet with a thinner jacket. But it would not be on the lighter end of the bullets available for that caliber. As for Blazer aluminum casings, IF Blazer sells them with the correct bullet then why not save a bit of weight? Can't hurt.

So, at the end of the day my bullet choice would be for "end use function", not for how much weight I could save. After all, I'm about saving my life a lot more than saving weight.

Eric

Blazer is good ammo, I've put quite a few of their rounds through my pistols. I doubt the weight difference of a few rounds would be significant.

Be careful about rimfire ammo purchased lately. I had 10 misfires out of 50 rounds yesterday, two different pistols. Remington .22 HP's. I did a web search about rimfire quality and came up with tons of returns.

Wolfeye, why not 9mm FMJ?? Or Cor-Bon/Magsafe rounds? FMJ's zips through like an ice pick.

The department I work for we used to use Blazers for ammo to qualify with. I suppose it's a little lighter since they use aluminum casings, however it's also cheap, hence why we used it.

It's also cheap meaning that it dirties the firearm, and is known to have jamming issues.


But the reason why we stopped using Blazers is because of an even that happened to me. A little story I'd like to tell you and everyone else about Blazers and why you may not want to use them. This happened to me when I was qualifying a few years ago.

We were shooting the 50 feet exercise, when all of a sudden my duty weapon, (Sig Sauer P229 40 cal) just stopped firing. I wasn't out of ammo, (it was only my 4th round fired in a magazine that holds 13 rounds), the slide wasn't back, and showed no obvious signs of jamming issues. I racked back the slide several times, hit the back of the slide, no "stove pipe" problem and couldn't figure out the problem at first. The range master ran up to me, told me to take the slide off the fire arm. I took the slide off, and he held it up and looked through it.

What happened was only the primer went off causing the slug to only fire half way through the barrel. If I were to be able to fire the weapon, I would of fired a round through a barrel that had another round stuck inside causing damage to weapon and myself. I could of been seriously hurt.

Because of this, I will NEVER fire Blazers out of any of my weapons ever again.

Just something to consider.


Tom

Once when I was in the Army, qualifying with the 1911 Colt, the guy in the firing position next to me had that happen. But, his gun chambered the next round and he fired it. The barrel bulged behind the lodged bullet, the slide jammed about halfway back and for some reason, the hammer was frozen. He had a sore wrist for about a week but no other injuries aside from mental trauma. This was using brass casings; Lake City if I recall.

I don't really think that this sort of thing is specific to a particular make of ammunition, I think it is just the luck of the draw. I use CCI and Federal primers for reloading almost exclusively and so far have never had a failure in many thousands of rounds. And, I have shot a fair amount of 38 Special Blazer with never a mis-fire. I suspect that you just happened to be in the wrong place at the right time. I don't like Blazer ammo because it can't be reloaded but otherwise, it has always worked well for me.

Not to try to change your mind, but this sort of misfire has happened with other brands as well, and is nothing new; it's the reason we're trained to cease firing and inspect the weapon if a round sounds or feels different when fired.

For that matter its probably not a good idea to shoot snake shot in an automatic because there isn't enough recoil to cycle the action properly and the next shell can jam in sideways, fortunately this doesn't set them off. I heard that with 1911 .45s that you have different springs for different loads, like target loads vs combat loads. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

Back to the thread - the most ultralight ammo is a .22LR
Jim <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

Ditto. I've had it happen to me. I've had squibs on a number of occasions. usually due to a malfunctioning powder dump on a reloader.

While I've actually caught squibs more times than I can remember in an autoloader (then again I used to shoot a frightful lot - on the order of 3-400 rounds a week.). Normaly you just catch it, clear the gun, then go offrange to pound it out of the barrel with a dowel. I did manage to not catch one once, rapidly jam-clear and cycle the slide on a .45, and then notice a much heavier recoil on next shot. "whoa" I thought and stopped. sure enough, bulged the barrel about 3 inches forward of the chamber.

Fortunately, you'd be surprised at the strength of most guns.

I've had jamming issues with all ammo. We stopped using it because either we just had bad batches, and that day we had several officers with jamming problems. If it's a weight issue I don't see much of a difference with aluminum vs. brass casings. if there is a difference I'm sure it's barley noticeable if noticeable if at all. If your carrying a weapon, and the reason is for protection, I personally would use quality ammo. Speer isn't a bad ammo manufacture. I use their Gold Dot in my Glock and duty weapon. I also use Ranger SKT's.


Tom

Sorry for not being specific: the ammo would be for my .357 sp101, which is the gun I carry when I'm hiking in WA. I have a bunch of Cor-bon safety slugs in my closet, and due to their really light bullet weight they're probably lighter than the Blazers. They're what I load my gun with when I feel like carrying around town or at home. I usually carry Federal Hydroshock when I'm on the trail, and I'm wondering if Blazers would be a decent alternative. 158 JHP with slightly lighter shells sounds interesting to me.

I know we're probably talking a total weight savings of a fraction of an ounce for 5 or 10 rounds, but the experiment might be worth it especially given the price.

It looks like they have "clean" ammo in .38+p. Not exactly powerful, but I wonder if it would foul less than their normal loads.

I've never had a Blazer round malfunction in my .357. I have had a squib (first time I've heard that term) with Winchester ammo, but it was my fault. I was playing around with lightening the trigger pull on my S&W 686 and part of that was to lighten up the hammer spring. I went too far and had a few misfires. They don't make it all the way into the barrel, they wedge into the forcing cone and then the cylinder won't turn. Haven't had any issues since I tightened the spring back up.

I shoot a revolver. What is this "jamming" you discuss in such detail? <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

the reaction to the slugs released from the bullet has to be strong enough to clear the chamber and eject the spent cartridge. [low powered loads jam] If not the gun jams on the next round, pushing it sidewways towards the breech but not actually going to battery. Badly designed bullets may not feed correctly which is why most automatic ammunition is pointed round nose. For instance, square .44 bullets cannot autofeed, thus sliding them into a revolver is the way to go. Also snake shot is best fired from a revolver because the force of the bullet is not required to make the action work. There is a reason machine gun bullets are pointed - so they feed well.
Jim <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

CCI blazer is great for racing, but is such a light load it is bad for defense! Use Cor Bon, their specs are unbeatable! CCI Lawman has a round nose for reliable feeding and is a solid performer, penetrating far. Light loads tend to be inconsistant even with a softer recoil spring, better to go with a good heavy load like the gun was designed to function with. If the time comes that you have to shoot something, you will never notice the recoil.

I mentioned this in another thread but it bears mentioning again. I had some of these cartidges given to me at work. They were .357 and I used them for practice in my 340PD. After the second shot, my gun locked up. I found that the recoil had caused the slugs to start sliding out of the cases on the unfired rounds. Catching on the forcing cone as the cylinder rotated. This could have been disasterous or worse in a emergency situation. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

I wonder if Blazer uses too light of a crimp. That's a pretty common issue with those scandium handguns, though; they can't shoot something heavy without jumping the crimp on the rest of the bullets.

Could be. My dept. issues and I use without the problem Winchester hollow points. I say so far as I don't practice with it too much. (not real fun) I have shot enough not to worry about the problem.

I've never had any such troubles. I use Blazer almost exclusively for target practice. Of course, the S&W 686 is a 3 lb revolver, it's going to absorb a lot more of the recoil.