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Lake City steel cased ammo

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GotSnlB28 View Drop Down
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    Posted: Jul 19 2021 at 9:49pm
Included with a recent purchase was this bandoleer of Lake City 56 steel cased ammo. Bandoleer has "LC S" denoting the steel case. Thought it was neat and others might be interested. I have seen pictures of a round or two before but never actually run across any until now.

I won't go into detail about what it rode in the box with, let's just say it's a winter restoration project with good bones. I took sympathy on the old gal ;)






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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote W5USMC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 19 2021 at 11:14pm
Nice, would love to have that bandoleer. I managed to pick up 15 rounds of Evansville 43 steel cased ammo a few months ago.

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Jond41403 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 19 2021 at 11:50pm
that is very neat and very unusual! First I've seen or heard of lake City 30 carbine steel cased. The bandelier denoting steelcased is the cherry on top. I would keep that bandolier just as it is, NOS,& nice and full. Now you're going to make me have to hunt one down haha
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (2) Thanks(2)   Quote Smokpole Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 20 2021 at 6:34pm
Steel cased was limited to use in the states. That was because it was hard on extractors. In combat broken extractors put carbines out of service. In the states, they were easily and quickly repaired. Evansville made the vast majority of steel cased. LC steel is pretty rare and highly collectable.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote David Albert Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 20 2021 at 9:55pm
GotSnlB28,

I didn't realize that LC made steel cased Carbine cartridges. Thanks for posting.

Originally posted by Smokpole Smokpole wrote:

Steel cased was limited to use in the states. That was because it was hard on extractors. In combat broken extractors put carbines out of service. In the states, they were easily and quickly repaired. Evansville made the vast majority of steel cased.


Smokpole,

Where did you hear that steel cased ammunition was limited to stateside use? Was it on page 682 of WBII, or somewhere else? There were two details on that page that I found interesting, but perhaps may not tell the complete story of steel cased Carbine ammo. The passage indicates that steel cased ammunition was "generally satisfactory, it is recommended that brass cartridge cases be used for carbine ammunition as long as brass is obtainable."   That determination was apparently made during Cavalry Board and Infantry Board tests submitted to the Ordnance Department on March 22, 1944. The last sentence in the steel cased section of WBII indicates that use of steel-cased Carbine ammo by the Marines for training purposes was approved on October 11, 1945, after the war ended. These two entries in the book tend to support your statement, but I'm wondering if there is more info to reference, and perhaps other chapters to the steel cased Carbine ammo story.

War Department TM 9-1990, dated September 1947 indicates that "Steel cartridge cases were used in some lots," in reference to Carbine ammunition. In a table indicating cartridge case type, "Brass" is listed with an asterisk indicating "recent lots may be made of steel." I would think that if such ammunition were limited to stateside use, that it would be noted in the manual differently.

The Chrysler plant in Evansville, Indiana made 485,448,758 steel Carbine cartridges, which is a lot of ammo to shoot stateside, particularly considering that the contract was signed on February 27, 1943.

Evansville steel Carbine cases were made of "steel technically described as 'spheroidized, aluminum-cleaned, with a .13 to .18 carbon content,'"according to the 1946 Chrysler published book titled, "Bullets by the Billion," by Wesley Stout, which tells the story of the Evansville Chrysler plant during WWII. It has some really nice Carbine illustrations, and goes into a lot of detail about the production of steel cased .45ACP, and .30 Carbine ammunition. The book brags that in "six months it was turning out millions of rounds daily of steel-cased cartridges accepted by the Army for combat use in all areas."

Any additional information that a member may have on this subject is appreciated.

Thanks!

David Albert
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote Smokpole Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 21 2021 at 10:12am
I had a book on the training organization that listed TOE for the Army training units, It included info on training of the women in service as well. It had a huge number of pictures including women training with carbines and pistols! The info on ammo usage for .22s, .45autos and .30 carbines was included in the book. Unfortunately the book was "borrowed" and never came back. It included descriptions of the ammo that was used in training. What I saw in War Baby was a second source for me.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote jeepwm69 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 21 2021 at 10:59am
Fried of mine growing up had a packrat/ flea market junkie grandfather who had all kinds of good stuff.

We found an M1A1 stock at his drug store.  The grandfather said it was original and valuable (because he didn't want us running off with it and tearing it up).  At the time, I didn't understand what he meant, but now I do.  We found an inland carbine elsewhere in the store, no stock.  Now whether they were originally together.....who knows?

But the grandfather also had a ton of steel cased 30 carbine ammo.  No idea what the headstamp was, but this was back in the late 80's/early 90's before the flood of overseas steel cased  started flowing in. 

Of course, being 13-14ish, we put the inland in the M1A1 stock and went out and shot it until he hid the rest of the ammo from us so we didn't shoot it all

Sadly, my friend took his own life in 1999.  The grandfather had a stroke several years later and his family sold off all of his stuff for pennies on the dollar.  Another local shooter said he drove past the store and saw two guys loading guns in the back of van, stacking them like cord wood.  He had some VERY nice guns too.

I'd love to know what happened to that carbine.....
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote David Albert Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 21 2021 at 1:37pm
Originally posted by Smokpole Smokpole wrote:

I had a book on the training organization that listed TOE for the Army training units, It included info on training of the women in service as well. It had a huge number of pictures including women training with carbines and pistols! The info on ammo usage for .22s, .45autos and .30 carbines was included in the book. Unfortunately the book was "borrowed" and never came back. It included descriptions of the ammo that was used in training. What I saw in War Baby was a second source for me.


Smokpole,

Do you remember anything else about the book? Was it a locally produced publication, made for a particular military base, or did it have a brown or manila colored cover? Did it have a colorful cover? I'd like to try to determine the source, if possible.

Thanks!

David Albert
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote W5USMC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 21 2021 at 4:41pm
Originally posted by Smokpole Smokpole wrote:

Steel cased was limited to use in the states. That was because it was hard on extractors. In combat broken extractors put carbines out of service. In the states, they were easily and quickly repaired.

This actually sounds like one of those old myths to me. If in fact the steel cased ammo was limited to stateside use I would bet it had more to do with the steel casings being more susceptible to rust/corrosion in an austere environment.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Smokpole Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 21 2021 at 9:10pm
The book had a green dust cover and was roughly 6x8 inches in size and around 1/2 inch thick. Wish I could remember the title. It listed the TOEs/TO personnel of each type of company/battalion/regt. etc... according to date since they change frequently during the war.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote SSNPingjockey Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 21 2021 at 10:05pm
This thread/link has some interesting discussions on the topic of steel casing use in WWII and ever since.

https://www.quora.com/Why-don-t-more-militaries-use-steel-cased-ammunition-for-general-issue

It does not have any direct evidence that steel cased ammo was not used at all by the US overseas but, like Wayne kind of hit on…..steel casings are just not as good as brass.  The use of steel casings by the Germans created problems.  In a combat environment with the weapon heating up due to heavy use, sounds like we’d all want brass cased ammo in US weapons, just like the Germans preferred.

Interesting about lacquer coating becoming sticky at very high heat, casing expansion and snap back, etc.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (1) Thanks(1)   Quote David Albert Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: Jul 22 2021 at 9:15pm
Originally posted by W5USMC W5USMC wrote:

This actually sounds like one of those old myths to me. If in fact the steel cased ammo was limited to stateside use I would bet it had more to do with the steel casings being more susceptible to rust/corrosion in an austere environment.


W5USMC,

Something in your post made me remember that in my deeper archives, I have a series of Thompson Submachine Gun documents that detail tests of steel cased ammunition at Aberdeen Proving Ground during WWII. These were given to me by the late Robert Segel about a dozen years ago. It took me a while to find them, but I located them this evening. While they are not steel cased Carbine ammunition tests, I think the results are somewhat relevant, and point to the possibility that similar documents may exist for the Carbine.

The papers are hand-typed originals from the War Department in Washington D.C., dated 7 March 1944. The subject is "Thompson Submachine Gun - Directive for Test of Using Steel Cased Ammunition." It is addressed to the Director of the Research Center at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, and there are several APG Firing Records that accompany the directive.

To sum it up, a week later, there were to be 5 Thompsons delivered to APG for testing. All had experienced failures with steel cased ammunition, resulting in the bolt chipping, or split cases. The bolt chip failure involved a failure with a round that was partially chambered. The firer then retracted the bolt, and allowed a second round to be fired from the open bolt firearm. The second round caused the first round to chamber and fire, and then it chipped the bolt. It was reported from the field that this type of malfunction only occurred with steel cased ammunition.

Inspection of TSMG's with this failure indicated that the chamfer of the barrel had a sharp ridge at the chamber end. These weapons often also resulted in split steel cases. The test was to determine whether a chamfering tool that had been fabricated to rechamfer the barrel without requiring its removal would be useful. The 5 TSMG's were to be fired sufficiently to determine the number of malfunctions that occurred, and the number of split cases. The barrels were them to be rechamfered, and the test repeated.

The letter notes that troops under actual training conditions, as well as battle conditions neglect to follow manual procedure in many instances.

The intent was to expedite the test so that necessary corrective actions could be taken through Field Service Modification Work Order.

The Thompson serial numbers were recorded, and all were M1A1's. The previous number of rounds fired from each weapon were listed as unknown. An F.A. lot of steel cased ammo was used for testing. Four of the Thompsons had 600 rounds fired, and one had 2000 rounds fired. Both 20 round and 30 round magazines were used for testing, with results listed separately. One of the 20 round magazines resulted in two failures to fire in one of the weapons due to light primer strikes, but the rounds fired on the second attempt. Out of the 4400 rounds fired, there were no broken bolts, and only two split cases.

Conclusions of the tests were that "the anticipated malfunctions referred to in the basic letter did not develop in the test in sufficient quantities to warrant rechambering," and authority to cancel the test was received at APG on 29 July 1944.

Anyway, I though that the test report could shed some light on the overall situation with steel cased ammunition in WWII, even though it is for .45ACP in a Thompson.

Thanks!

David Albert
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