Skip to main content
Help Center Community Shop

Military .308 brass

9 on the floor
I was just processing some 7.62x51 brass for reloading when I noticed some of it was headstamped "LC 86 LR".
This brass was all fired from an M60 by Navy SeaBees and given to me in bulk at the range years ago.
I looked at it when I got it and it all looked like LC 88 brass with the NATO cross, so I never gave it a second look till now.
The "LR" brass has no primer crimp.
What do I have?
0

Comments

11 comments

Date Votes
  • CHEVELLE427
    what i understand
    LC=lake city,
    86= 1986,
    LR? I do not know
    0
  • 9 on the floor
    Thanks, CHEVELLE.
    I knew it was Lake City, just never seen it with the LR before. And no primer crimp.
    0
  • CHEVELLE427
    watch out for some of the military brass,

    say 46g of one powder in commercial brass might be to the top in military brass.
    0
  • babun
    LR= LONG RANGE. Different bullet and powder charge. Bob
    0
  • 9 on the floor
    So is LR kind of like military match brass?
    And why no primer crimp or NATO cross?
    And why fire it in an M60?

    Questions, questions.
    0
  • Laredo Lefty
    Lake City Match brass is stamped "LC Match" & year. The reason that brass is not crimped is it is not intended for use in combat, but competition.

    When loading military brass it should be loaded down 10% from commercial loading data because military brass is thicker than commercial brass.
    0
  • babun
    No nato mark because it was not made to nato specs. You may find cases marked 'match", "LR", "X", and some others too. Most used a 176 grain bullet and different powder. Think the M183 round started the ball rolling. Then went to xm183, then more and more types , the marines had a lot of input because they had troubles with the BDC not matching the trajectory of the various loads. bob
    0
  • 9 on the floor
    Thanks guys.

    I load lots of military brass and know about the 10% reduction to allow for case wall thickness, I'd just never run across the LR designation before.

    Thanks again for all the information.
    0
  • heavyiron
    Hi,

    The history of these cartridges is confusing so this is a short attempt to summarize.

    The "LR" does stand for long range.

    In the mid-1960's Lake City made two types of match cartridges with two different manufacturing processes. The headstamps were LC 64 NM to LC 67 NM and LC 64 MATCH to LC 67 MATCH. These were M118 and used either IMR 4895 or WC 846 powder.

    Later came the M852 which originally started life as a Sierra 168 grain 13 degree boattail bullet. This bullet performed well out to 600 yards, but at greater distances the cartridge performed poorly. Sierra then switched the M852 to a 175 grain 9 degree boattail design which performed well. The M852 began life using WC 750 ball powder which created too much pressure in the M-14, so it was changed also. When the M852 with 168 grain bullet evolved into the 175 grain bullet and downloaded it morphed into the M118LR during the late 1980's. This is probably your brass.

    During the late 1980's "match" brass was only marked "LR" on the headstamp. Therefore, current brass from Lake City is marked LC LR 95 to LC LR 09. Neither the cases or boxes have any reference to "Match" or "National Match" ammunition.

    "Match" ammunition is now extinct because of two reasons. The first was the switch competition rules in 1993 to allow competitors to provide their own ammunition and the second is that commercial ammunition has gotten so much better, there is no need for government manufactured match ammunition.

    Currently, the closest thing to match ammunition manufactured by the military is 7.62mm Special Ball M118. This isn't the whole story but I hope this helps.

    Heavyiron
    0
  • grandman
    Heavyiron,
    What is the military using for civilian ammo now? I have seen some Federal Match on the line used in M14/M1A`s and have heard that the Marines use .300 Win Mag in Federal Match for sniper rounds.
    0
  • 9 on the floor
    Thanks heavyiron.
    Upon closer examination, this brass is stamped 98, not 86 [damn my aging eyeballs] so it falls into the date range you mention.

    wonder why they were running it through an M60?
    0

Please sign in to leave a comment.

Recent Activity