Double Step Down neck LC headstamp...

[hogdogs]

So lets just say a "buddy" showed me a brass rifle cartridge he found that is 100% inert with punched primer and full of sand.

It was found on a military owned big piece o' land.

Head stamp is an LC and is followed by what I think is 8 and "l" or "I" or "1"...

It is a double neck or 2 step downs. the smallest is like a .22 lr or .22win mag. The fat end seems fat like a .30-06 or so... The fat section seems like a "short action" compared to the long action length of the .30-06.

Last AA batts are in the gps and low after 2 hunts so no pics right yet.

The smallest section is long like 5/8ths to 3/4 nch or so.

Any ideas what it might be? Likely some sort of practice ammo knowing the place it was found.

Brent

 

[MTT TL]

LC is Lake City from the Lake City ammo plant.

I'd check my measurements again. They sound a little off.

 

[FrankenMauser]

It's a 7.62x51mm blank that dropped from one of the helos, or one of the "tough guy" idiots that thinks the M60 is a good OPFOR weapon.

What part of Eglin did you find it on?

 

[hogdogs]

Cool... "He" found it in the NE quadrant... An area called Choctaw East dog area...
That sounds 'bout right as I find tons of 5.56 blanks. I assumed this may be a sort of blank round but I wasn't sure with no star crimp and the long small section throwing me off.
Lots of cool finds... Also I have found expended 9mm "paint" ammo.

Coolest military find (aside from the mil vehicle junk yard) is a sort of fin stabilized gizmo. D battery size diameter and what may be a spent rocket motor. The fins are a stamped stainless steel unit. it seems obvious these fins were held in compression until exit of a tube.

I guessed this as a component of a cluster bomb or maybe some sort of long burn parachute flare...

So as not to lose my access privileges, I leave the munitions sort of finds alone... But I can return to the GPS waypoint for measures...

Brent

 

[MTT TL]

I guessed this as a component of a cluster bomb or maybe some sort of long burn parachute flare...

It is a parachute flare body.

If it were a cluster bomb you would be dead.

 

[hogdogs]

Well I would be fine as it was fully expended...

I reckon many tests are done without each cluster being a live explosive.

Seems many of our modern weapons systems and such go thru one phase or other of R&D in this area. IIRC the MOAB was tested here.

I was on a limited mobility hunt with a buddy and they put these folks in all of the "CLOSED" areas where the big bucks are safe most of the year.

We were in an area where a cluster type bomb (possibly moab) destroyed area...

It was AWESOME!!! Shots to 700 yards in one direction. All the trees were sheared off about 5-8 feet high and by this time all of the rest of the trees has rotted down and nice green foliage abounds...

BTW, My buddy got an 8 point and a 9 point off that spot that weekend.

Brent

 

[MTT TL]

Well I would be fine as it was fully expended...

That is kind of my point. An expended cluster bomb would consist of fragments. An unexpended one would be extremely dangerous and unstable and could easily kill or maim you.

They would not let you into an area where cluster bombs are used due to the high dud rate. The colloquial "MOAB" is a fuel air bomb that does not fragment like a cluster bomb nor dispense sub-munitions. It would do a hell of a number on trees however.

I find it odd that they would drop one outside of an impact area though. I would check the areas where you are hunting to insure you are in the right area. It would really suck to lose a leg because you stepped somewhere you should not have.

 

[hogdogs]

The limited mobility and scout hunts are well planned... the hunter is escorted to their spot and the feller escorting them in explains the boundary to that spot. The hunter is not allowed to leave unescorted even if they get a kill.

The assigned escort returns at mid mornin' then at lunch then picks you up when time.

The areas that are open to hunters have the potential to harbor unexploded ordinances... Thus every person buying a pass must watch a short vid on not touching, marking spot and staying for the EOD guys if possible to show them the exact location.

Brent

 

[Bud Helms]

I find it odd that they would drop one outside of an impact area though.

Not intentional, as I'm sure you know, but not rare at all. Eglin EOD is very active policing Eglin's active ranges. There is also an EOD school that opened after I left the area, back in the late 80s. Much of EOD's success depends on controlled flight parameters and accurate post-flight debriefs from those hot missions. EOD has a prominent role in ordnance testing at Eglin, so the problem of unexpended, unmarked ordnance has improved over the years.

There was a time when ordnance would get away from the pilot without his knowledge. It is less likely these days with the instrumentation and telemetry used. Less likely, maybe even unlikely, but not impossible.

I used to work as an instrumentation tech in an outfit called "Fuse Test", part of USAF Systems Command/ADTC on Eglin. Then later I contributed from altitude.

Eglin has a very good safety record, considering the Armament Development and Testing mission hosted there for so many decades. There's no telling what is still in the ground on some of those ranges from years past.

One is wise to observe the CLOSED AREA signs on Eglin property.

History of Eglin AFB

 

[Bud Helms]

I assumed this may be a sort of blank round but I wasn't sure with no star crimp and the long small section throwing me off.

The crimp blows out to form a straight tube. Real fast burning powder. The star crimp is made in a tubular front section. Firing it blows it back out to the original tube form. The crimp marks are still visible in soot marks and crease marks, I bet.

 

[hogdogs]

Cool link, Bud...
Site C-6 is mentioned as the dev. of the radar array required to track satellites...

I hunt south off the road used to get to C-6 and west of US 331 south...

I guess it was the humorous tone I used but when I buy my pass, after the vid, I say "If'n I find a cool big bomb, it is gonna be my newest coolest mailbox post ever..." "I don't waste the EOD feller's time..."

Brent

 

[hogdogs]

One is wise to observe the CLOSED AREA signs on Eglin property.

Understatement of the nearly ended year...

Brent

 

[FrankenMauser]

IIRC the MOAB was tested here.

Yea. The MOAB test was insane.

I was 12 miles away, and still felt the concussion. That was the only conventional weapon I have ever seen produce a well defined mushroom cloud.
I cannot put the experience in words....
Shock and awe.

The areas that are open to hunters have the potential to harbor unexploded ordinances... Thus every person buying a pass must watch a short vid on not touching, marking spot and staying for the EOD guys if possible to show them the exact location.

That video doesn't do enough to stress the dangers, in my opinion.

I used to have to recover helicopters from some of the live-fire areas. (Sometimes you have no choice - land in the middle of unexploded ordinance, or crash in the trees.) And, I recovered several helicopters from standard LZs (that are historic live fire ranges). Even the "safe" areas had a lot of UO popping up. The actual live fire areas are absolute death traps.

Entering closed areas of Eglin is an extremely dangerous proposition.
There are so many pieces of ordinance out there, it boggles the mind.

And, there are "biological" testing areas, as well.

 

[pendennis]

From the description, it sounds like a 7.62mm blank. The blanks don't have any type of "star" crimp in them. They have an extended neck which looks like a roll crimp. They use some type of wax in the top of the round. The extended neck is used so the rounds will feed reliably in rifles or MG's.

The silhouette looks a bit like a round with its nose removed. The primer pockets are crimped just like any other military round.

About 2/3 of the way down on this page, there's a drawing of the M82 blank round.

http://www.inetres.com/gp/military/infantry/rifle/762mm_ammo.html

 

[hogdogs]

Yepper that is what it looks like...

Brent

 

[Bud Helms]

pendennis, quite correct, sir.

I was looking at the M64 Grenade adapter about three up from there. Somewhere I have seen some bottle neck cartridges with a long nose and star crimp ... probably not military. Memory fails.

 

[Uncle Buck]

Coolest military find (aside from the mil vehicle junk yard) is a sort of fin stabilized gizmo. D battery size diameter and what may be a spent rocket motor. The fins are a stamped stainless steel unit. it seems obvious these fins were held in compression until exit of a tube.

Sounds like a slap flare. We used to carry three of them with us while on patrol.

 

[44 AMP]

The crimp blows out to form a straight tube. Real fast burning powder. The star crimp is made in a tubular front section. Firing it blows it back out to the original tube form. The crimp marks are still visible in soot marks and crease marks, I bet.

That the 5.56mm not the 7.62. 7.62 doesn't have the star crimp, but a roll crimp at the end of the "bullet" part of the blank case. There is a red wad (paper? wax?) in there to hold the powder.

Most often found linked for the M60 series machine gun. I have fired and handled a lot of these back in the 1970s. Even have a few loose in my odds & ends cartridge box.