I was sorting through a mountain of brass recently and found a handful of 9mm Luger cases that are head-stamped "AMMOLOAD." What caught my eye was the inside of the case, which has a little ledge in it; at first I thought it was a small piece of a smaller case trapped INSIDE a 9mm case . . . but no, that's just the way it is.





I cut one open, along with a Federal case for reference. (Pardon the rough cutting job....) The AMMOLOAD halves are the first and third in this photo:



This thing appears to have a lot of extra brass in there, which makes me a little concerned about increased pressures if you reload these alongside normal 9mm cases. I did a web search and found that someone calculated that there is 9% less capacity in this case in the area not occupied by the bullet, but I can't confirm that number.

I have a handful of these if anyone wants to make some hot loads.

Has anyone seen these? Has anyone reloaded with them? Thoughts?

Never seen them but I'll be keeping an eye open! Thanks for the education.

I've seen them and figured that it allowed the manufacturer to use less powder to get the same pressure/velocity...

I never reloaded them though.

I have seen tons of them in the brass I have been getting.
Lots of speculation as to why they did that, but no real answer from them as to why.
Less case capacity= less powder for the same velocity
More support in the bottom of the case= less bulged brass when loading to +p velocities

I have seen these in both 9mm AND 45acp
Always good to inspect your cases before loading.
These can slip by in Dillon and Hornady progressive presses, and if the reloader doesn't catch the difference in powder volume, bad things are going to happen.

Stay alert, inspect ALL your brass prior to reloading, and most of all Check, Check, then Check again. Safety first!!

Dammit.



Yeah. I really doubt that my RCBS lockout (powder cop) die would catch that minor but important variation.

maybe something that was designed specially for +P stuff or designed to be reloaded many more times than the standard case

Looking closer at your pics, there seems to be a raised ring in the primer pocket right at the flash hole.
Wonder what happens if you try to push a regular primer in there?
Probably hit the anvil and crush it?

I looked at the case again to make sure that the ring is "real" and not just a burr from my cutting.

It's real.

Deleted.

It's a raised ring, all around. I used the tip of my knife, and I could feel it. I did the same with the Federal, and it wasn't there.

And yeah, these are going in the scrap bucket as soon as we're done discussing them . . . I'm not going to mess with them. They'll be in there alongside the NATO brass.

That's a long flash hole too... Interesting!

This stuff is coming from a company named Freedom Munitions.

Those that are using a lot of it are reporting serious problems with the cases separating along the "ridgeline". This can lead to a stoppage that will just plain piss you off because now you have to go fishing for the "collar" left in the chamber.

Another problem reported is that the "ridge" is not uniform in it's distance below the case mouth. This could be a big problem when loading your pet load and then having a reduced volume when you get to a case with more "thick portion".

Last gripe posted on another forum I visit was the fact that the case heads are convex which could lead to light primer strikes.

In short, it seems like it's poorly made brass that's not meant to be reloaded unless you measure the ridge height, match up the cases, and then use an appropriate bullet.

Some have speculated that the extra thickness is an attempt to stop the Glock Bulge but if this is the reason, it's sure created a bunch of other problems for a reloader.

Ammo Load is a manufacturer of giant commercial loading machines.

Wonder if they're in the brass market as well.

As I understand, they also own "Freedom Munitions". This crap was supposed to be their initial trial of this "design".

Have you tried filling one with water to compare the actual volume of the case.