Storing ammo - long term

Muleskinner said:

Military ammo can with a dessicant bag in each can. Stored in temp controlled basement. I have surplus ammo from the late 50s and reloads from my dad from the late 60s.. all still go bang.

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Muleskinner said:

Military ammo can with a dessicant bag in each can. Stored in temp controlled basement. I have surplus ammo from the late 50s and reloads from my dad from the late 60s.. all still go bang.

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Bountied said:

But what size desiccant bags? 1lb or bigger? What ammo cans? 50Cal or the little 556 ones??? Geez I need to know!

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Pinecone said:

Actually 5.56 came in the 50 cal size cans.

The smaller cans were for .30 cal.

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Bountied said:

Ok, but which one do I store my ammo in so I can sleep at night not worrying about it becoming unshootable?

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Docster said:

Given the same quality, why would one be less effective than the other? Only difference would be weight when filled. There are threads addressing what to look for in ammo cans regarding quality

Get the reusable dessicant beads that change color when saturated with moisture. Recharges with time in microwave.

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Dodahdude said:

I store my factory ammo in different size military ammo cans. Every so often we hear them pop. Like a gas build up and the can release the pressure. Has anyone ever hear of this? Oh, I've opened the cans and haven't seen anything wrong.

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Dodahdude said:

I store my factory ammo in different size military ammo cans. Every so often we hear them pop. Like a gas build up and the can release the pressure. Has anyone ever hear of this? Oh, I've opened the cans and haven't seen anything wrong.

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Bountied said:

OK, stop... let the thread die...

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Baldheaded said:

I am late to this tread but had "long term" been defined. Are we talking 5 years or 25 years? What I would like to know is how long can ammo just sit on a shelf in the box it came in before you should consider a different storage solution? I personally just put my ammo into 50cal steel containers right from the start because I never know how long it might be. I have shot ammo from 50 years ago and not had any issues this way.

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lazarus said:

To many factors. Where and how is it stored still? In the original boxes in someone’s attic in Florida is going to last a fraction of the time as someone storing it in a humidity controlled basement in Alaska.

In a normal house with air conditioning used most of the hot and wet season, many decades before you’d worry about it being ruined. Probably centuries.

It’s how anal do you want to be. Modern smokeless powders is produced with buffering compounds and the priming chemicals are pretty stable on their own. They ARE temperature sensitive. Stored hit they’ll break down significantly faster than stored at room temperature. Let alone stored cool or cold. Humidity has a fairly small effect unless it is stored in a condensing environment or one with rapid temperature changes and high humidity (IE gets warm with high humidity while the ammo is cold, causing condensation in the casing).

Most people aren’t going to care about it lasting more than a few years or a decade or two. In which case, store it in your house. Done. It’ll probably still be fine half a century or more later without special precautions. But it’ll almost certainly be fine for 10-20 years.

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Bountied said:

Jesus! stop it...

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