Pakistan POF Berdan-primed Brass

[S&W Rover]

I always pick up brass at the range! Mine, plus any other brass that has been left behind in my lane.

Last night, I picked up some 9mm brass headstamped POF 76 9MM 2Z. POF stands for Pakistan Ordnance Factory, I found out later with help from the Range Officer. 76 is probably the year of production!

Looking inside, I saw that the round had a Berdan primer, with two flash holes instead of one centered flash hole of the normally encountered Boxer primer. First I'd ever seen - so I'm sharing this as a new experience. Others may be familiar with this brass; there are a few postings about it on the internet going back a number of years.

The POF brass looked to be a slightly different, too: uniformly darker, almost brown in color compared to “regular” range mongrel brass. When cleaned up, it looks to be the same color as typical brass. Inside, it had a heavy ring of lacquer around the place where the base of the bullet was in the shell. The primer is lacquered in place, too.

If you are a reloader, Berdan-primed brass is probably something you need to watch out for, if you pick up brass on the range or buy bags of unsorted range brass from secondary vendors. Berdan primed brass could bend or snap the pin of the typical sizing/de-capping die.

According to the POF web page, these POF bullets are 115 grains, marked either MK1Z (or just 1Z) or MK2Z (or 2Z). The MK1Z is rated on their web page at 1119 fps. The MK2Z is labeled submachine gun ammo, rated at 1296 fps. The brass I found is marked 2Z.

 

[e3mrk]

I dont do it but I have read where people drill a hole between the two primer holes and then just reload as usual.

 

[SMSgt]

I wouldn't trust any ammo or brass from Pakistan.

 

[Redford]

I dont do it but I have read where people drill a hole between the two primer holes and then just reload as usual.

Don't think you can do that the anvil is belt into the case not the primer

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[muddocktor]

Don't think you can do that the anvil is belt into the case not the primer

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Yes, the anvil is built into the case. I guess that after you drilled the flash hole, you could get the rest of the anvil out with a primer pocket uniformer, but that sounds like wayyyy too much work for a common caliber.

 

[mikld]

Yep, Berdan cases ca be reloaded and yes Berdan cases can be converted to Boxer. But in the real world with tons of 9mm brass laying around the only use for Berdan primed cases is to sell for scrap. But some will reload/convert them just fer grins...

 

[bigedp51]

I wouldn't trust any ammo or brass from Pakistan.

You must be almost as smart, good looking and modest as I am.

Below Pakistan .303 British click........................................bang ammo fired during a rapid fire mad minute.

Bottom line, wait a few minutes after the "CLICK" before opening your bolt.

Aim High Air Force
MAC 69-73
Yokota AFB Japan

 

[DWalt]

The ONLY time I felt it was worthwhile to attempt reloading a Berdan-primed case involved a batch of fired 8mm Kropatschek cases. I drilled out the primer pocket to hold a shotshell battery cup primer. It worked fine, as these were low pressure loads.

 

[hdwhit]

SMSgt wrote:
I wouldn't trust any ammo or brass from Pakistan.

Why is that?

 

[HCH]

I wouldn't trust any ammo or brass from Pakistan.

[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njvFIloLH7A[/ame]
Making bullets (sic) in Pakistan.

 

[jimbo728]

Best answer to the why not in Pakistan question, for sure.
Jim

 

[hdwhit]

SMSgt wrote:
Making bullets (sic) in Pakistan.

What does this garage shop in the Tribal Regions on the border with Afghanistan have to do with the Pakistani government's ordnance factory?

 

[hdwhit]

S&W Rover wrote:
Berdan primed brass could bend or snap the pin of the typical sizing/de-capping die.

That's why even though most of my reloading equipment is RCBS, I have a Lee decapping die with its collet-retained decapping rod.

Also, I sort my brass by headstamp. My miscellaneous box has three Boxer primed cases with POF headstamp. Since it is less than the normal size "batch" that I use, my miscellaneous brass is used for loads I know will be shot were I might not be able to find them again. So far, none of those miscellaneous cases has caused a problem.

 

[bigedp51]

What does this garage shop in the Tribal Regions on the border with Afghanistan have to do with the Pakistani government's ordnance factory?

Surplus ammunition is outdated and sold off because it does not meet military standards. Meaning it may not be 100% reliable.

 

[2152hq]

POF 303 Brit caliber ammo was pretty common and very cheap some years back. It had a terrible rep for hang fires and duds.
I suspect most of the problems came from poor long term storage in very overheated conditions there or some other place.
But the fact that it came from Pakistan was not lost on the not so happy buyers. Nick names like 'Pride Of Frankenstein',, 'Click-Bang' and others not quite so cutesy names were common.
I've never seen any 9mm POF, but I'm not surprised. Probably other calibers around too.
IIRC there some SMLE's of POF mfg'rd,, #4 rifles(?).

Several ways to convert Berdan to Boxer.
I used to cut the top surface of the fired Berdan primer off with an end mill leaving the side/ring still in the pocket. Then use a LR primer swage to form the pocket to LR size.
That pushed the old portion of the Berdan primer ring to shape still in the pocket and swaged the old Berdan anvil down flat in the bottom of the pocket,,it also usually swaged the anvil mat'l to close up the Berdan flash holes too. Final step was to drill a new flash hole in the center for the LR primer.
I did this with the 8x56RMannlicher (Straight Pull) Brass that was selling for about $2/box of 10rds at the time,,. It was good brass too.

Then later there came commercial boxer primed brass for the caliber, but by that time I had moved on from the shoulder bruisers.

The conversion using a 209 shotshell primer works well too. Keep the loads down.

All pretty much un-necessary these days with the availability of most any case w/ boxer primers
I've never found a local source for Berdan primers and the few I've worked with gave me enough experience with them to know I don't want to use them anymore! Some seem to have no trouble decapping them at all. I never got the hang of it.