Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Remington ammo quality

Deer season 1996 When i was 4 1/2 i was sitting in the woods with my dad, a decent buck comes by and he put’s his model 70 lightweight 30-06 on it, squeezes the trigger and nothing, runs the bolt quietly and again nothing, a third time nothing and that was enough time for the buck to decide to move on. Middle of that day at camp it was discovered that only 7 rounds of that box of 20 180grn Remington core-lokt’s had good primers and 13 failed to fire. After that my dad or myself never bought another round of Remington ammo for years. Both of us convincing ourselves we surely had one of the very few boxes that could have ever been like that we both started buying some Remington ammo to add to our stock piles again 7 or 8 years ago.


About 2 months ago i had picked up a 30-06 colt light rifle i was planning to send off to get the NULA stock and treatment but keep the factory 30-06 barrel as long as it shot good. Put a vx2 3-9 leupold on it and grabbed a box of 180grn core-lokt’s off the top of the 30-06 stack on my ammo shelf just to make sure the rifle was a good shooter before sending it in. I Went out to my shooting table and had it zeroed in 3 shots. Then decided to try a couple groups for fun. First shot, click, nothing. I proceed to shoot a 1 jagged hole 2 shot group and when i squeeze the third one nothing happens. Result was 6 of the box of 20 appeared to have bad primers. Ran them through another rifle to verify it wasn’t the colt.

Called Remington and they sent me a label, i sent the box back to them and a few days ago I received a new box of the same ammo. Nothing wrong with the customer service, but had it ruined a hunt a replacement box of ammo isn’t going to make anyone feel a lot better. I understand in a trophy hunting or limited opportunity hunt you should probably only use handloads or better ammunition than core-lokt. But at the same time i know a lot of people that do trust it.

At this point i’m really just laughing about how un believable it is that 27 years apart a dad and son get 2 boxes of the same exact ammo that apparently had several rounds with bad primers. I honestly don’t think i’ve ever had a single round of factory loaded centerfire ammo fail to fire except the occasional commodity grade 223. Is it more common than i think? Anyone had it with Remington in particular? Anyway’s, long story i just felt like telling.

Years ago, I used Rem. Corelokt for my hunting, and took some Elk with it. One time, I had an Elk in my sights, pulled the trigger, and same as you, only got a click. Elk ran off. Went back to the range with the same box, and discovered more misfires, about six in the box. This was factory ammo. I have not used it since that day.

The only time I shoot factory ammo is when I'm wanting it for the brass, so I can reload it to my specifications. Having said that, I have discovered that over the years, most of the "bad" primers in ammo can be traced back to a light firing pin strike. I'm not saying that certain lots of ammo aren't bad when they leave the factory, because it undoubtedly happens, but the rifle itself can also be the cause.

As far as the new Remington ammo goes, I picked up about ten boxes for a friend who was looking for some and he hasn't said anything about it not firing. I do know he's shot a lot of it too.

My M70 AW, purchased a couple of years ago, had a weak striker spring, probably a contracted part. I replaced it and no issues since. First symptom was poor accuracy, then misfires started. The light strikes killed those primers BTW; no bang on the second (maybe third) try after I fixed it.

I live under a lucky star, no center fire factory ammo misfires, just a few Aguila .22s that apparently didn't get any Eley priming compound installed during the manufacturing process.

I used factory Core-Lokt ammo as my go to prior to handloading. IT may not have been the most accurate but it always fired. I'm with JamesJr on his thoughts. Have you verified that there is no oil that's set up on the firing pin from years of sitting? I've noticed that CLP will thicken over the years and the old guys used WD-40 to clean. That's another story.

I had that problem a few years ago, but this buck waited out 3 clicks before the 4th went bang. I replaced the spring in my 700's bolt and all is well now.

I bought a brick and a half of 9 1/2 primers cheap one time and quickly figured out why they were sold so cheap. Probably 20% didn’t go bang the first time. Many would go off the second time though so I regulated that brick to load development where pulling bullets is a pain but not the end of the world.

No misfired but had a box of core locks in 06 that had pistol powder mixed with the rifle powder. Was at the range shooting said ammo. Think it was the third shot that kicked excessively and was louder. Ejected the brass and primer pocket was huge. Got home and pulled bullets on the rest. Looked like a dot powder mixed in. Been too long to remember but was either red or blue dot. Rifle was good. Old Colombian Mauser.

If your recent misfires were from 7-8 years ago, that would have still been old Remington. The new ammunition is still the same Arkansas plant, but under Vista ownership. Does that mean it’s better quality? I don’t know. That would be nice if Vista improved quality. As far has factory ammunition goes, I’ve had the best luck with Federal and Norma.

I’ve never had misfires with Core-Lokt, but I have not had good accuracy with the exception of some 130 grain .270 and some 150 grain 30-06, and it was not exceptional accuracy. As most know, factory loaded 270 is typically slower than other factory cartridges. However, Core-Lokt .270 130 grain has consistently chronographed give or take only around 2,775-2,825 and similar in several rifles I’ve used. I have also seen that reported by others. Meanwhile, Federal Power-Shok (blue box) typically chronographs 2,950-3,000+ range. With that said, I’ve seen much better relative velocity out of the 30-06 150 grain Core-Lokt loads.

Again, it would be nice if Vista improved things. Has anyone shot recent, Vista owned Core-Lokt ammo and how did it shoot?

I have a Remington brand 25/06 that did the same and cost me a mule deer buck. It is in my collection of factory failures. Just has a Remington 12 gauge fail to fire.

I have been using Remington ammo since 1976 and never had a misfire. Been reloading for last 15 years and using Win primers mostly so don't know about new ammo.

They told me The recent mis fires were manufactured late 2020 according to the lot numbers on the box. I’ve shot some other newer vista owned remington ammo and all has been fine. Really like 130 grain core-lokt tipped in 270 out of my other colt light rifle.

I only use core-loc in my Savage 99 in a .300 Savage been very accurate and have never had a miss fire..
NOW on the other hand I'll never use there rimfire,dirty,fowl and inaccurate

I’ve had the misfire thing and very poor accuracy.
Severs years ago I bought 300 rds of 06 core lokt , tried it in a Valmet over under , Savage , Remington 700 , and BAR . None shot it good , I’m talking in excess of 2”
So finally I scrapped it and kept the brass .
Think I still got a box or two of it somewhere , 10rd boxes
Then several years later bought T/C Venture and some core lokt for step son , zeroed the gun in and handed it to him for early Christmas. Few days later he calls and says it won’t fire
Bring it over
He was right , sometimes it would fire after. Couple strikes , sometimes not .
Tried it in 721 , bang every time . So we sent the rifle back , and in a few weeks hadn’t it back , I handed it to him and told him he needed to get it done , season was closing in on us
Another friggin call
So now I’m thinking WTH ?
Tried it in 721 which was a tack driver , bang , but poor accuracy .
So now I go to web and find complaints about core lokt .
So I get some Federal blue box and it shot fine , but now his confidence is shot in the gun .
Ended up ,choke, giving him my pride and joy T/C Icon 243 with beautiful wood stock , what a tack driver .
I kept the Venture under the bed for a few years and finally got it out 6-8 yrs ago and that sucker put a smile on my face .
So , I haven’t been a big fan of it in some years , but like many others , grew up with it , was what most people in the day hunted with .
On the flip side of that got some old 220 rd nose that shoots damned good and a Savage 20 gauge slug gun that shoots their accu tip lights out , bought about 350-400 rds of that 10 yrs or so ago
Need to get that stuff out and see if it’s srtill capable of stacking them
Kenneth

back in '90 or '91, my dad (RIP) couldn't find any 30-06 180gr Remington RN factory loads in stores/gun shops. he had about 5 cartridges to hunt deer with. later on, in '91 or '92, he got 1000 180gr Remington RN factory loads (50 boxes of 20 round cartridges). he said he would never again get that low. 2 or 3 years later, he bought a TC Contender and Remington m7 and the '06 (Remington m760) never went out to the woods. i now own it and 40 something boxes. my son has my grandpap's Rem m760 in '06. i owned Remington Moutain rifle, ADL, BDL, CDL, Savage m116 with adjustable muzzle brake and Savage m110 in '06s. i sold them and now i have only one '06, Arisaka Type 99 with a Lyman aperture sight.

i started reloading in '92ish, so not having factory loaded ammo wasn't my concern.

i don't believe he ever had misfire in the Rem m760 (which he bought new in '69 or '70), neither did i, in the couple of years i used factory ammo.

i think the accuracy grouping was around 1 1/4 - 2" at 100 yards (5 shots/bench).

I have never had Remington ammo fail to fire. I have had some that was weak. 243 and 30-06. Like it was underloaded. I don't buy rifle or rimfire. Shotshells are good.

I had a few misfires years ago with 30.06 rem ammo bought from the local hardware store. I went back bought another box of the same lot number and had a couple those misfire as well but that's the only time i can ever remember a misfire with rem ammo and i've probably shot truck loads of the stuff. It was always pretty accurate too. Truth be told, there has probably been more game killed on the planet with a Remington cor-lok than anything else. I wouldn't hesitate to use them again if I had to use factory ammo. MIke

Years ago my brother got a new Marlin 22 semi auto rifle and a 500 round box of the cheap Remington 22's. He kept telling me the ammo was no good, as it wouldn't fire in his rifle. He gave it to me, and I shot up the rest of the box, probably 400 rounds or more, without a single shell failing to fire. I was using a Remington 511 rifle. I think he sent that Marlin on down the road.

Received a call from Remington last week, they examined the rounds i sent back and said the anvil’s in the primers were too deep.