Bad ammo

[peachhead]

Back before Christmas, I was zeroing a rifle for a customer- a Ruger ranch rifle in 300blk. I had a case of Ammo Inc. 110gr VMax which he also bought so I pulled a box to use.
3 of the first 5 rounds that I loaded were misfires. I ran them through twice just to make sure.
I opened another box and had no issues whatsoever. I will note that I have shot a good bit of this brand of ammo myself in different calibers and never had a problem with it.
I called my sales rep. Eventually (I won't get any how long it took) I was involved in an email string with her sales manager that basically said, "wow, no one else has ever reported a problem with it. Sorry you had issues." I said, do you want to send me a replacement box at least? She said, I'll see what I can do.
At this point I think I can assume that it's not going to happen. I am frankly a little disappointed.
Has anyone else ever had issues with a factory box of ammo and what did you do? Am I being unreasonable to expect a replacement?

 

[contender]

I rarely use factory ammo in my centerfire firearms. And I've never dealt with Ammo Inc.

But I can say that the bigger companies like Winchester, Federal, Hornady etc all do seem to be much more in tune with wanting happy customers,, and do replace bad ammo.

If you have more of this ammo, and use it w/o issues,, then it's odd to find just 3 rounds like that. But if they don't replace that ammo, and you later find more bad rounds,, let them accumulate, and keep them informed. (Since you've been having emails back & forth.) If more of them are bad,, then something was wrong when they ran that batch,, and they SHOULD be concerned.

You are thinking you should receive a full box of ammo for 3 bad rounds. If the box of ammo only has 5 rounds,, I'd say yes,, replace the box. But if it was a box of 20 or 50 rounds,, replacing a full box for 3 bad rounds may be asking a bit much to a bean counter somewhere. The bigger companies will often replace a few bad rounds with a full box,, as a good will gesture. A smaller company,,,??? Who knows. As I said,, I have no knowledge of Ammo Inc.

Just my simple minded thoughts on this.

 

[peachhead]

I haven't shot the rest of the box, but I probably will just to see how it goes.
I see your point, and that's probably how they think, but frankly, I would think making it right for your customer would mean more than what a bean counter thinks. Also, they have to consider: I am a dealer and I buy in bulk, and I don't really "have" to buy from your company.
3 out of 20 (that I know of) is a 15% failure rate. That should be over your QC limit.

 

[Laserbait]

I rarely use factory ammo in my centerfire firearms. And I've never dealt with Ammo Inc.

But I can say that the bigger companies like Winchester, Federal, Hornady etc all do seem to be much more in tune with wanting happy customers,, and do replace bad ammo.

If you have more of this ammo, and use it w/o issues,, then it's odd to find just 3 rounds like that. But if they don't replace that ammo, and you later find more bad rounds,, let them accumulate, and keep them informed. (Since you've been having emails back & forth.) If more of them are bad,, then something was wrong when they ran that batch,, and they SHOULD be concerned.

You are thinking you should receive a full box of ammo for 3 bad rounds. If the box of ammo only has 5 rounds,, I'd say yes,, replace the box. But if it was a box of 20 or 50 rounds,, replacing a full box for 3 bad rounds may be asking a bit much to a bean counter somewhere. The bigger companies will often replace a few bad rounds with a full box,, as a good will gesture. A smaller company,,,??? Who knows. As I said,, I have no knowledge of Ammo Inc.

Just my simple minded thoughts on this.

I completely agree. Ammo Inc is a pretty new company (2016), so I would think that they'd really like to look at the failed rounds. As a customer experience issue, replacing the ammo would be "the right thing to do" for them. Both for product development, and customer goodwill.

We all know what Ruger's CS is like, and it's one of the main reasons that we keep buying their products, even when we've had a problem.

All that said, I reload all my ammo too, so I am my own worst/best customer.

 

[Mobuck]

More info is needed. What did the primer(s) look like. Fully indented? Did you make multiple attempts to fire? A brand new rifle (other than factory test fire)?
Here's where I'd look first: Possibly a bit of debris trapped inside the bolt which impinged on the firing pin during the initial firing attempts?

 

[contender]

Mobuck,, he ran them twice. And he fired other ammo from a different box w/o issues.


Ok 3 out of 20, and yes a failure rate of 15%. Since you buy in bulk,, look at the box with the bad ones,, and look for a "Lot #" to identify that box. Look at other boxes to see if any are from the same lot #.

And I agree that a bean counter shouldn't be the final say-so,, but sadly it can happen. I'm NOT saying that is what happened,, but it's just one of several possible answers.

I agree that if I were running the company I'd want to know why they failed. And I would also step up & replace bad ammo.

Have you offered to return the bad ammo AND the remaining partial box?

 

[Pál_K]

I have had one issue with Ammo Inc.: a single 9mm round with the bullet seated very deeply in the case. There is no way I will fire that.

Until recently, rarely have I chosen a manufacturer other than Federal, Remington, or Winchester. My reasoning was that they had the resources for high quality production and quality control.

I did, however, use Norma and Lapua for my European military rifles, such as for 6.5x55mm. Both are high quality ammunition manufacturers.

Remington was the first to dissapoint me - with a box of .30-06 all having deformed tips. Then Winchester, with two boxes of 5.56 where some of the bullets were seated about 4mm deeper than normal.

Besides Federal, I've had good luck with PMC, Hornady/Frontier, Black Hills, CCI, and Marlin ammunition.

 

[peachhead]

Mobuck,, he ran them twice. And he fired other ammo from a different box w/o issues.


Ok 3 out of 20, and yes a failure rate of 15%. Since you buy in bulk,, look at the box with the bad ones,, and look for a "Lot #" to identify that box. Look at other boxes to see if any are from the same lot #.

And I agree that a bean counter shouldn't be the final say-so,, but sadly it can happen. I'm NOT saying that is what happened,, but it's just one of several possible answers.

I agree that if I were running the company I'd want to know why they failed. And I would also step up & replace bad ammo.

Have you offered to return the bad ammo AND the remaining partial box?

Yep, offered. No response.
No issues with the rest of that lot, that I am aware of.
I know it's only 3 rounds (so far anyway, until I try the rest of that box) but it's just the principle of the thing now. They are not a long term established company. It "should" be in their best interests to keep customers happy. But their only response was "we haven't had any reports of any other issues."
It's just irritating.

 

[Mobuck]

As it turns out, I'm experiencing a similar problem. Different ammo company which I'd prefer not to identify until the problem is handled.
I ordered 4 boxes of 6.8SPC from a 'custom loader' because I could neither buy Hornady ammo or bullets for the load I wanted. I did a test run of this ammo in two of my 6.8 AR's and had a dud on round #3. The response I received from the ammo company was disturbing. In effect, the owner's response was probably : just a bad primer and that was all.
Today, I pulled the bullet from that round and found the primer had fired but apparently NO POWDER CHARGE IN THE CASE. Talk about OOPS. Where did that charge go or how many cases didn't get charged or over charged? This time I made the situation very clear to the representative and got an immediate return authorization for the remainder of the ammo.
We'll see how this plays out. For now, if anyone ordered some 'white box' 6.8 SPC ammo with 120 grain SST bullets, don't shoot it.