50 cals, dipped in uranium?

reply to post by txinfidel


I got a geiger counter and a 50 cal. black powder rifle

You have to be careful with Barretts with funky loads - you can't shoot a sabot round with one, nor some of the explosive or penetrator rounds.

It was sort of a toss up if some of the then-current explosive 50BMG rounds were ok (80s), we didn't have any on our fairly expansive TO&E at the time, although I'm sure we could have gotten them if we'd wanted any.

These days you can get explosive Raufoss Mk211's, which kick ass, and they're approved for Barretts.

Although truthfully, if you've got an M2 that's not wallowed out and is set up properly on a pintle mount, you can make hay at quite a long distance with one. It's just too heavy to lug in as a sniper weapon.

reply to post by rickymouse


Nice. I bet that one would be exempt though.

Im sorry, but this claim goes nowhere....unless ya wahnna buy some uranium sheep dip.....

Originally posted by txinfidel
So I was at the gas station today and was approached by a vietnam vet who was in need for some gas money to get home. I handed him $5 and then a conversation ensued about how bad the VA hospitals are now, obamacare and how obama needs to get out of the white house etc etc. He said that he sometimes wished that we the vietnamese won because many Americans these days dont appreciate what those vets fought and some died for and he showed me where he still had an old bullet lodged in the back of his shoulder.

Then he was talking about casing ammo. I told him I knew a guy who recases ammo and also 50 cal. He said that every 50 cal rifle on the market has been dipped in uranium so I looking to see if this can be confirmed or denied by anyone on ATS.

Yowsers.

You got taken. first its unlikely that the guy was a vietnam vet.(or is a drug seeker and found that the VA does not give out pain meds like candy)

And the VA hospitals are a lot better then most hospitals in the US except teaching hospitals and a few very expensive private hospitals. i go to the VA for treatment and i am a ex EMT and have transported to a number of non VA hospitals and have seen the difference.

Also i have got a lot of care from the VA.
I have had Laparoscopic gall stone surgery at a time the hospital in the city i lived in did not do them and did the old style with the 5 inch scar and a 1+ month recovery.

I had 5 way heart bypass surgery(CABG x 5 ) and drove myself a100+ miles home a week later.

Been DXed with H.V.Casleman's disease and Sarcoidosis after the local hospital where i lived could not find out what was wrong and claimed my symptoms were all in my head.(I have never been back to my local hospital.)

With the VA if you need need treatment anywhere in the US they have your medical records and with a few clicks on the computer they have them right at hand and in a emergency this in its self can be life saving. No other hospital system as big has this record system.

The EPA would never allow uranium to be used like that so i give that story a big BS rating.

reply to post by stirling


I dont eat sheep.

Perhaps call in the George Soros and the fabulous five.

Sheep eater eric holder, the obamanator, pelosi staff u ck er , Hillary clitten and case sons teen staff u cker.

reply to post by ANNED


HI anned,

I dont really see your point.

As opposed your take on the VA compared to his. Really makes no difference to me. Thanks for posting though. Just don't see anything significant there.

What did he mean when he said that he sometimes wished that we the vietnamese won because? "...we the Vietnamese...?"

As for the DU, it's a heavy metal and was used as ballist for counterweights on many of the systems I worked in the Air Force. It's coated in a nickel plate to "keep it" what radiation it has left. In the case of DU being used as rounds, I always thought the round itself was DU and it was coated like the ballist we used to keep down rad levels. But I could be wrong about that.

Based on personal experiences, I feel he was given you "an old war story." A good fiction with bits of non-fiction. I knew a lot of guys like this in my day. One even told me once about how he (a crypto guy) took out several "Targets of Opprotunities" himself (as in hitting the pickel button or bomb and missile release button) on an incentive flight in Vietnam.

Originally posted by txinfidel

Beware as there are many scam artists out there in parking lots, gas stations asking for money to fill up gas. I've bumped into one too many off lately. Local law enforcements have cautioned the people as well about scamsters. Just an advice.

He said that he sometimes wished that we the vietnamese won because many Americans these days dont appreciate what those vets fought and some died for and he showed me where he still had an old bullet lodged in the back of his shoulder.

Confused here. WE the vietnamese? Lets be realistic. The North Vietnamese did win.

Depleted uranium .50 rounds yes.
Dipped in uranium no.

en.wikipedia.org...

Depleted uranium (DU; also referred to in the past as Q-metal, depletalloy or D-38) is uranium with a lower content of the fissile isotope U-235 than natural uranium. (Natural uranium is about 99.27% U-238, 0.72% U-235—the fissile isotope, and 0.0055% U-234). Uses of DU take advantage of its very high density of 19.1 g/cm3 (68.4% denser than lead). Civilian uses include counterweights in aircraft, radiation shielding in medical radiation therapy and industrial radiography equipment and containers used to transport radioactive materials. Military uses include defensive armor plating and armor-piercing projectiles.

Most depleted uranium arises as a byproduct of the production of enriched uranium for use in nuclear reactors and in the manufacture of nuclear weapons. Enrichment processes generate uranium with a higher-than-natural concentration of lower-mass uranium isotopes (in particular U-235, which is the uranium isotope supporting the fission chain reaction) with the bulk of the feed ending up as depleted uranium, in some cases with mass fractions of U-235 and U-234 less than a third of those in natural uranium.[2] U-238 has a much longer halflife than the lighter isotopes, and DU therefore emits less alpha radiation than the same mass of natural uranium: the US Defense Department states DU used in US munitions has 60% the radioactivity of natural uranium.[3]

reply to post by paraclete1


I think what he meant was that he wish the Vietnamese would have won entirely. I think he was just expressing his dislike for the current state of affairs in this nation and how people feel entitled these days and don't appreciate those who have fought against the communists in a nation that just reelected the welfare president. People don't appreciate the freedom they have in this country and gave birth to the entitlement generation. I too share his resentment.

reply to post by hp1229


No worries. I had already gave him $5 as soon as he asked because I knew he was a vet and I could tell he was in pretty bad shape. The stories I got I suppose were just in return, he did not ask anything more from me after that, but I did feel good to help a vet who made a sacrifice for the love of his country.

reply to post by grey580


On second thought, he very well may have been talking about the rounds seems that we were talking about recasing ammo, just at the time it seemed like he was talking about the rifles themselves. Thanks for clearing that up.

A typical .50 cal rifle will weigh between 20-30 lbs unloaded.

The idea of coating a weapon in a heavy metal like DU makes very little sense.

.50 CAL rifles are already heavy and impractical even for most military uses. Doing something like this would neither help the function of the rifle, nor would it help the operator.

The rounds themselves can be and have been made from DU. However they are not used often as are very expensive.

txinfidel
reply to post by watchitburn

 

I know it sounds crazy.

But think about the russians who fought for communism that were later offed by their fellow comrades. Radiation poisoning may kill slower than a 50 cal, but it still is a killer none the less.

Problem is, uranium isn't very radioactive. You could handle it all day, long as you don't inhale any machining dust or eat without washing your hands first. It's primarily a chemical poison.

So as a poison to kill 50 cal buyers, it's pretty lame. I have two. Neither is radioactive.

Is it true the U.S State Department has banned exports of anything 50 cal ? even sporting rifles ,muzzle loaders ,brass ,big game rifles even though they are not 50 BMG weapons just anything 50 cal

wombatta
Is it true the U.S State Department has banned exports of anything 50 cal ? even sporting rifles ,muzzle loaders ,brass ,big game rifles even though they are not 50 BMG weapons just anything 50 cal

No, it is not true.

A barrel maker in the U.S states on their website ,they cannot Export 50 and up cal barrels ,i emailed them and they cannot export anything 50 or bigger, U.S State Deparment will not grant them an Export Permit ,they can export lesser cals under 50 cal

txinfidel
reply to post by watchitburn

 

I know it sounds crazy.

But think about the russians who fought for communism that were later offed by their fellow comrades. Radiation poisoning may kill slower than a 50 cal, but it still is a killer none the less.

...erm what? Care to elaborate?

The OP paid $5 to be played as a chump. I own a 50 BMG and my job is radiation detection and control in a shipyard. 50 cal ammo is not radioactive unless it is made from DU. Uranium is not fairy dust, dipping something in uranium does nothing at all except slightly contaminate it. As far as I know small arms ammo (including 50 bmg) has never been loaded with DU for use by our troops, only for developmental testing.

Ranb