Experience with Samco Global Ammo Orders?

**j894** · August 19th, 2012, 08:45 PM

Anyone have any experience with ordering Ammo from Samco Global?

A few weeks ago I ordered 400 rounds of pre-Iranian, surplus 8mm Mauser ammo (despite mixed ammo reviews). After waiting 2.5 weeks for Samco to ship the ammo, UPS delivered it a few days ago. The ammo was a small box, within another shipping box, which looked like this:

All rounds were packed super loose, going every which direction.. and many of them looked like this:

Half the ammo, if not more is dented up all over the place to the point of where I don't feel comfortable shooting it (a lot of it does still chamber). Is it even safe to shoot ammo with dents all over the neck of the casing, or the body of the casing itself? Will it not affect the pressure of the round when fired?

I know the ammo originally came out of larger case from which smaller quantities were separated, however to me it seems like pure laziness not to packed it correctly.

I called them to tell them about the problem and exchange the ammo. They did send me a UPS return label, but the lady on the phone didn't really care to hear my concerns about their packing/shipping methods, and pretty much said anything to end the conversation and hang up. I have a funny feeling that when my replacement ammo gets here, its going to be the same way.

It seems like this happened mainly due to Samco's sub standard packing and shipping methods. Has anyone run into this when ordering ammo from Samco? Do the pack all ammo like this?

**thebearpack** · August 19th, 2012, 09:27 PM

Only experience I ever had with Samco was years ago when I ordered some Swiss ammo from them. Besides the ridiculously slow shipping, it was an okay deal.

That said, the issue with your ammo may or may not have anything to do with their poor packing (though I'm sure that didn't help matters). Chances are that Iranian stuff has been banged around and poorly stored for decades and most likely the next batch will look the same. If it were me, I'd ask for a refund and hold out for any other surplus 8mm. Even 50s Yugo might be better than that stuff.

**j894** · September 5th, 2012, 02:16 PM

Originally Posted by thebearpack

Only experience I ever had with Samco was years ago when I ordered some Swiss ammo from them. Besides the ridiculously slow shipping, it was an okay deal.

That said, the issue with your ammo may or may not have anything to do with their poor packing (though I'm sure that didn't help matters). Chances are that Iranian stuff has been banged around and poorly stored for decades and most likely the next batch will look the same. If it were me, I'd ask for a refund and hold out for any other surplus 8mm. Even 50s Yugo might be better than that stuff.

I can imagine the ammo has seen better days especially after falling off the back of various unmarked trucks a few times, as well being kicked around a few different continents for 6 or more decades.

But supposedly the ammo was in 1,000 round wood/zinc cases with 5 rows of 200 each. The pics of the case you get show individual rows of ammo. I'd imagine if it were packed in rows before being stored and sent to me instead of thrown in a box, it would of survived being stacked under 100 other boxes of the same ammo in Samco's warehouse and being body slammed by UPS a few dozen times.

I'm trying to avoid dealing with their refund process as they would only offer me credit instead of the actual cash back, plus loss of shipping costs. I did pay via master card so I could do a charge back if I really wanted to, but that's just another headache.

Anyway, I sent the ammo back a few weeks ago and I'm waiting for the replacement stuff to come back. When I called they said it shipped out last Friday so it should be here any day. I'll report back when it arrives, hopefully they checked the next batch before it was sent.