Loaded ammo does not require a Hazmat fee. Primers and powder do require the fee. Never understood how parts and pieces require a special fee but those same parts and pieces combined together do not.
i've made that argument myself.. and here is how it was explained to me. note.. that I don't 100% buy it yet either..
primed, charged cartridges are pretty inert. takes a hit on the primer head to detonate a cartridge. without it being chamberd.. it will pop and not expell like fired from a proper chamber. very unlikely for it to go off int he first place... and if it does. also unlikely to chain react another primer or case.
now.. jump over to a tray of primers. logic is that in the unlikely event, as above.. that you set one off.. that they are close enought to chain react. and since primers are sold byt he tray of 100 or case of 1000.. that you could get a big reaction.
the problem is. primers in a tray.. are pretty safe! i guess the engineers that made them lil plastic trays.. knew what they were doing... go figure!
while i don't reccomend it... I have actually DROPPED primers. trays and cases. never had one pop.
not saying because of that low iteration test that they CAN'T pop.. just saying I've BTDT and not had pops after dropping boxes or trays of primer on a tile floor. Has it happened to someone else? the math suggests yes...
so that's what i was told anyway.
the fly inthe ointment i see is that a single hazmat sticker ( 28 bucks or so ).. can cover both powder and primers inthe same shipping container.
we all know powder deflagrates ( burns ) doesn't explode.. and that when uncontained.. it just burns fairly non plussing. now. i think you take 15k primers nad 8# powder and put in a cardboard box and let up-fesdup-X handle it.. and i'm surprised there have not been hazmat package explosions.. especially since the boxes I've recieved have looked like they air dropped them to me sometimes!
don't get me started on binary explosives either.
tannerite.. etc.
the whole deal boggles me. funny line in the sand the BATFE draws.
