The Turkish 8mm ammo has had a lot of mixed feelings among shooters using it. Some claim there are certain years to avoid, 1947 in particular, as that year suffered from case neck cracks and loose fitting bullets. However, I have shot hundreds of rounds of it and it was all good. I inspect each and every round as I strip it off the useless Turk stripper clips and put it on Yugoslavian stripper clips and I have yet to reject a single round.

It is loaded to the maximum, like the 8mm Mauser cartridge was designed for. It shoots a 154 grain bullet, but rumor has it that there was a small amount of heavier stuff available a couple years ago, but I have never seen it. Out of a long rifle barrel, like the Czech 98/22 or the Turk Mausers, some of it has been chrono'd at better thatn 3100 feet per second! Take that all you .30-06 lovers! For me it shoots to closer to the point of aim on 100 and 200 yard targets, whereas the heavier 196 grain Yugo stuff shoots nearly a foot higher.

Sadly, the good old days concerning this ammo are now only a rememberance for most of us. I can well remember buying it for a nickel a round, paying $3.50 for a 70 round bandolier at gunshows and hauling as much of it home as I could carry. Unfortunately, there was only so much of it stored away and the piles had to run out sometime. For me, that happened about three years ago. You can still occasionally find it, where someone is selling off what they collected when it was cheap, but at greatly exerated prices. Last week in a small classified shopper newspaper available locally, there was a guy south of me selling some but he wanted $25 per 70 round bandolier!

Just remember that it corrosive so take the proper precautions with your rifle after shooting it. And you will be amazed at its penetrating ability. I have matched it up with a guy shooting WW2 vintage armor piercing out of his 1903A3 and I was shooting Turk out of one of my Czech 98/22 rifles and there were some steel plates at the range that were pretty thick, probably 3/4 to one inch thick. We were shooting at 100 yards and the guy with the .30-06 AP was having fun trying to poke holes in the plates. I told him to move over and let me try with the Turk ammo and I showed him how to punch holes in thick steel plates! We had some hanging gongs made out of old railroad tie plates at the range and they did not last but a couple weeks when people were shooting Turk at them. After the Turk dried up, these same people are shooting Yugo and Romanian ammo and the tie plate gongs last a lot longer.
Curt