One thing I always find interesting is the way that items which by rights should be identical end up rather different due to differing manufacturers, constraints of time or manufacturing capacity or just because someone decided to do them in a slightly different way. Today we are looking at a 1970s ammunition box for belted 7.62mm ammunition. We have previously looked at one of these boxes here, that box was simply marked up. Today we are looking at another example with rather fuller details stenciled on the side:

This box has escaped being repainted since it was first filled so gives a good snapshot of late 1970s markings. We have a large orange explosives label and the markings indicate that this box held 200 rounds of 7.62mm ammunition in mixed link of four ball rounds to one tracer rounds. The ball rounds were produced on the 2nd May 1978 and the tracer rounds on the 18th April 1978, both by Radway Green. Finally an NSN number is included to allow stores to be accurately traced:

On the end of the box is the weight of the full box:

The box itself was produced in 1976 and is an H82 box, used for a number of different types of ammunition through to the present day: