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I about blew up my gun yesterday

3K views 30 replies 20 participants last post by  Tripod 
#1 ·
Yesterday, in the third 25 of a 100 bird shoot, I had one of those misfires where the primer goes off but has no powder in front of it. As you might imagine, the wad stayed in the barrel and the shot bounced off of the trap house roof. I cleared the wad, reloaded and continued on.

About five shoots later, I found my missing load of powder. I shouldered the gun, called for a bird, and let loose what had to be a double load of powder, in this case around 34.8 gr. of Clays. The recoil was like that of a 300 mag.

I remembered that the night before, my reloader had a "hiccup" and I had to reposition the hulls in the machine before starting again. Apparently I repostioned them one station off.

It took a real effort to get the action open and the hull out of the chamber, but the gun didn't show any visible damage. I finished the 30 or so birds of the event with no notible changes, but am still wondering how close I came to getting a face full of shrapnel.
 
#4 ·
My friend, you were probably extremely lucky! When something like that happens on the line,its probably best to change guns to finish. Not smart taking a chance.Its not enough to
think" you cleared the gun....LOOK and see if you really did. Good/safe reloading CAN be the difference twix life and death, and all shooters need to be aware of this!Over a long period od time without any problems we tend to get take things for granted............something we can't afford to do!
 
#7 ·
Near misses are better I suppose but I am thinking that we are only allowed a given number of them. Be careful. Everytime I read a thread about double charges, I ask myself how the hell they can happen. First, a shell without powder MUST look differently with the crimp caved in, no? Secondly, the one that gets the double charge would be nearly, if not impossible to crimp so it stayed closed, no? Thirdly, I do not know how the RCBS functions and can only comment on a MEC, but, with a single stage, if you charge powder and then insert a wad the charges would be separated and not seemingly cause an issue. You would have to drop shot in order to recharge the barwith powder. If you forget the wad you can't throw another powder charge until you have dropped shot in the hull (wad or no wad). In either case the shell would certainly not look normal.

With a progressive the shot drops right after powder sp the hull would be overfull of componants I would think. I have tried to double charge on a 650 and could not do it. One of the shells you loaded would have to look very strange and should be picked out by any astute loader operator. I just don't get it. I suppose there is a scenarion which would include removing hulls from the turret, backing it up and then starting over but that in itself should make you pay attention.
 
#8 ·
Question # 1 "but am still wondering how close I came to getting a face full of shrapnel."

Answer: Not close at all, a double charge of shot will not damage the cheapest of shotguns let alone a 3200.

Question # 2 Would the shell look differently with a double charge?

Answer: Not in the least. All modern wads have a collapsible “cushion” in the center. A double charge of powder would simply crush the cushion section (causing additional felt recoil) to make up for the additional powder. At the most you might have noticed a little more (and I mean very little) resistance when that shell was going through final crimping.
 
#11 ·
I have, in the past, intentionally put a double charge of powder in a hull to see if it was possible. When I did this on a MEC 600 Jr, the wad came up and shot spilled. Then I could not make the crimp remain closed. On my hydraulic PW, shot also spilled out of the case but I could force the crimp closed. The shell was bulged and I could not get it into the chamber.

I am not contending that someone could not get a double powder charge in a normal appearing hull. My only point is that I could not figure out a way to intentionally do it.

Pat Ireland
 
#12 ·
Please don't tell us extra shot loaded in any shell couldn't ever destroy a gun. Tell that to the kid back in the 60's who thought a little extra shot might get him another bird. I heard the boom and looked down the line just in time to see him launch a fiberglass barrel from his Winchester semi-auto over the traphouse.

The right combinations of circumstances and -who knows!!
 
#14 ·
I did the same thing on a Hornady 366. Thought I had everything back in the right place, but all of a sudden I had shot spilling everywhere, just like Pat mentioned. I had also done a shell without a primer that night - dropping powder all over the bench.

Anyway, after the shot went everywhere, it was then that I emptied out the machine completely, salvaged all the components - and found the double powder charge and the no powder shell.

THAT WAS WHEN I PUT EVERYTHING AWAY AND TURNED OFF THE LOADING ROOM LIGHT for the night. My head just wasn't in it. Don't know if i was tired or what. So I quit for the night.
 
#15 ·
Old Ranger, I had the samething happen to me with a Hornady 366 many years ago. First shot pop, couple shots later KABOOM. Actually happened to me on the third house too. I bought a box of factory loads to finish. I was still a little hesitant to pull the trigger.

I actually tried to duplicate my mistake but shot spilled all over the place. I'm not exactly sure what happened but I'm very careful when I put shells back if I've had to remove them from the turret. I actually look in the one going in to the powder drop to make sure it's empty.
 
#16 ·
I'm wondering if the part of the powder charge that was supposed to go into the 'squib' actually hung up in the drop tube and then went into the next hull along with the charge that was supposed to in that hull. I had something like that happen when loading .308 rifle ammo on a Dillon 550. Turned out that I had a dead wasp stuck in the powder drop tube/expander. You might want to pull your powder drop tube on that RCBS machine and check for obstructions.
 
#17 ·
Wow! This is tuff to make sense out of for a couple of reasons:

A) I saw a kid blow an 1100/1187 all to pieces. He was on Skeet Station 3, and blew pieces past Skeet Station 5. Opened a nice gash in his hand too.
Just a kid that knew nothing about reloading and showed up at the store where the clerk told him to get a MEC 9000. You may have noted I always recommend starting on a MEC 600jr. Now you know why I make that recommendation.

I don't know for a fact what made that gun blow. This kid was just starting, so I doubt he loaded the wrong powder, simply because he only had only one powder.

B) I was told by an executive from Hercules that all their published loads were such that a double charge of powder would produce less than proof pressures.

C) I had a MEC hiccup, and a shell from that batch, was seriously over-charged. Gun held. Target broke. I switched to new ammo, but didn't find any over-charges, or no-charges when I checked the remaining ammo

D) I tried loading a double-charge with these components, and there is no way the bulged shell and spilled shot would not have alerted me.

E) Shells with no powder always scare me because I'm wondering where did that powder go? I haven't had a chargeless load in over 10 years (I'm VERY CAREFULL since item C), but I've had squadmates with them. They still scare me.

I cannot figure how all of these things can be true. Perplexed I am.

BTW - The kid with the blown 1100 and the gash in his hand. I went with him to the emergency room. Of course the emergency room called the police. Ever try to reason with a policeman that thought he was investigating a gunshot? Try explaining that nobody was shot. Since this policeman was called to investigate a gunshot, he had to report who was shot. He was totally unprepared to deal with the fact nobody was shot. "But my form says I have to report the shooting victim.” Er, wrong form officer. But it was reported as a gunshot. It wasn't a gunshot. But since it was reported as a gunshot I have to....etc. etc. etc....round and round. I figured he thought I was trying to cover-up a gunshot. He was about ready to read me my Miranda rights.
 
#18 ·
I have never had that experience but I've come darn close. I have a triple beam balance on a shelf above my loader and when I think that I may have produced a shell with an incorrect powder charge, I set the balance to the known weight of a shell holding the components I'm loading and I weigh each shell until I either find the oddball or assure myself that all the shells are OK.

Morgan
 
#19 ·
I'll agree with Sarge and go one further. Retire the gun and don't shoot it again. If the action was hard to open and the shell was hard to extract, some changes to the structure of the gun were almost certain to have been made. It may "LOOK" just fine, but it is difficult to tell what changes were made by the offending load. Send it up to Pat Laib at the very least or have a "REAL" lab do some testing to be sure. You really can't tell just what changes may have ocurred since you have no previous baseline to refer to. This kind of event could show up much later as a ruptured barrel or some other catastrophic event. It does not have to fail right when the stress ocurred, just when the limits of the particular firearm have been reached. It can take a few thousand more rounds to reach that point, or just another over pressure load. It's a crapshoot. It may also last for a lifetime without failure, but my luck would not be that good.
 
#20 ·
From MrSkeet410:

<I>"E) Shells with no powder always scare me because I'm wondering where did that powder go? I haven't had a chargeless load in over 10 years (I'm VERY CAREFULL since item C), but I've had squadmates with them. They still scare me."</I>

Every shell I have ever produced that has had no powder in it has gotten that way because I captured the powder charge to weight-check it, got distracted and failed to dump it into its shell before continuing to load, and that usually occurs right at the end of a session. I invariably find the powder charge in the pan on the scale a day or two later and usually AFTER I've pulled the trigger on the empty.

Morgan
 
#21 ·
Bridging is another thing I have never experienced. I am at a loss to understand why, with the vibration/shaking of a press when the handle is pulled, how powder could hang up in a tube. Mine look like they have been polished inside. Same for hydraulics, a lot of movement in a press.
 
#22 ·
Depends on the powder as to whether you could double charge or not. I quit using titegroup for that reason.

As far as the being hard to open. I have seen regular shells, over charged shells, new shells that swell up and make the action difficult to open.

Don
 
#23 ·
I've seen powder bridge bad enough to stop the powder flow entirely, so if a partial charge were to knock loose and fall into a hull, it's a possibility. The only way I could see a double charge getting loaded might be a very light load of a very dense powder with a "soft" wad. I've never tried to do that, but it might be a long winter, so who knows.
 
#25 ·
Guns can be damaged in many ways. A damaged gun may shoot for several months, perhaps several years, while the problem gets progressively worse. Finally the gun blows and we then assume it must have had a double powder charge in one shell.

Most readers of this thread reload and have a scale. Why not test this question yourself. Drop a normal powder charge in a hull and then pour a second charge weighed on your scale on top of the normal charge and then continue loading. See what happens.

Pat Ireland
 
#26 ·
I have loaded win 570 way over the amounts you should use double ect never harmed the barrels on my gun , recoil is crazy however . Also put buckled shells in and shot them back then I used perazzi tm 1 more is suppose to be better at barnyard shoots .some of the guys shot 1 7/8 oz 3in at oaklys !
doent help either one fella broughthis 3 1/2 in 10 ga to OAkly 19 shots is all he could take .What we do to have fun .


Pat Kelley now 63 yrs old , would think of it again !
 
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