Ka-Boom at The Range Today

[Patriot]

Wow! What a beautiful afternoon to spend at the range. Cool, no bugs,
a few people. I decided to make this a Boom and Bang afternoon followed
some .22 cal fun.

First thing I decided to do was to break out the ol' '06 and give her a little
loving. Shot her a little during the NES shoot but she had her feelings hurt
by all the BIG IRON at the shoot and was sulking in the corner of the safe.
So I took her along with her little brother, the SBHH .44 Mag, so she wouldn't
feel alone.

I had some left over M2 Ball from the NES shoot (6 rounds) so I decided to rid
the ammo case of this and loaded up three rounds. I touched off the first round
and the magazine release popped open and the other two rounds came
tumbling out of the magazine. I also got some blowback in the face which has
never happened to me before with any gun. I didn't think too much of it at
the time so I closed the magazine and inserted the remaining two rounds
and shot them. After I touched off the two rounds I looked at the cases
and this was what I encountered with the first case:

I checked the rifle out and all looked OK. The remainder of the rounds were
OK as well.

The rest of the afternoon went a lot better. There's something about
shooting Ruger 22 rifles and pistols occasionally that's a lot of fun.

 

[SKS Ray]

I had a good range day too. Went up to Zero Hour with Madmarc0, met up with a few people and headed to Ames rifle and pistol club. I finally sighted in my Saiga 308 with POSP scope, shot some steel with my favorite Chinese SKS, and tried out Marc's full auto MP5. Lots of 9mm and a suppressor from Zero Hour made it even more fun.
To top it off when we were leaving the range Marc found the guy who has the Mad Max Yellow/Blue Interceptor who lives nearby. I finally got to check out the car and got some info on how he acquired it and his black XB Coupe thats being done.
All in all a great day.

 

[jhrosier]

TBP,
You have no idea how close you just came to a catastrophic failure.
Flatten the rest of the brass with vice grips and recycle it.
50Kpsi gases can do a lot more than just ruin your day.

 

[Patriot]

TBP,
You have no idea how close you just came to a catastrophic failure.
Flatten the rest of the brass with vice grips and recycle it.
50Kpsi gases can do a lot more than just ruin your day.

I guess those Remington boys know how to make a bolt and receiver.

Is this the kind of thing that could have converted my bolt and receiver into this?

 

[jhrosier]

...
Is this the kind of thing that could have converted my bolt and receiver into this?

In a millisecond.
Somebody was looking out for you today. A word of thanks is in order.
A lesser action might not have survived the event.
A cracked case head is the absolute worst kind of case failure because the intact portion of the case seals the chamber well enough to allow full pressure to build up. The design of the Remington action vented the gasses through the magazine well, instead of down the bolt channel and into your face. Most WWII and earlier bolt guns would have blown the extractor from the bolt.
You should take a close look at the bolt face, extractor, ejector and firing pin for damage. The Remington bolt is easy to strip down to clean the powder residue from inside but don't try to remove the extractor or ejector. It wouldn't hurt to remove the action from the stock and check the stock for cracks if it is a wooden stock.
BTW, what is the headstamp on that ammo?

 

[Patriot]

In a millisecond.
Somebody was looking out for you today. A word of thanks is in order.
A lesser action might not have survived the event.
A cracked case head is the absolute worst kind of case failure because the intact portion of the case seals the chamber well enough to allow full pressure to build up. The design of the Remington action vented the gasses through the magazine well, instead of down the bolt channel and into your face. Most WWII and earlier bolt guns would have blown the extractor from the bolt.
You should take a close look at the bolt face, extractor, ejector and firing pin for damage. The Remington bolt is easy to strip down to clean the powder residue from inside but don't try to remove the extractor or ejector. It wouldn't hurt to remove the action from the stock and check the stock for cracks if it is a wooden stock.
BTW, what is the headstamp on that ammo?

Thanks for the info. I think that I will send a note of thanks to the boys
over at Remington. I had planned to take apart the gun for a complete check
before I shot it again. I will let you know how it goes. If anything is even a
little bit amiss I will send it back to the factory for inspection.

The headstamp is: DM on one side and 42 on the other.

I intend to go through all my 30-06 brass to cull this headstamp and do as
you recommended, crush it into oblivion.

 

[WVBob]

It was made in 1942. Lucky it still shot.

 

[EddieCoyle]

WOW! Don't buy any lottery tickets for a while, you used up a ton of luck with that one.

 

[1903Collector]

Someone is definitely watching over you my friend.

 

[Patriot]

Update on the Ka-boom!

Well after giving this a good look over, it seems that Remington rifles are
not only a beauty but also a beast. It took this licking and 'kept on tickin'
in stride. Not even so much as an out of place mark on the action, bolt,
or stock. I'm going to take the stock off to check it out and the hardware
on the stock side but I don't expect to find anything. I am very impressed!

Thanks for all your input and knowledge into this Jack.

 

[MassMark]

Glad to hear you and your rifle are ok-fine!

 

[jhrosier]

TBP,
Glad it worked out for you.
It's probably well past time to retire brass that's over half a century old.
I'm not a metalurgist so I can't explain the fundamentals of age hardening in brass but I've seen it before. The best example though is some 1880's or thereabouts ..42 Russian ammo in my collection which has spontainiously split from the primer pocket and up through the web. This is Russian milsurp ammo which has never been fired.

A lot of us are still shooting some really old guns and this thread should be a usefull reminder to consider the possibility of metal fatigue, both in ammo and guns. I retired a WWI vintage 1911 a few years ago when the barrel bushing fractured, sending the recoil spring and plug downrange. I got to thinking about what other parts were likely to fail and decided a brand new MKIVSeries70 was in order. I figure that it's good for about another 80 years.

While most of the old guns are safe to shoot, none of them will handle the effects of a cartridge case failure or accidental overload like the modern sporting rifles are designed for.
I am also somewhat concerned about the many recent reports of QC problems with current ammo. A number of rifles and handguns have been destroyed by overloads in new factory ammo and there seem to be recalls of all sorts of ammo in the past few years.
I generally feel safer shooting my own handloads than factory ammo because I know that all of the people in my basement ammo factory are paying close attention to every detail.

 

[vellnueve]

Perhaps it might be a good idea to have the rifle looked at by the factory anyway. Not all damage is visible even on a close visual inspection.

As for shooting older rifles, I have to say that when I start loading 7.5, .303, and .30-06, i'll probably be loading the lightest loads I can find. Not just to save powder, but to reduce the wear/tear on the rifles.

 

[Admin]

I'm glad to hear you're alright. That was a close one.

 

[jhrosier]

.....
As for shooting older rifles, I have to say that when I start loading 7.5, .303, and .30-06, i'll probably be loading the lightest loads I can find. Not just to save powder, but to reduce the wear/tear on the rifles.

vellnueve,
Back in the day, when most of my shooting was milsurp rifles, I found that reducing the bullet weight and keeping the same aproximate velocity of the standard military load resulted in a nice mild load that shot well out to a couple hundred yards and closely followed the trajectory for which the original sights were calibrated.
With .30 caliber rifles, a bullet of 125-130 grains is about right. Medium burning rate IMR powders, such as 3031 and 4895 usually gave the best accuracy, with very mild recoil and little muzzle blast.
Jack

 

[dreppucci007]

Jeez! Glad to know you are ok and had a great time, Richard!