Bad day at the Range for Custom Gun.

W

Wendyj

New member
Was shooting my gun and hear awful noise. Two guys down from me had just put 3 grand in a custom made 308. They spent half hour beating bolt open. Back of case looked like someone had shot a 30-06 bullet through it. Front was curled up. Throat in barrel was damaged. Bolts firing pin was jammed so fR back in you couldn't see it. Ripped the face completely off the bolt. They were really lucky. No harm to shooter. I asked him what powder he was using and he didn't know. I'm almost happy I'm still new and triple check my stuff. I thought what I was doing was overkill but not after today. This can sure,y be dangerous.
 
Hope they learned their lesson. ...Whatever it was.

--

A couple months ago, I had to put the first rounds through a new rifle.

...Custom build, chambered for a new .475 cal wildcat - which is, itself, based on a wildcat (which has no "standard" parent cartridge). Plus, I was using a bullet that no one else (all two people) working with the wildcat had tried, and I was seating it on top of a powder that no one else had tried.

Even with a little bit of wildcat experience, I always have a little anxiety when pulling the trigger on the first 4-5 rounds.

With that one, though.... It felt like I was Yuri Gagarin, being rocketed into into the unknown.
Mostly, what went through my mind was, "Please don't blow up. Please don't blow up. I like my face. Please don't blow up. I need my fingers. Please don't blow up. Please don't blow up. I know the powder charges should be more than safe. Please don't blow up."

The initial test loads performed exactly as I expected, and provided great feedback for further development. ...Surprisingly. :rolleyes:
 
asked him what powder he was using and he didn't know.
Click to expand...

That right there should tell you something.

At least some gunsmith got paid for the deal (hopefully the smith isn't as big a fool as the shooter).
 
That's not an either/or question. Stupid applies to both unless the other person doing the loading does it professionally.
 
At some point I will stop trying to pound the bolt open and unscrew the barrel.

If they catch you using the shooting bench to pound open a rifle, there could be consequences.

But if you look for it, you can see bolt knob dents in a lot of shooting benches.
Just like if you look for it in old revolvers, you can see a lot of them have pounded nails.

I have a hammer in my vehicle. I have an action wrench and barrel vise at home.
 
Maybe the guy was so rattled he couldn't think clearly. If he doesn't know what powder he used, did somebody else load those rounds? That response was revealing on a couple of levels.
 
if it was factory ammo (included "remanufactured" from a licensed maker) I would expect the guy to say it was factory ammo.

If it wasn't factory ammo, and the guy didn't know what powder was in it...

well,...I'm NOT that trusting. Other than factory, either I make it or I know what's in it (and how much) or it doesn't go through my gun.

I ABSOLUTELY will not shoot unknown reloads.

Makes me wonder if they "blew" all that money on the rifle, then bought the cheapest "gun show reloads" to save money.....???

if so, that worked out well, didn't it??:rolleyes:
 
Some years ago I was at the range working on a couple of my rifles and had my toolbox with me. A fella came down to me from the end of the line and asked to borrow my hammer, which I let him borrow.

Curiosity got the better of me and I watched him beat his bolt open, chamber another round and fire, and beat the bolt open again.

I packed up my gear and retrieved my hammer on the way out. Really didn't want to watch that bolt break and shatter his face for shooting overloaded ammo.
 
Why I stopped shooting . . .

Having to beat a bolt open on a Rem Model 7 chambered in 223 is why I stopped shooting Wolf ammo. I know a lot of people have good experiences with Wolf, but I suggest staying away from it.

Live well, be safe
Prof Young
 
I know this is a little off topic, but it always amazes me when I hear or see people at the range that have all this money tied up in there firearms and they put the cheapest ammo they can find in them.
 
I was at the range a couple years ago . There was a couple there shooting and every shot they had to slam the bolt up by hand . Not only that but every 4th or 5th shot they had to push a cleaning rod down the bore to pop the case free from the chamber . I wanted to go over and ask what was going on or state that sticky bolts are a bad sign but I did not . At the time I had read a thread about guys hating it when other come over and start telling them what they are doing wrong . Just about the whole thread was guys saying " mind your own business " . That really had me think twice on going over and saying something . To this day I still question my choice not to go over .

it always amazes me when I hear or see people at the range that have all this money tied up in there firearms and they put the cheapest ammo they can find in them.
Click to expand...

There is a guy at my local range that has a Savage model 10 BA which is a 308 with that super fancy tactical stock . They cost 2k+ . Every time I see him there he is shooting wolf or some other cheap steel cased ammo .

I have a Savage FCP-K which is the exact same rifle with out the fancy stock . He shoots 2 moa with his fancy rifle and I shoot sub moa with mine . He asked me a few times what he's doing wrong . I tell him it's the ammo he is using . I even grabbed five rounds of my reloads and shot them through his rifle . I shot just under a moa group . Sure enough the next time I saw him at the range . There he was shooting that same wolf crap . Some people just don't get it .
 
They're out there.
Overheard at a gun store:
Guy brings his bolt action rifle in with the bolt stuck closed.
Shop owner asks him about his load.
Guy has no idea about much of anything other than he loaded the cases plumb full with "gun powder."
Shop owner asks what kind of gun powder.
Guy says, "You know...gun powder."

Another one:
Guy comes in another shop and wants to buy factory ammo for his hunting rifle.
Shop owner asks what caliber.
Guys says "Browning."
Shop owner says "Browning what?"
Guy says, "Let me look in some ammo boxes, I'll know it when I see it."
 
Don't have a whole lot of horror stories like these to share. I was lucky and had good mentoring and, the loading manuals to learn correctly. I wish those fellas the same in the future. God Bless
 
Sometimes people that you think know what they are doing will do something that's hard to explain. A nephew of mine called me and asked if you could shoot 25-06 "bullets" in a 270. I was shocked at the question. He's been hunting for many years. I said that it was a real bad idea, so don't do it. He said that he already did it. I guess a 25-06 must chamber in a 270 bolt gun. I never tried it. I asked him how he got the wrong ammo, and he said something about it being 120 grains, so he thought it'd be Ok, so he bought it. He isn't a kid. He's a grown man and running a company. I worry about him.

Anyway, if you or someone you know is having unexplained pressure problems, see my chat on in this section about my problems with my new custom 223 barrel. It sounds exactly like what the folks did when they had serious problems with that custom gun. I just didn't try to force the round to chamber and then fire it.
 
g.willikers said:
Shop owner asks him about his load.
Guy has no idea about much of anything other than he loaded the cases plumb full with "gun powder."
Shop owner asks what kind of gun powder.
Guy says, "You know...gun powder."
Click to expand...
There was a web site that purported to tell how to do all sorts of things (contributed to by the general public on a wide range of subjects). It becamse the subject of a thread on a gun forum for a page that described how to reload ammunition.

I checked it out.

Most of the pages had correct information.

The one about loading said exactly what your gun shop customer said. The web site specified to fill the case with powder (and only implying that the student should leave enough room to seat the bullet.

I should have copied the text of the instruction. But what I did was to send a message to the administrator of the site, explaining how dangerous that page was.

It was gone the next time I looked a few days later. I hope I am not the only one who sounded the alarm.

Lost Sheep
 
Metal god said:
(edited for brevity)I wanted to go over and ask what was going on or state that sticky bolts are a bad sign but I did not . At the time I had read a thread about guys hating it when other come over and start telling them what they are doing wrong . Just about the whole thread was guys saying " mind your own business " . That really had me think twice on going over and saying something . To this day I still question my choice not to go over .
Click to expand...
I am still naive enough to have gone over. But I am not so naive as to give advice unasked that might not be welcome. Instead, I take the Socratic approach. I ask a question. One (hopefully) likely to lead the person to a thought process that will illuminate.

For example: Does your rifle do that all the time? What do you think it means?

Of course, Socrates wound up with a hemlock cocktail for his efforts.

Lost Sheep
 
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