Squib Load...Anybody Else Experienced This?

[Worc]

Recklessly firing a pistol in rapid fire is not a legitimate practice, its an absolute certainty that doing so amidst a squib load blows up your gun, and in so doing, threatens you and anyone else near you with serious injury!

Nothing reckless about doing double tap drills or fast fire drills when doing it under control. I could be argued that if you do carry and don't do these kinds of drills it's reckless behavior because you are not preparing for a self defense situation. Unless you plan on telling a bad guy to slow down his approach so you can proceed slow fire in case of a squib.

 

[Evil Monkey]

Not true. In a short recoil system, the barrel/slide unit starts to move and begin the unlocking process the instant the bullet begins to move, so even with a barrel obstruction at some point down the barrel, the bullet will usually move enough to cause the pistol to cycle and put a fresh round in the chamber. Only if the bullet is tight against the obstruction, preventing the bullet from moving at all, will the slide not move.

I disagree.

If the bullet in a squib load, whether it's primer-only or a severe under charge, stops mid barrel, then there is not enough force cycling the pistol. The force of pressure may move the barrel/slide, but there cannot be any reliable cycling to load a fresh round. We're talking a 115-230gr bullet stopping midway in a 4 or 5in barrel. What makes you think a 1 pound slide/barrel assembly is going to extract, eject, and feed reliably when a bullet measured in the grains can't even leave a short barrel?

 

[MeanestNiceGuy]

Evil Monkey
Sequence of events:

1. girlfriend says it won't shoot, this is assuming she pulled the trigger.
2. NiceGuy takes pistol, and had to have cocked the pistol again due to the fact that the kel tec PF9 doesn't have double strike capability.
a. Either he soft cocks the slide/hammer with the round remaining in the chamber or...
b. He hard cocks the slide/hammer and loads a new round.
3. Fires the first round with no issue.
4. Second round blows up pistol.

NiceGuy you need to confirm or adjust my assumptions. What exactly did you do when you girl gave the pistol back? Be extremely specific and leave no detail out.

If the round your girlfriend tried to fire was a squib, then that means when you loaded a new round by racking the slide, that first round you fired should have blown the pistol up, but instead it happened on the second round.

Adjust them....#2 and #3 never occurred. The magazine was full and ready to shoot, but she had problems pulling the trigger. I stepped in right after her and fired the first round....the trigger was a little hard to pull. I tried to fire again (still hard to pull), then came the explosion.

 

[Evil Monkey]

Adjust them....#2 and #3 never occurred. The magazine was full and ready to shoot, but she had problems pulling the trigger. I stepped in right after her and fired the first round....the trigger was a little hard to pull. I tried to fire again (still hard to pull), then came the explosion.

You're saying you fired the first and you tried to fire again, and that's when it blew up. That means you fired twice, based on what I'm reading.

Based on this information, I'm assuming the reason why the pistol had a hard trigger was because the round was barely in battery because a bullet was stuck in the throat of the barrel. When you fired the first round, both bullets were pushed out and compromised the barrels integrity. The second round fired finished the barrel off.

This is assuming your girlfriend didn't rack the slide to get rid of the squib casing and chamber another round without you knowing, because I HIGHLY doubt a squib load with the bullet stuck in the throat would have chambered a new round for you to shoot, which then would have interfered with trigger function.

I'm inclined to believe this was a highly pressurized round and not a squib load with the same reason why the trigger was hard to pull was because the bullet was probably seated too deep and bulged out the sides of the casing, causing in-battery and trigger issues.

 

[James K]

Hi, Evil Monkey,

What makes me think that a bullet moving up the barrel without exiting will cycle a pistol? I have done it.

You say that "The force of pressure may move the barrel/slide..." But in a recoil operated pistol, the pressure does not move the barrel/slide, the recoil does, and recoil begins the instant the bullet moves and is complete before the bullet exits the barrel. So, in a pistol with, say, a 5" barrel, bullet movement of 3 or 4 inches is more than enough to initiate the cycle.

Jim

 

[9x45]

Squibs will not KaBoom a pistol, but bullet setback will. If the round is only .050" shorter, the pressure can almost double. Squibs result in a bulged barrel whereas case ruptures only blow the magazine out but don't damage the gun. And while double charging is a popular theme, it is pretty impossible for commercially loaded ammo that uses a powder check station. Measure the remainder of the rounds for OAL. Squibs are very common in competition shooting.

The Perfect Squib

case rupture from an Open Division Major 9 STI

 

[Ocraknife]

Are squib rounds common in competition due to the probability associated with firing so many rounds?

 

[9x45]

Ocraknife, yes, your average competition shooter will run 20,000 to 50,000 rounds a year between matches and practice. Also because everyone in the games reloads their own ammo. It tends to happen more with newbies, new to both competition shooting and re-loading, but us grey beards are not exempt. It typically happens on auto indexing presses when you get a jam, because of a mil crimped case, or you put a 9x17 case in instead of a 9x19, and instead of pulling all the stations and dealing with it later, a case without powder will go unnoticed. The Dillon 550 is a manual indexer, so it's much harder to not throw powder, but easier to double charge (with high density low volume powders, not low density high volume powders). That's why I always recommend high volume powders for newbies. You have to visual each case after the powder drop and before the bullet seat.

Shown are .357SIGs on the shell plate, 7.8 grains of BE-86 almost fills the case to the neck.

Dillon 550 manual indexer

Dillon Square Deal auto indexer

 

[johnwilliamson062]

The thing I love about my muzzle loader is it is pretty hard to miss a squib

Everything else I hate.

If I've had one I didn't notice and nothing broke. I shoot all factory ammunition, which seems to lower the chance.

 

[Rinspeed]

After shooting for 30 years and reloading for 20 I've only had one and it was last year. It was someone else's trusted reloads and even though I knew something wasn't right with the recoil I consider myself slightly lucky that the cylinder wouldn't turn. The bullet didn't enter the barrel far enough to clear the front of the cylinder. This was with a 27-2 and I am very happy the situation didn't go much worse. I try to educate others that shoot with me of the dangers of a squib.

 

[walnut1704]

If you shoot very much it is highly likely you will eventually experience a squib.

I personally have never experienced a squib with factory ammo, either centerfire or rimfire. I've had plenty of failures-to-fire, but no squibs resulting in a projectile left in the barrel.

Since I reload I don't shoot a lot of factory ammo outside of rimfire. I have had squibs with my own reloads.

The first one was in my very first box, where I neglected to clean the oil out of the brand new all steel sizing die. The first case squeegeed it all off and the oil contaminated the powder charge.....pfffft. What a mess. Oily gunpowder all over the place.

I didn't have any for the next thirty years. Then I switched to a Lee Auto-Disk powder measure. It was the only fixed-disk, automatically actuated, powder measure I could find. In my original configuration I was relying on the spring return to retract the disk and recharge the cavity.

Unnoticed by me, after I had been using the measure for quite sometime, the spring would occasionally fail to return the disk. It short it would jam in the forward position.

I was loading light charges in .38 spl cases on a Dillon 450. I did periodically check them, but checking 10% of your charges won't necessarily catch 10% that are squibs.The charges were extremely difficult to verify visually, given the cartridge, the charge, and the equipment.

My ultimate solution ended up being to rig the chain return option that measure has, and not rely on a spring.

There's something to be said for a load that is easily visible, or using loading blocks with a single stage.

 

[9x45]

One of our local USPSA hoser’s managed to load 600 rounds of squibs, and near squibs. The ones that made it out of the barrel were so slow you could watch them impact the target. Turns out a little piece of paper, from the seal on the powder jug, fell into the charger bar on the press and of course changed the volume. It was significant, something like 5.5 grains to 2 grains. So he gave up after the first stage and had to pull all the remaining rounds. It’s generally a good idea to visual the case after the powder drop, and weight out your load at the beginning of a run, and at the end. And of course make sure nothing gets into the powder hopper tube

 

[stagpanther]

I'm a bit confused here, you said you fired it immediately after the firearm was returned to you and it fired just fine, then you fired it again and it blew up, is that so? If so, you didn't have a squib load, you had an overcharged load, a squib load is a bullet that lodges itself in the bore, obstructing it dangerously! A squib is always marked by a light sounding ignition, such as a childs cap gun would make, the cartridges primer usually being the only propellant.

If you had a squib, then you MISSED it and fired another round into the obstructed bore, and you are solely responsible for the mishap if such is the case, is that what happened?

I don't agree with this. A squib happens when--whatever the reason-- the bullet fails to achieve enough velocity to exit the bore.There can be many causes for that including the case not sealing properly to the chamber--which could be a headspacing issue or even a bullet that might not seal correctly to the bore diameter. Either way--you could still have a normal full ignition of a regular powder charge and still fail to have the bullet exit the barrel. I've noticed in my after-market barrels that there are wide variations in chamber tolerances and I'm extra careful when selecting factory or hand-loading ammo. even the case type and proper belling or not at the mouth can have an impact on bullet seating and chambering. This is further complicated by the fact that most semi-auto rounds headspace off the case mouth, yet bullets that might be compressed loads and get "bashed around" under heavy recoil may need something of a light or better taper crimp. Nothing goes through my semi-autos unless it passes the "drop-test" where I simply drop the cartridge into the inverted barrel and it seals with the rim back flush to the chamber shroud with a satisfying "thunk" and then also drops freely out with nothing more than a slight tap on my palm. Lead bullets especially require more care since they need room to expand and also can cause quicker fouling. I've had a couple of squibs and in both cases there was full ignition--I was just lucky as all heck that in both instances the bullet lodged just in front of the chamber so that the next round could not chamber far enough to complete cycling. Just my 2 cents. : )

 

[45_auto]

you could still have a normal full ignition of a regular powder charge and still fail to have the bullet exit the barrel.

It would be obvious when at a minimum the magazine blew out of the gun. All that pressure locked in the chamber is going to go somewhere as soon as the barrel locking mechanism releases.

The results would be similar to what happens in a "kaboom" due to case head blowout through an unsupported chamber. But at least in the "kaboom" case the bullet exits the barrel relieving a substantial portion of the pressure, although the gun still blows apart.

I've had a couple of squibs and in both cases there was full ignition--I was just lucky as all heck that in both instances the bullet lodged just in front of the chamber so that the next round could not chamber far enough to complete cycling

Were you shooting a Highpoint or other blowback weapon?

If you were shooting a recoil operated weapon, there is no way that the bullet generated enough recoil force (force = mass x acceleration, bullet stuck in front of the chamber = essentially zero acceleration) to operate the slide if it was stuck just in front of the chamber.

If you were shooting a blowback operated weapon, the chamber pressure would cycle the slide normally for you. That's why the slide is so heavy.

If you were shooting a recoil operated weapon, then your squibs weren't anywhere near full power loads. The pressure will either be relieved through the end of the barrel when the bullet exits or back into the gun through the breech if the bullet sticks and the barrel unlocks.

 

[stagpanther]

My own hand-loads--which I individually weigh each charge. I do not fully understand the recoil physics necessarily--but I can tell you with absolute certainty that an improperly headspaced case in a Glock 20 using an after-market barrel with heavy mainspring can achieve a full "recoil report" that is indistinguishable from a "normal ignition" and yet result in a squib load without blowing the gun up.

 

[45_auto]

My own hand-loads--which I individually weigh each charge.

I would imagine that it's more probable that perfection in handloading has eluded you rather than the possibility that you have discovered a situation in which Newton's Third Law does not apply.

No big deal either way. Believe what makes you happy.

 

[stagpanther]

Quote:
Originally Posted by stagdpanther
My own hand-loads--which I individually weigh each charge.
I would imagine that it's more probable that perfection in handloading has eluded you rather than the possibility that you have discovered a situation in which Newton's Third Law does not apply.

No big deal either way. Believe what makes you happy.

I'm not interested in bucking responsibility for something I did wrong--but at the same time I am certain I had a full recoil and muzzle lift at the time I shot the cartridge that produced the squib. My interest is only finding out what actually happened--if possible--even if that means I totally screwed something up which I have no problem admitting.

I called Glock and talked to a pistol engineer specifically about the 20. I described my experience and he confirmed that it was possible to fire a full charge cartridge that results in a squib without blowing the gun up--though he suggested that I might have some stretching/deformation in the barrel that I might not be aware of. The official position appears to be that you should only use their stock configurations with factory jacketed bullets, so the hand-load lead cast bullet I used was not a variable they would give any advice/opinions on--other than I shouldn't be doing it.

 

[45_auto]

though he suggested that I might have some stretching/deformation in the barrel that I might not be aware of.

If you really talked to someone at Glock and he made the statement above, he wasn't an engineer.

 

[Stevie-Ray]

I can tell you with absolute certainty that an improperly headspaced case in a Glock 20 using an after-market barrel with heavy mainspring can achieve a full "recoil report" that is indistinguishable from a "normal ignition" and yet result in a squib load without blowing the gun up.

I've never heard of any squib load blowing a gun up-only the next round fired after a squib that wasn't discovered, yet cycled the slide.

 

[stagpanther]

The statement was made that the only way you get a squib was from an UNDERPOWERED charge--but I had a squib years ago with a 10mm hard cast hand-load that I'm fairly certain had a normal ignition of powder because the report sounded normal and the recoil felt the same. The argument is under the laws of physics--that energy has to go some place--and if not down the barrel it would necessarily blow the gun up in the reciever--yet that did not happen to me and I went on to shoot thousands of rounds through the gun (though I did stop using the barrel in question).