Non Epic (but Major) Fail

[mjoplin]

I'm with Don2, the board has been dead for too long, so I'm throwing a couple out there.

This had the potential for disaster, thankfully nobody hurt, no damage to property...

Have been teaching my 15 year old daughter both shooting, reloading, etc. She's been doing extremely well so far but I failed in one area of gun safety. I hadn't monitored her closely enough when putting ammo in the magazine.

At the range, had multiple guns, multiple calibers (first mistake). About midway through a mag she'd inadvertently placed a .380acp in a Sig Pro chambered for .40 S&W. While I would have noticed it while stuffing the mag, she is not experienced enough to have noticed (has gotten significant training since).

Apparently the extractor claw held the shell back and allowed the firing pin to strike and fire the round. To her credit, she felt like something was wrong and set the gun down for me to examine. I dropped the mag, pulled the slide back and pulled the shell (was only halfway extracted from the chamber). Was amazed to find the front of the shell ballooned out to .40. Field stripped the gun, saw no damage but put it up anyway. Got it home, cleaned it and closely examined the barrel & chamber and found no damage. Have shot it since with no issues or diminshed accuracy.

Major "Oh Crap", and a lesson learned in gun safety for me.

[Don2]

The very first thing is that SHE is Ok..!!!!
I'm sure you drilled her in all the safety rules.

Ya...Looks like you have a half fire formed 40 cal and 380 combo..!!
Not sure I have seen an inverted bottle neck case??

I always seem to have a problem with 380 and 9mm brass getting mixed, I bought both 9mm and 380 "OF" brass and both came with a mix...Good thing I load both.
Then I also get a few 40's thrown into my 45acp brass also.

Glad all is well now...
Have Fun & Stay Safe
Don2

[y5e06]

A Never Again thread for reloading?
this past weekend my attention started to stray, i wasn't watching my hopper. ended up loading 20 or so 223 before realizing the hopper was dry. Luckily it was the start of another batch so i wasn't too far in. I was gonna throw the whole batch out. but out of curiosity i threw them in my vise and pulled all the bullets to see how many had no powder, how many were partially charged, and how many were full.
about 6-7 had only a few kernels, 2-3 were partial, and the rest seemed fully charged. oh well. No harm done, just a little loss of reloading components including some of my brand new cfe223 powder i was trying.

[mjoplin]

Unreal (AndyC post) that anyone would intentionally fire 380 in a 40 to save money.... Future Darwin award finalist!

Would definitely recommend a bullet puller for the 223's. I have used mine a few times and have found it invaluable. I think I paid 14 bucks over at Carter's Country for it... definitely a low budget item.

My first use was on some 1955 Twin Cities AP .30-06 my dad brought back from Korea. It had been sitting in mom's moldy damp basement for decades and I pulled one apart recently. The round was nasty on the outside, green, correded, etc. Unbelievably the components were good... the powder burned, I cleaned the empty brass and fired off the primer in a rifle and it worked as expected. ...btw, would never have tried the shooting off the assembled round. I don't want to be a feature in the Darwin Awards book!

Some pics of that round

[Don2]

A Never Again thread for reloading?
this past weekend my attention started to stray, i wasn't watching my hopper. ended up loading 20 or so 223 before realizing the hopper was dry. Luckily it was the start of another batch so i wasn't too far in. I was gonna throw the whole batch out. but out of curiosity i threw them in my vise and pulled all the bullets to see how many had no powder, how many were partially charged, and how many were full.
about 6-7 had only a few kernels, 2-3 were partial, and the rest seemed fully charged. oh well. No harm done, just a little loss of reloading components including some of my brand new cfe223 powder i was trying.

Just an FYI.
I bought a Hornady bullet puller that you screw into a single stage press with a flip handle on top. That sucker works GREAT and its not that expensive. Just have to buy the correct size Colet for the size bullet and away you go with very little to no marring the bullet up..!!
I actually bought it for 223 rems I had that was reloaded by someone I know...BUT will not shoot someones reloads unless I'm 100% sure of them. Used everything over but powder..!!!
Have also used it on mil 30-06 and 7.62x39 ammo with sealed bullets, just push them in first and pull out just fine.

Don2

[y5e06]

I have a kinetic (hammer) puller. i use it when setting up new combinations. however this time i had already crimped the loads. so, the hammer version wasn't going to work esp with 55gr bullets. I don't have a press mounted puller as I've never really needed it... except last week.

[Gyrogearhead]

I've been using both the inertial (hammer) bullet puller and the press mounted Hornady collet type bullet puller and love them both. If I'm only disassembling two or three cartridges I use the inertial puller but if I have a lot then the Hornady is the only way to go.

I had about 20 boxes of .30 Mauser pistol mil-surplus ammo that I bought before I "slugged" my broomhandle and found that it needed a 310 cal bullet. Decided to pull all the ammo apart and reuse the brass. That's when I discovered it was berdan primed.

Deprimed a handfull of cases and drilled out the berdan anvil before I found out the primer pocket was too big for small pistol primers and too little to accept a large primer

Gave up and put it all in baggies in a cardboard box for future use / disposal. That "bargan" ammo cost me a bundle of time.

As the old Fox used to say: "Some days chicken, some days feathers."

Gerry

[cbunt1]

Gave up and put it all in baggies in a cardboard box for future use / disposal. That "bargan" ammo cost me a bundle of time.

As the old Fox used to say: "Some days chicken, some days feathers."

Gerry

If I could have even $.10 on the dollar back for every "bargain" I've jumped into I'd be a rich man! But boy all the lessons learned :)

If we learn from our mistakes, I should be a genius by now!

[MoJo]

I've been using both the inertial (hammer) bullet puller and the press mounted Hornady collet type bullet puller and love them both. If I'm only disassembling two or three cartridges I use the inertial puller but if I have a lot then the Hornady is the only way to go.

I had about 20 boxes of .30 Mauser pistol mil-surplus ammo that I bought before I "slugged" my broomhandle and found that it needed a 310 cal bullet. Decided to pull all the ammo apart and reuse the brass. That's when I discovered it was berdan primed.

Deprimed a handfull of cases and drilled out the berdan anvil before I found out the primer pocket was too big for small pistol primers and too little to accept a large primer

Gave up and put it all in baggies in a cardboard box for future use / disposal. That "bargan" ammo cost me a bundle of time.

As the old Fox used to say: "Some days chicken, some days feathers."

Gerry

Ah, I thin you may have made an error.

.30 Mauser, 7.62 Mauser, and 7.62 Tokarev all use the same .310"-.311" bullet .30 Mauser and 7.62 Mauser are the same 7.62 Tokarev is similar but, not interchangeable. I've read that the Mauser round will shoot in the Tok but not the other way around.

[Gyrogearhead]

Ah, I thin you may have made an error.

.30 Mauser, 7.62 Mauser, and 7.62 Tokarev all use the same .310"-.311" bullet .30 Mauser and 7.62 Mauser are the same 7.62 Tokarev is similar but, not interchangeable. I've read that the Mauser round will shoot in the Tok but not the other way around.

Yeah, Mo there's a fox in the henhouse somewhere. I went back and measured several of the FMJ bullets I pulled from the "surplus military" that I was speaking of and with my Starrett micrometer they all measured 0.3010" diameter or nearly dead on 30 cal. So I got out my pocket calculator (hidden under my desk litter) and found that 7.62mm = 0.3000 inches. 7.65mm = 0.3011 inches so my surplus ammo is closer to the original Borchardt specification of 7.65mm from which the broomhandle ammo was derived. Whodathunkit?

I measured the bore slugs again, just to be sure and they still measured 0.309" to 0.310" so my old broomhandle is closer to being a 32 cal Mauser. Normally I would have thought these measurements would indicate a really bad "shot out" barrel but inspection with a bore light reveals sharp rifling and a clean bore. Also the markings on the slugs are sharp and clean with no tearing of the lead. So my conclusion is that this barrel was rifled for a 32 cal bullet to begin with.

Over on the Mauser broomhandle forums I've seen mention of other pistols that were manufactured to 32 cal rather than 30 cal but no one seems to know if it was a manufacturing error (a sloppy tool room in Germany?!? Heaven Forbid!) or a special requirement for a large customer (that doesn't make since either if the ammo is the same??) So what the heck is going on? At this point in time we'll probably never know for sure. But, I did find in my files a copy of an old Lyman reloading manual that said the 30 mauser bullet diameter is 0.309" - 0.311" which is right for my gun but a long way from 7.63 pistol. Curiously the info that came with my Lee 30 Mauser dies says the same thing and calls it 7.85 - 7.87mm. So maybe the "7.63" in the Mauser official name is just a nominal measure???

By the way, the boxes containing the "mil - surplus" ammo I bought indicated a Chech manufacture of 1954 so I presume it was made to Tokarev specifications. The label identified it as "P 7.63 CAL".

Gerry

[slinco]

The pic of that 380 brass is amazing, never thought that could happen.
Glad everything is ok