I tried to blow up an Arisaka with a full charge of bullseye. It set the bolt back and ruined the gun, but it did not blow up.

Pondercat, I size my 454 cases down just below the base of the bullet only to keep my cases from stretching, it works. I have to FL size them about every 4th reload when they start getting some resistance in extraction. I'm using a Taurus RB and it appears the chambers are a bit large causing the cases to lengthen quite a bit when sized. They don't grow when partial sizing at all, so gone with trimming the damn things.

sonofagun, Off the top of my head I am not sure what bullets I was using. I seem to think i switched from 130 gr Hornady to 130 gr Speer. I don't remember. I do know that of the three savages I have reloaded for. I have had to seat speer bullets deeper than hornady to keep them from touching the lands. If I am right about it being the 130's that load was 58.5 gr of h 4831
I went back to see if I made any notes. The only thing I see is at the time was I changed the OAL on the loads. Hornady was 3.310 and I changed the speer to 3.240
I also remember that after I got the gun back I chambered one of those pounds and when I opened the bolt and pulled it back the bullet stayed in the barrel. Like I said before the bullet was pushed HARD into the lands. I don't remember what I did with the rest of those loads.
Ron

[ 12-29-2002, 09:30: Message edited by: Idaho Ron ]

Thanks for the response Ron. I still wonder if something else was going on to cause such a catastrophic result. I think I'm safe in saying that most major bolt guns (like your 110) have enough safety margin to withstand anything other than GROSS reloading mistakes (usely a powder mix-up such as wrong kind or severe overcharge). I don't think switching bullet makes and/or seating into the lands should "blow up" a gun - actually, your gun didn't really "blow up" - you just had a severe gas leak - apparently back through the primer pocket. The cause of your incident may (?) have been actually a loose primer pocket(?) Anybody else want to comment? Can seating into the lands "blow up" a gun?

I had a SAA colt clone that I was shooting along with another one. I heard a louder than normal report and a "different" type of recoil. When I brought the gun down, the top half of the cylinder, top strap were gone, the fram was cracked and the back of the barrel split. I went home and pulled the rest of the bullets from that batch of reloads...all the same...weighed in at a load that was midway between starting and maximum load. My only injury was to my pocket book and the fact that I think my heart rate must have hit over 300. It now hangs on my reloading bench as a reminder that even after 30+ years of shooting and reloading, that accidents can happen.

Never blew one up personally, but had a friend that used some of what he "thought" was 4320 in an '06, and which we now believe was 4227. Took a 77 Ruger apart in fine fashion, fortunately, he was not injured. I have had sticky bolt lifts a couple of times, and once had the primer fall out of a 7x57 case in a single shot Ruger when I dropped the action open [much heavier case mixed in by accident]Only 160 grain 7x57 load that ever chronographed over 2900 fps!! Usually, I try to be very cautious. 60,000 psi out in front of my nose makes me think of possibilities, grave ones.
I always check case charge levels before seating bullets. That has saved me from a load with no powder a couple of times, as well. Regards, Eagleye.

I have trashed several. Trashed a Remington 700 bolt with the second shot from some overseas ammo. Loaded a max load of WW748 with some 50 grain TNT's. Shot great at 75 degrees F. Blew extractors out of AR and Savage within 45 minutes of each other when temp was 95 degrees in prairie dog town. Blew up a mauser 30-06 with faulty headspace. Had the gun rebarrelled. First shot OK. Second shot swelled the reciever. Gunsmith missed the headspace by about .005 over no go. Blew the magazine out of 742 Rem. Loading late at night. Read the manual wrong. Put 3 grains over max in the case. No other damage though.

Bought lessons. I stay away from max loads. Work up carefully. I also pay attention and check, check and recheck the process when I am loading. I also wear good glasses.

I wasn't thinking when I posted earlier about shotguns. I "wrecked" one of them.

I had a Winchester 20 ga. pump that I was horrible with (short stroked it a lot when the blue quail hunting got fast and furious). My answer was to buy a Remington 1100 in 12 ga. That was the answer, until I got so good with it I was over-running my limit fairly quickly. I decided to buy a Remington 1100 in 20 ga.

I found one at a gun shop. The only thing I didn't like about it was that it had a full choke. I got the gun for $75 and my used Winchester pump. A friend whose advice on guns I respected said I got a steal.

I bought the gun and ordered an RCBS reloader about a week before the quail season opened in Texas. The reloader arrived the evening before the season. I hurriedly rigged it up in the garage and went to loading. I had five boxes done by the time I crapped out for the night.

The next morning I took the new beauty out with friends, and we had one of those mornings. The blues were everywhere. We would bail out on one covey and jump two more coveys, then jump singles for thirty minutes more.

The problem was that my new reloads were barely throwing the shot out of the barrel, about every fifth shot. I knew I had a problem, but I was 30 miles from the house, the birds were thick, and thought I could work around it. I thought I was being careful under the circumstances, but eventually a plastic shot-column hung at the full choke on the end of the barrel. I pulled the trigger again, and the gun really rocked me as the full charge hit the obstruction.

I blew the last four inches of the barrel out. The vent rib kept the top part of the barrel straight, but the bottom half of the barrel was pointing straight down.

When I got home and checked the reloader I saw that I was barely putting any wad pressure on the loads.

I sawed the end of the barrel off and used what was left as a skeet barrel. I bought another 1100 barrel with a modified choke, made sure I had the reloader adjusted correctly, and never had another problem.

If you ever get in a hurry; get ready for an accident.

Never have had one blow up, but I had a 357 Herret TC once that stuck the case before I found that a particular brand of brass needed to be neck reamed and a few years after that a 300 Savage in the T/C had a primer fall out after firing..What is it with the tight necks in these T/C barrels, custom and otherwise. Convinced me that I needed to start at LEAST 20% below max...live and learn.....all that before I got a little gray

Well, I have blown up one.....

Really dunno what caused it either. That's what kinda frosts me. A double charge? Maybe, but I sure doubt it. That cylinder on that .44special was never very thick on that thing.

Only time I ever experianced a recoil going straight down.

That's after a charge of 6.9gr of Unique and a 219gr cast bullet, over a standard CCI large pistol primer.