Many years ago, I was brought a Franchi semi auto 12 gage shotgun.

That shotgun had a steel rod at the back of the bolt, that went into a spring in the pistol grip.

Well, that rod was sticking out of the pistol grip, where the space between your thumb and forefinger would be.

It shot straight through the stock!

Luckily, no damage to the shooter.

What happened was is a classic in that “little knowledge is worse than no knowledge at all” syndrome!

The shooter wanted to make “more powerful ammo” from what he had.

I cannot remember what ammo he had, but what he did was this.

He opened a few rounds very carefully.

He found that a lot of space was taken by the plastic wad.

BINGO!

His brain went into over drive!

He decided to cut the middle part of the wad, and keep only the top and middle!

He replaced the space he gained with more powder, and more shot!

He only fired one shot, and the result is what I described above!

quote:

The shooter wanted to make “more powerful ammo” from what he had.

Let me guess....was his name Walter...??

quote:

Originally posted by 30.06king:

quote:

The shooter wanted to make “more powerful ammo” from what he had.

Let me guess....was his name Walter...??

No.

This happened before WALTER!

Hey, we do have our geniuses too, you know!?

Sounds like some of the stuff that goes on with African poachers. How do you work up a load for elephant with 1 inch water pipe for a barrel?

Don’t laugh!

I have no idea how old I was, probably around 8.

When we decided to make a canon out of fireworks.

We got some firework which were about 2 inch cubes.

They had a wick one lights and runs off.

They go off with a very loud bang.

We got a few of these, and took them apart.

We collected all the powder inside them, and put it in a 3 for steel pipe.

We buried most of the pipe, pointing up at an angle.

We put a marble in it, and let it.

The whole thing went up with a ginormous bang.

Everything was thrown all over the place!

First lesson in loading ammo by ourselves!

Sounds similar to us as kids in the early 1950's.
Renter had a 3' belt of .50 BMG's.
I got 'em, tossed a few in the trash fire pits of the day.

Made up a board with a nail, set a long pipe on it,
dropped a few shells down from the garage roof.
Each shot we had to replace the board and cut off the torn up end of the pipe.

Never noticed my buddies Dad had come home til we fired one.
Wasn't long til Chuck came running out to see what we'd blown up.

Shortly after that the belt came off!!

George

I remember as a kid prying out 22rf bullets and placing the powder from one into another case and pushing the bullet back in. Loaded it in my dad's 552 speedmaster... Sounded like a high power rifle going off, blew the case head off and popped the bottom cover off the action. I never did that again.

68 yrs. ago my buddy and I put an M80 on a rock lit the fuse and covered it with an old usty soup can then backed off about ten feet. When it went off the can did not fly into the air. It blew apart and rusty shrapnel filled my buddy's arm.
My friend has been dead for some time now but I have his monument in my back yard on a 3' stick.
A rusty old soup can. roger