If you have a center fire rifle fail to fire what procedure do you follow. What do you do with the bullet and how much time do you wait.
I have heard that they could fire after a long period , I don't know need some input.
Shotgun shells when I watched trap shooters if they had a failure, with out waiting they would put them in there jackets it was explained to me there is a diference in how you handle the two.

I keep the gun pointed downrange
I wait for at least a minute and make sure the muzzle stays in a safe direction...

I then, keeping the muzzle in a safe direction, and covering my eyes open the action and dump the cartridge on the ground.

I then check the barrel for obstructions and when I'm sure the gun is safe I might pick up the round and inspect it to see what the failure was caused by.

In any case the time is a couple minutes or more before I touch the cartridge.

Don't get in a hurry and remember to treat the rifle as though the damn thing could discharge at any time in the process even though a hang fire is usually a matter of a fraction of a second.

Vapodog has it on the nose as about all you can do. Iv'e never had a primer failure but would be careful with it. Never have heard of one going off sometime later either, but someone may have. I have had .22 misfires as many have but not a center fire.

But then what do you do with the cartridge? Pull the bullet and reload it, or take it to the fire dept.??

After nearly 50 years of shooting,I've never experienced a hangfire.Misfires?Absolutely.But never a hangfire yet and I've fired many thousands of rounds.
Do they happen more frequently than I thought and I've just been lucky?

It's gotta be a rare occurance....but it happens...

http://www.marlinowners.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=5202&...ostorder=asc&start=0

1 or 2 misfires in a centerfire and several
hangfires in my muzzleloader but even the the hangfire was only a fraction of a second after the primer ignited.

Either way keep the barrel pointed in a safe direction!!!!!
One you open the chamber and eject the cartridge I feel everyone near you is alot safer.
I would personaly not pick it up for at least a minute and would get it to the trash can quick if I was at a range.If I was in the woods
I would throw it into the timber or any where someone might not happen on to it later.

One thing to keep in mind is if you handle it and it did go off you would be better off holding onto the bullet rather than the actual case itself.
The chance of a misfire becoming a hangfire is
very remote.IMO

Just had this one in a rifle, and had several in pistols...misfires, not hangfires.

Keep the gun pointed as if firing for a full count of 10.

Turn head away from ejection port and eject cartridge.

Check firearm for possible cause.

Check cartridge for clues.

In every case of mine so far, the primer had a light dimple from inadequate firing pin impact. I pull the bullet and fire the empty cartridge the next trip to the range. So far, every one has fired. My conclusion every time has been tha tthe primer was not completely seated...

Several have recommended that you just recock and fire it again. Based on my experience, that should be okay, but I don't recommend it personally.

quote:

Originally posted by ray m:
After nearly 50 years of shooting,I've never experienced a hangfire.Misfires?Absolutely.But never a hangfire yet and I've fired many thousands of rounds.
Do they happen more frequently than I thought and I've just been lucky?

The most memorial was some time aroun 1952?? Any how the Mod. 760 just had come out and inspecter Dick Wagner (Cleveland PD Late rChief of police ) was was fireing his ,I think, forthe first time. For some reason he was shooting it as a single shot with no clip in it.

We all heard the loud CLICK and no boom.Puzzeled Inspecter Wagner started the slide to the rear. As the rifle unlocked the round went off. The bolt was blown back and the action split. The case was ruptured and blown back .a large part of it passed down through magazine area, went through Dick's vest and shirt, furrowed the skin and mussle along his tummy and than exited without doing any more body damage. I have had short duration hang fires but this was the worst I have witnessed. roger

Bet that soured him on Remingtons and their ammo

I hold it down in the rest and wait for 1min +/- as stated. Then I eject it,..then after a few minutes,..I stick it bullet down into the dirt and forget about it. After a few weeks or so,..I toss it into the drainage ditch full of water/mud. If it didn't go off in a modern rifle with modern compononts,..It's most likely a bad primer. I don't however go home and pull it apart,..I toss the whole thing.

If I remember correctlty primers "should ignite at temp. near -20f.,below who knows,hang fire?,.I will wait at least 3 seconds before ejecting the round.Hot temp. I cannot tell...

quote:

Originally posted by bill r:
If you have a center fire rifle fail to fire what procedure do you follow. What do you do with the bullet and how much time do you wait.
I have heard that they could fire after a long period , I don't know need some input.
Shotgun shells when I watched trap shooters if they had a failure, with out waiting they would put them in there jackets it was explained to me there is a diference in how you handle the two.

After you have cleared the weapon per vapodog's instructions, and made sure there's no bullet lodged in the bore (which can, and does happen!!), inspect the cartridge. If the primer indentation appears light, then you might try firing it again. If it shoots, OK! If not, repeat the "hangfire/misfire procedure". Then when you get home, disassemble the round to determine why it didn't go.

The only time I've seen something like this happen was about 40 years ago when I let a friend reload some of his .308s with my tools. he came back from a bear hunt, swearing at "those damn reloads! Only about half of them fired!" He'd brought them back, so I took them apart and discovered that the problem was that he'd only put powder in about 2/3 of the cases! The bullet bases were all just black as hell from the primers. He was lucky that none of them had pushed a bullet into his barrel, because he'd fired several AFTER the misfires!

Another cause could be a weak striker spring, or a broken striker tip. Examination of the primer will tell you if either of these is the problem.

I have never experienced a primer misfire with U.S. made primers, nor with a reload or a U.S. factory load. The only ammo I've ever had misfires from was old Argentine 7.65X53mm "FM" ball ammo from the 1970's.

Gee...I can't answer that one! I never had a primer fail to go bang...

I loked through my notes...3 misfires with 2 different lots of UMC 40S&W ammo and one recent one with Remington green box corelokt rifle ammo. All fired the next time through (as empty cases though...bullets were pulled).

Never had a reload fail to fire. Since I have shot about 3:1 reloads:factory ammo in recent years, I therefore consider reloads to be much more reliable than factory ammo. YMMV.

The only missfires I have experience with was with a friends .454 Casul. He was trying some new primers, and lucky me I got the one that went "pop" not BANG!

Pointed it down range for a minute, then gently lowered the revolver to the ground with the muzzle still down range. Went back to the fire for about 15 minutes, then opened the cylinder. Bullet was pushed up into the barrel, but very little powder was ignited.

My friend said he thought it was bad primers. He pulled all the bullets and then just fired the empty cases in his gun to get rid of the primers.

I've had misfires but, most of the time I just recocked the Bolt and it fired on the second go. Weak spring will do it quite often.

Please, if you do eject it onto the ground, Do it onto grass or leaves (something soft) and not onto Concrete or Gravel as the sudden shock could make the round explode and cause you injury. I've heard of folks dropping rounds and having them explode (Not violently but, enough to get a splinter of brass in your eye or skin for sure).

On the rounds that don't go bang on the second try, I wait a minute ease the round out slowly and throw it in our pond or in a brush thicket. I'd hate to put it into the trash and have it go off on a garbage handler or someone place it in a burn pile .

Good Luck!

Reloader

You may want to avoid pulling the bullet, A live round in a bullet puller is like a pipe bomb waiting to explode. Sure, most of us do it w/ live ammo that hasn't failed but, why risk it w/ a primer than could go under just a little stress.

Reloader

I have had hang fires load testing and working up loads... I have also had a few rounds that failed to go off, but the culprit was a weak firing pin or was from a batch of Federal 210 primers I got ( box of 1000).... I had 25 or 30 out of that batch of 1000 that did not go off....

I just slide the bolt back and remove the round by hand, take it home and disassemble it.....Put a new primer in the case and take it back to the range the next time with that batch of brass....

I don't look at it as something to freak out about....Handle if safely and there should be no problems...

cheers
seafire