guy ar work here had bought a 50 cal ammo box full of 223's from sportsman guide. Over the week end he went shootn and one round was a way far overload. stuck the bolt broke the extractor etc. on a ruger 77. gun is ok but i'm be damned if i can figure out just how they got such an overload in a factory round

Butch...

I had a bad round on some Black Hills ammo that screwed up a Ruger 223 for me also a couple of years ago...

I know they use bulk powder...

I also had a handloaded 223, screw up and mess up the same rifle, (after it had been repaired from the other load)... that load was 25 grains of H 335, and a 55 grain SP, with a Win Small Rifle primer...

Shouldn't have screwed up the rifle but it did...that is a pretty standard load...

I had a similar experience many years ago with a Savage in .223. It was a warm handload, 26.5 gr of Accurate 2230, if I recall, with a remington 50 gr sp, and a CCI-450 primer. Blew the primer, Stuck the bolt, lost the extractor, but the gunsmith checked it out and said it was okay, dropped in a new extractor and I was good to go. Still not sure why it had such high pressure, unless it was a "perfect storm" of on the edge components: a slightly heavier piece of LC brass, a slightly hotter than usual primer, a slightly oversized remington bulk bullet, and a very warm day (probably 90 degrees or so. The funny thing was, I was set up to chronograph the load. With the Nosler Ballistic Tips, it averaged around 3350 fps, but with that particular remington bulk 50 gr bullet, it was around 3250 until that one touched off at 3680 fps!

quote:

Originally posted by 2ndtimer:
Still not sure why it had such high pressure, unless it was a "perfect storm" of on the edge components:

For exactly that reason safety margins were invented.

..and your bolt rifle is chambered for .223 Rem and the ammo was 5.56?

"5.56mm" is simply a designation for the military round, Hutt. The only difference between a gun chambered for .223Rem or 5.56mm NATO is the length of the leade in the chamber. The leade, or freebore, is longer in a military weapon to facilitate rapid breeching and extraction in automatic firearms. The ammo can be shot in either chambering, but accuracy will suffer in the weapon with the longer leade because the bullet must travel farther before the riflings get a grip on it.

Funny this came up now, I stopped by to see a friend yesterday and he had a Federal round split lengthwise in a Remington rifle he was shooting, it split from about the start of the thickened web up the side of the case maybe 3/4 inch He said he had fired about 20 rounds and the next one blew gas and brass back into his face, he had sunglasses on and they got speckled pretty good. He showed me a box of Federal ammo he had bought at WalMart, a 200 pack for 79.00 IIRC. Inside were ten small white 20 round boxes, I took some out and looked at the headstamp, they were all different years of LC mil brass loaded with 50 gr hp bullets? Federal in the recycling game now?

A very well known ammo manufacturer once actually recalled a lot of ammo (22-250, 100,000 rounds) to sort out the six cartridges that actually contained two bullets in them.

Shit can happen......but I'd have said this was impossible until I saw the X-Rayed photo of a 22-250 with two bullets in it.

Vapo;I'm sure shit happens to them too, I found an extra berdan primer inside a 7.62x54R case I had just fired. After yesterday I started thinking back to a phone conversation I had with one of the tear down contractors about 5 years ago, I asked why 8 pounders had doubled in price in such a short time. He started telling me how the small teardown contactors would be gone in less than 10 years, that the gov't started a new program for purchase of surplus powder and components, when a lot came up you had to bid for the entire lot, which left all the little guys out because of huge quantities, and that Federal had won some huge lot of powder, several train cars full and had it all shipped to their Minnesota?? facility. Now when I look for surplus powder there is a lot less to choose from, maybe soon it will no longer be available, then see Federal ammo loaded in mil surp brass and I'll bet Wc844 or Wc846 powder too.

The future, and all the trouble it portends for us gunowners, is why I'm buying up this stuff right now. I may never get to shoot it all, but at least I will have it if I ever do get some time to use it...

SAAMI's Unsafe Arms and Ammunition Combinations Technical Data Sheet page states:

The .223 Remington is rated for a maximum of 50,000 CUP while the 5.56mm is rated for 60,000 CUP. That extra 10,000 CUP is likely sufficient to cause a failure in a chamber that's only rated for the "sporting" .223 Remington.

The .223 Remington and the 5.56mm NATO, when checked with a chamber ream from a reliable manufacturer of each, also have discernable differences in the areas of freebore diameter, freebore length (leade) and angle of the throat.

quote:

Originally posted by butchloc:
guy ar work here had bought a 50 cal ammo box full of 223's from sportsman guide. Over the week end he went shootn and one round was a way far overload. stuck the bolt broke the extractor etc. on a ruger 77. gun is ok but i'm be damned if i can figure out just how they got such an overload in a factory round

Confusious say: "Never use factory-loaded ammuniton........"

well he found the answer - he pulled down a bunch of rounds and found a couple with just a pinch or 2 of powder in them had to be one of them that detonated. called sportsman guide and got a friendly f**k u.

Hey Butch, Do you think the Powder that "did not" get into those two cartridges, managed to get into a couple of others - a Powder Hang in the Powder Measure?

Would there have been room in the regular Load for a Double Charge to go unnoticed?
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I've seen folks mention Weight Sorting 22LRs, but I can see where it might have been a good idea to do that on this stuff too. Amazing that they just told him to go away, looks like they would have been concerned.

I've received a couple of their Fliers but haven't bought anything from them. Don't really need that kind of Customer Service.