Did something that's a first for me today, always made fun of others that did similar.

I have a personal rifle I built 6 or 8 years ago, as a dedicated prairie dog gun. It's a 16 pound rifle, huge 33" long barrel, mauser action, in .243. Has a weird space age thumbhole stock made of walnut and rosewood that I bought from Frank Martinez 10 years ago when he used to be on here. I moved away from SD right after building it, so never used it except to test fire one time, 20 rounds at the range. It's a solid .5 inch 5 shot at 100 rifle. Even on the mauser action.

I can't remember what twist the barrel is, and didn't mark it on the underside of the barrel. I got a bunch of 110 grain BTHP sierra's that require a 7 twist to stabilize, I think this is probably an 8. No problem, right? Just put a jag and patch on and check.

I do that, and the barrel has awful loose spots in the center. Start a patch from breech or muzzle, it turns a quarter turn, then slips, then holds, then slips, etc. I would never expect a barrel like that to be accurate, but it is. So, not being too bright, I think "bigger patch". So, I tear a larger patch off of my shop rag, and push it in. Goes through the tight area, into a loose spot, and then hits a tight spot and sticks. Push harder, and it starts again, but feels funny and not really twisting. Get about halfway down the barrel, and it's really dragging. Try pulling back, and it does, but doesn't twist. get back to the first spot where it stuck, and it stops. Now, I realize, I pushed through the patch, and the drag has just been the patch on the rod, not on the jag. I think, no problem, unscrew the jag, it will fall out the barrel, and then I can get the patch out. Unscrew the rod, it comes out, but the jag is stuck. Try compressed air. No go. Push from either end, no go. Won't screw back onto the rod, either. I can't believe, for the first time in my life, I've stuck a jag in a bore.

Put a case with a primer in, and tried to shot it out. No go. I don't have a test trap set up in the shop. But, put 5 grains of 4350 in a case, went into the basement and fired it into the crawl space under the other part of the house, into the insulating foam. Came out clean, no damage. But, lost the jag into the foam on the wall.

How stupid can a guy get? At least I didn't ruin the bore trying to pound it out. Now I have a small amount of sympathy for guys that do this and bring it to me to fix.

I expected you to say that the powder set the insulation under your floor on fire and burned your house down.
Here is another one involving cleaning patches, but I was just a bystander. My first job was in a Basic Training Company. One evening I was checking the CQ, who stayed in the Supply Room (to guard the weapons). The CQ and two privates had an M16 and were using a hammer to pound on a cleaning rod sticking out of the muzzle. I asked WTF they were doing; a soldier had a cleaning patch (on the rod) stuck in the bore. So the Sergeant thought that inserting another rod from the muzzle and pounding on it would force it out.
What happened is that one cleaning rod was driven along side the other, and gouged the bore very severely. We had to job order the rifle, and get a replacement.
Idiots.

I got a jag/patch on a pull through arrangement stuck in a .17 HMR Volquartsen. It was stuck and broke off the handle on the pull-thru! I called Volquartsen about a replacement barrel as I figured I was screwed. So I went 'Magilla' on the inches of pull-thru that was remaining with vicegrips as my handles. It came out and accuracy was not effected. I'm much more careful when I clean it and it still shoots iddy-biddy groups!

Remember the Speer plastic bullets for 38's, fired by a primer? I knew a college Law Enforcement instructor that went all in on these for students to practice indoors. Due to soot/carbon build-up a student got five of these stuck in a very nice (borrowed) 5-screw Model 10 5" barrel. The sixth shot got stuck halfway into the barrel and locked the cylinder up. What to do? The instructor went over to the Vo-Tech side of the building and borrowed a drill motor with a 5/16" bit and proceeded to drill the stuck plastic bullets. Needless to say he drilled a new straight 'groove' in the barrel. He called me looking for a new 5" barrel.

Haven't had those things happen so far.

I bought a new L461 Sako Vixen .222mag.

That had loose areas in the bore. Shot dime sized groups whenever checked. Put over 6000 thru it mostly on prairie dogs. Got it in Germany and sent it home. Didn't discover the flaws until I got home several months later.

Finally it went wild and missed a big fat one at 60 yards three shots as it just sat there.

Amazing such a barrel will shoot at all.

George

Customer brought in a .17 with a bore snake stuck in it. Finally got it out but that was a pain! I've used bore snakes for years but haven't gotten one stuck in the barrel yet. Fingers crossed though!

Time to break out the grease gun.