So he kept shooting a load, that had already blownup his rifle?

ah, yeah..

Sorry to hear about this.. this is frieghtening

junk the ENTIRE thing, and start over... much like a racing helmet or a sparkplug, they are good for ONE good hit..

jeffe

It could be detonation. Too bad he destroyed the loads, you could check if the case was full.
Being "modern" hasd nothing to do with it.
ood Luck!

Hmmmmmmmmm, maybe his parents were (closely) related.



Sounds like "Darwinism" @ it's finest!

he's extremely intelligent. senior chemist for a private lab here. does tons of research projects for the government. he is stubborn and doesn't like failure with anything. yes he has been married twice. before you carry your jokes any further hear this. he feels like this rifle needs defeating. rifle 2 himself 0. hes ex-military from the special forces. he's not afraid of it and likes the challenge even though i agree with most of you here about sending this rifle to the corner. most of us here haven't walked the same ground this man has. he's been to hell and back. if he wishes to wrestle this rifle, more power to him. life could be worse. he has holes and metal all in him. one leg doesn't work too well because of a mortar round so i guess he figures this rifle going off is not so bad. the first time it blew he said it reminded him of vietnam. there was a dead calm and the earth stood still for a moment. the only difference was here the sun was out and birds were singing when he became conscience from the rifle. in nam the experience he said was not quite the same. i'll not discuss his analogy to insure that im not making light of the situation he went thru there. it was real for him and personal. he's neither stupid nor unlearned. challenges good or bad to us, he takes head on and never looks back. im sorry if i take a bit of offense to some of these light hearted comments used to describe my friend. this mans not here to explain his reasons for carrying on with this rifle. to him its important to overcome this rifle. if so, thats good enough for me. im glad we had determined men like him that aren't afraid to challenge something they feel defeated by. he gets up and keeps on fighting. ive watched this man live in pain because of his sacrifices for a cause a lot of people never understood. ive carried him and his gear up and down many mountains in wyoming. hes never failed to stand with me and challenge me to be better than i could be otherwise, despite his physical limitations. hes taught me more about living and dying than anyone in my life so far. the life hes earned means something. my point is, i do not take his desire whether good or bad, to challenge life lightly. he came from poverty, a broken home, to war and hell, to alcoholism, to personal failures, to self healing, to education, to teaching and now being a highly successful senior chemist that has earned early retirement with a pocket full of money. taking something head on and what most people are afraid of and deem stupid has earned him this. there ends my defense of his actions. im proud and honored to call him friend. i mean that with a high level of respect.

Oh my god spare me. He is playing with fire. And what if the bolt comes back through his head the next time, you will proudly carry the coffin. This is not bravery or stubborness, it is pure stupidity. Scrap the damn thing.

Snider700

I would think that the wrong powder was used. Maybe a pistol powder?

Any way the thing that you keep saying about too little pressure causing some sort of malfunction is wrong. If you use too little powder of the correct type for a given cartridge that can be a problem. Say less than 50% case volume. Now with this scenario you will have too much pressure do to detonation.

As far as the action goes I would have it checked out. If it gets a good bill of health I would get a new bolt and go on about my rat kill'in. By the way I have only been married once.

Shawn

You don't really shoot a Mod,98 that you put $2500.00 into, do you?

That action may now be suffering from set back as mine was after my last kaa-booom. It well may be safe to shoot with the new bolt I have in it, but if a load approaches 50K that bolt handle sure gets hard to lift.

$2500.00 sure is a lot of pork chops, Snider. roger

no doubt. if he had any clue that it was going to blow the second time, he would not have allowed anyone to be near. i was with him right before it blew and we were discussing the rifle and the fact he had not fired it in a while. i walked inside to clean my rifle and boom. the round sounded mighty close and not that down range echo you usually hear. i hate i brought this topic up so hes left out to be criticized. he's as safe as they come. hes mighty meticulous with how he loads because of his lab procedures follows at work. i gave the wrong impression about what challenges him. he's definitely not afraid of the rifle and the fact that it'll kill him. neither bother him or concern him. he's not unsafe or lax in his approach to things. he is a little odd on how he views things in relation to the norm but its because of his life. that we'll never change. if he read these posts he'd only laugh at us all and not in a way thats portraying disrespect to us or our way of thinking. he'd shrug and continue on. our range is at his house and he has a shop. the time span between blow ups was about 21 months. you can bet that no-one will be present on the next firing. we all were in his shop when it blew this last time. all the old rounds were destroyed. there wasn't but 5 left out of 20 that had not been fired. its odd the cases show little if any pressure sign's. the primers were a little flat but no tight bolt lift or any of the normal signs. just a weird set of things that you just couldn't predict. we talked about the odds of it blowing twice given what we knew about the rifle. he fired the gun right after the first blow up and hasn't fired it in 21 months. it just wasn't expected especially after all the work that had been done on it to repair it from the first blow. new bolt, new barrel, new bolt keeper and new stock. as i said the action was never damaged. either time. we'll know soon. the smith knowing the circumstances will take all the necessary precautions to eliminate the third time. thanks to all!

If he's still got some of that ammo, how about having it pressure tested?

Snider, if your friend wants to continue to shoot that rifle, good for him. But please tell me that he is going to do it by himself out in the middle of a field somewhere. It's one thing that he has made the decision to take the risk of hurting himself by shooting that rifle. I have no problem with that. However, don't let him make that decision for someone else that may be sitting or standing near him while at the range. I would hate to see an innocent, fellow shooter get hurt when it could have easily been prevented.

Perhaps the next time he shoots it, he should use an old tire and a string and get behind a tree.

There is a possiblity that this was an "8x57J" rifle.
Their bore is .318 as opposed to .323

you wouldn't throw 2500.00 dollars in the garden would you? i do not think it'll make for better tomatoes. they would look good growing around that mauser. the rifle ain't the problem. factory rounds and his reloads shot all day long. when the westfield rounds were fired, then the problem started. the info on the metal tests from the first blow lead us to the bolt being brittle and not to the rounds. the bolt was changed and it held this last time as did everything else. we now know the culprit. lucky for him and but unfortunate. if it blows the third time then it blows. the rifle will be tested again with the gunsmith in his test range under safe conditions.

bartsche: im beginning to wonder about the stresses that action has been under. i discussed that with him and he said the gunsmith was checking all that out and had. gunsmith said it was fine. the guy has seen a lot of rifles in his shop over 40 plus years. hes done some great work for us all. i quess with a new bolt and a practically new shilen barrel plus a new bolt stop he'll feel good about it. the smith took it apart after the last blow and said when he was done it'll be fine. he was pretty confident with what he saw. what caused yours to blow?

Snider, your friend may be a chemist, etc, etc, etc but he needs to learn that stupidity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results each time.
Immediately after the POS blew up the first time, it would have become a very ugly tomato stake were it mine.
You might want to tell him that shooting a rifle after it blows up isn't like getting back on a horse after he throws you.

bluetick: the gunsmith thats repairing the rifle has the same feeling about the powder that you have. the action was given a clean bill of health last time and this time. the bolt will need to be replaced. those fn mauser's are some tough actions. this last 98 bolt withstood a lot. the case volume of powder was better than 75%. i found the name of the company/people who loaded the ammo. westfield ammunition. by what you said it leads me to believe it was the wrong powder. i had read some where about too little powder and low pressure was a problem. thanks for clearing that up. your answer sounds more logical. the rifle was bought from an estate auction by a gun collecting group. never fired. my friend bought the gun. it blew up the first time because the bolt failed. the rifle was given a new bolt and barrel. no harm to the action. the cartridge blew this time. no reason to feel anyone was in danger either time or he would have never fired the gun. the next time there will be the same understanding. the bolt will be replaced and the action gone over carefully. the stock will be replaced and the old barrel put back on. it will be test fired by the smith in a safe environment just as before. still no reason to feel there's a problem. bluetick,im quessing from your call sign your a dog man. maybe? i myself, married once and still married. she loves buying me guns. great women. as for the rest of you, well i hate to say it, but you use this forum to make yourself feel adequate and thats sad. when you judge another man your only judging yourself. judgement lies at the door of the judge. i do not know your motives for your posts so i apologize if i offend unjustly. use this forum as it was intended. you neither know the man or his intent. thanks bluetick for your information. it will be shared.