jfh
Member.
"...are you sure there's no possibility that you doublecharged it?"
You're not being an ass by questioning this; a double-charged case is certainly the most-likely speculative cause.
1. I think I could have overcharged the case--but I do think that it is extremely unlikely. The rounds were produced on a auto-indexing progressive (Pro 1000), minimizing the liklihood of a double-charged case.
All the remaining rounds in the magazine were disassembled by Winchester and found to be (nominally) the 4.9-gr. 231 charge.
Keep in mind that this charge level is a (relatively-) low-pressure 10mm round. I had developed it because it was very accurate, because the brass lasted far longer than full-house rounds (which I really don't seek to shoot), because it made Major, and because it was economical to build. Of course, 9.8 grains of 231 would blow a gun, of that I have no doubt; I just think it's very unlikely that amount of powder was in the case.
2. The brass were used Starline, but carefully inspected, etc., and were (probably) used less that five times (This was ten years ago, so without digging out the file, details are hazy.)
3. This occurred about the height of the (early) questioning of Glock kaBooms--before Internet forums allowed easy and broad information exchange, so there is no documentation of a sorts available to the public.
Generally, at that time, there was ongoing discussion of the ka-Boom problem--it was being found in police 17s, with lead reloads, but those generally seemed to be the squib/bulged barrel routine. I talked to the St. Paul PD armorer about it (St. Paul was an early adopter of Glocks)--and he and I reached a (subjective) conclusion that it could well be issues of a poorly-finished barrel leading up.
That conclusion is why I recommend 500 rounds or so of barrel burnishing.
Other than it being a disagreeable incident, the only disappointing issue was Glock's non-response: After hearing the word reload, the receptionist didn't even put me through to Customer Service (although she did offer her personal 'relief' that I wasn't seriously injured). The only long-term cost was a general dislike of Glocks on my part--I sold my others (19, 17L), and settled in on 1911-type semiautos.
Enough digression--we shouldn't hi-jack this thread.
Jim H.