Have you ever had a gun break at the range?

[BLACKHAWKNJ]

M 4" S&W M-19 locked up on me 40 years ago, needed a gunsmith for that. The extractor on my High Standard Victor broke in a range session-after 48 years.

 

[Seedy Character]

EVERY GUN FUNCTIONED THE ROUND BEFORE THE ONE WHERE IT BROKE.


IT HAPPENS

Not a matter of IF, but WHEN.

 

[lsudave]

Have you ever had a gun break while shooting it at the range?

I'm not talking about a simple feeding malfunction (tap, rack, and you're back), I mean something physically breaks and turns your gun into a paperweight until it can be repaired/replaced at a later time.

Yeah. I don't actively hunt, and I'm not "an operator" : so any breakages that occur while firing, happened at the range.

Extractors- 2 handguns, and a rifle. Guns became single shot instead of semiauto. First time it happened, I paid a gunsmith years ago. Learned how easy it actually was, did the others myself.
Star BM- NO, not the firing pin... the captive recoil rod assembly. Was shooting Yavex, which is significantly hotter than your average range ammo. Found the parts online and replaced. Taught me that hotter isn't always the best thing.
Yugo SKS- firing pin disaster, blew back through the bolt assembly. I replaced once with an East German pin, which did the same thing, before getting the aftermarket spring-loaded one that has been good to go ever since.
Norinco Tokarev- that junky tack-on safety, has some tiny screws that aren't very tough. recoil caused one to shear and crumble, the resulting grit locking up the slide. It didn't peen the slide or frame, just jammed it up. This happened very early in my ownership period of guns, I brought it to the gunsmith I knew. He hit it with a rubber mallet until it released, in front of me. Then we figured out why. It was that event that taught me working on guns isn't rocket science, simply a mechanical event.

This has reinforced to me why having a backup gun is a good idea. I just know with my luck, my good'ol reliable primary sidearm will have some random critical part break exactly when I need it most!

Good idea. I don't feel actively threatened enough that I CARRY multiple firearms, but liking to shoot, it's a good idea to have options in case one is down.

I do apply the concept to carry and protection, I choose something ruggedly overbuilt for the cartridge.

 

[CapnMac]

In personally-owned firearms, I've been pretty lucky over all. Had a couple where they were "wrong" out of the box, which is not the situation posed by OP.
Had a Series 70 collet bushing break a finger while on the clock. That was not nice. Mind, one the broken bit was fished out, the pistol still ran.
More 1911 ambi safeties than I care to think about (did not "stop" the gun, just the right side flopped about uselessly).

Just lucky, I guess

 

[theotherwaldo]

I've never had a gun break while I was using it.
I have acquired a number of guns that broke while other people were using them... .

 

[Nasty Canasta]

I have a Erma baby Luger that likes to "spit the bit" loosing the extractor, spring, & plunger. Did this one day out shooting & took some serious persuasion to get it unlocked & repaired. I did a few modifications & so far it's run well-not easy get parts for it anymore & I can endure one more mishap but so far it's hangin' in there-I really like this little gun & have paid more to keep it going than it's probably worth-Guy's gotta have hobby

 

[Mk VII]

Ruger Old Army - broke part of the hand.
Browning HP - broke the shoulder, locking (T-series 1960s gun). Broke/bent the bbl lug (then-current production 1990s gun)

 

[Armored farmer]

A few times.
The worst one was when my firing pin return spring broke on my trapgun during the shootoff for class AA runner-up at the Illinois state shoot at Brittany Shooting Park about 2014ish.
I had already survived a couple rounds and was 50x50 in the shootoff. When it misfired, I was so flustered that I didn't realize what was wrong. I had a spare spring in my shooting bag!

 

[Slamfire]

Yesterday at the range, a shooting bud recalled an experience with a faux British Jungle carbine. He was with an individual who owned one of those No 1 MKIII rifles that had been "converted" to a jungle carbine configuration.

This is a real Jungle Carbine, built built on a lightened No 4 action



The owner of the faux Jungle carbine took a sitting position, aimed, fired one round, and his flash suppressor followed the bullet down range! Bud claimed it was between 25 and 50 yards down range.

Without a front sight, the faux Jungle carbine was done for the day!

We never got the story about this failure, but together, we think we know what happened.

A bud picked this up behind the firing line at our Gun Club





That is a Mauser extractor, minus the extractor hook.

This a 98 Mauser extractor, with the rounded hook, so rounds can be dropped in the chamber and the bolt closed.



Many military Mauser extractors have a square ended hook and that will not snap over a cartridge rim. Those actions are designed to feed from the magazine only, to prevent double feeds.

Not everyone knows about the military extractor that only allows feeding from the magazine. And so what we think, is that someone came to the range with a military Mauser, dropped a round in the chamber, and could not get the bolt to close, at first. Persistence is not a virtue when you don't know what you are doing! Eventually that individual got that bolt closed, maybe with a hammer or block of wood, and broke off the extractor hook. Then, once the bolt was out of the rifle, tore off the extractor in disgust and left it on the ground.

 

[FL-NC]

Yes. I have personal guns that are designated "for range/training use only". I have a Glock 17 that the frame broke on after it hit the 100,000 round mark of +P ammo. My best guestimation is that it is around +50,000 rounds since the factory rebuild/frame replacement. I also have 1 AR that I have worn out 3 barrels on (we are on barrel #4 now) and have just about every other small internal part fail at some point, including the bolt head. When I was in the military, we regularly wore out guns and parts of guns of all types stateside. But all of our weapons were replaced or rebuilt and given a clean bill of health prior to deploying. I just accept this as the cost of training hard, which I do with guns that I won't be utilizing for any application where malfunctions and parts failures will put me in a bad situation.

 

[12Bravo20]

I've melted a M60 barrel or three before.

 

[JJFitch]

I've been a high volume, competition shooter for over 35 years.
firing pins
extractors
magazine catches
sear nose
firing pin spring

Makes for a long ride home in the middle of a match!

Smiles,

 

[Pivot Dr]

Yup! Trigger safety on my XDs broke and jammed into the frame and a Taurus 1911 ejector broke. That was my fault, tried to chamber a round by dropping it into the chamber and releasing the slide rather than loading it out of a magazine. Oh yes, A Rock Island 9mm 1911 broke off the end of the ejector. Still worked fine, didn’t realize it until I was packing up to leave. What’s that little piece of blue steel laying there? If you run 1911s you ought to have extra extractors, ejectors, and spring retainers in your kit. Sooner or later you’ll break or loose one of them.

 

[BlueHeelerFl]

That happened on my first civilian build. I always test them well now.



That's not a hard fix. Find the part, and there are plenty of Marlin 60 disassembly/reassembly videos on You Tube.

This was back in the early 90's. I attempted to replace the buffer myself at the time, and the entire thing popped open sending parts everywhere. I did have the parts forever, but I lost rack of them when I moved everything from the family after my mom broker her hip.

As I said before, I tried taking it to several LGS in NYC to see if they could help me and they basically told me no and to get lost. If one of them had said that they would ship it to Marlin for me for a fee I would have happily done so.

 

[sharkman]

Yep, H&K USP .40 Compact. Broken hammer strut if I remember correctly, turned it into a good club. Glad it didn’t happen on. A two way range!

 

[caribou]

Ive busted plenty of guns while Hunting. 30+ years of gun use and abuse.
I have flat worn out more than a few rifles.
Besides cracking/breaking rifle stocks, Ive had a Rem 870 3-1/2" trigger group break up inside, and had to get another trigger groupe.
An Ortigies .32 broke its firing pin when my daughter Mary was test firing it.
Dropped more than a few magazines while riding.
Dozens of Ruger 10/22 rear sights of Williams folding type. all broke at the hinge.
Pulled out a lot of sling swivels, but never on purpose...LOL!
Most Hunters around here have a collection of broken/used up rifles and shotguns.
The repairs most have can be remarkable, maybe even deserving a collecting niche'.

 

[PapaG]

Several times. On my old TB I've had, on different occasions, broken a trigger part, a firing pin, and an action bar.
Broke some little pi in my 357 Blackhawk.

 

[tarosean]

Lots of Trigger return springs. I blew up a Llama but I wont count that as was my fault

 

[375supermag]

Hi...
Had the ejector rod housing fly off on a couple of single action revolvers.
One was on a .44Magnum Virginian Dragoon that I had bought used a couple of weeks beforehand. The retaining screw just vanished, no idea where recoil sent it. I was just happy to find the ejector spring. Easy cheap repair.
Second was a Ruger BlackHawk, forget which caliber it was. This one was a bit more involved to repair because the screw sheared off. Still not expensive, again I was able to find the ejector spring.

 

[wiscoaster]

....Persistence is not a virtue when you don't know what you are doing! ...

Amen to that!!

 

[SC45-70]

Does this count?

SC45-70

 

[SDGlock23]

Never had one break but I did have a case-head separation years ago shooitng an XDm which took it out of service. Nothing broke but the remainder of the case stuck in there and needed tools I didn't have on me.

 

[vintovka]

View attachment 1058012
Does this count?

SC45-70

Well that's a real sale killer!!!!

 

[vintovka]

Not me but a guy brought in a Remington 597 Viper AR lookalike .22. Said it wouldn't eject. Found that Bolt had tossed extractor, spring and plunger. Was weeks finding spring and plunger and many painful hours fixing it, Finally resorting to assembling bolt in a big plastic bag to keep parts from flying out. When fixed and functioning i told him i never wanted to see it again and advised to get rid of it asap.

 

[Idahou]

VZ 58 - there is spring loaded lever which keeps trigger group pins in place - well, this one didnt (as it seems, somebody it factory just forgott to put it in place). So after few shots, pins shaked out, triger group moved and derailed bolt into frame. It was stuck.
Repaired in shop by hammer

Second time with VZ, this time it was my fault - i was testing new handguard and gas block cleaning, so i didnt lock-tight it. After few shots it shaked zero from on my red dot, but since i lost needed hex key and since red dodt dint had QD...