Hangfires?

Never had a hangfire, but I have had plenty of FTF. Had a particularly bad case of Gun Club #8s.

It's quite interesting standing there aiming downrange long after the clay has hit the ground, wondering when or if it's gonna go off. All the while 4+ other guys staring at me. I am never sure how long to wait before clearing the round.

yes, terrified the crap out of me. While shooting some 8mm turkish surplus, pulled the trigger, no fire. Figured it was a FTF but I kept the round down range, probably 3 seconds went buy and I was about to go for the bolt when BOOOM!!! Round went off. I wasn't quite ready for the recoil and got a good sore shoulder. ALWAYS wait a minimum of 15 seconds when a round fails to go boom when you pull the trigger.

Yep. I got some really old 7.62x25mm ammo on stripper clips and was firing them through a CZ-52. Every few rounds one would hang for up to about half or two thirds of a second before lighting off. I quit after a couple of clips.

Yep. "Grandpa surplus" 12 guage. Went off just a couple seconds after the trigger pull. Put the rest of the box on the shelf as a keepsake.

I had some turk surplus 8mm that i got a few hangfires with. They would go off sbout 10 seconds later.
Many years ago me & my brother got a bad can of percussion caps. They would take 30 seconds or longer to go off. He pulled the trigger on his 12ga and it went click, about 45 seconds lster he lowered it from his shoulder & boom. The barrel came up & hit him in the face

Hangfires? Yes, in my early days of reloading.
Just a couple of "snap/kabooms" taught me to clean primer pockets carefully.

Saw a guy at the range have a hangfire. He had enough time to say "What the...?" pull the rifle off his shoulder and tilt it to look at the action when BOOM! It was a bolt action .308, smacked him pretty hard. I learned to respect the rules about hangfires after seeing that!

Yea I have had them, and still do every once in awhile. Mostly with old POF or RG .303 British and I have had a few with old 8mm. Most is click bang with the bang happening pretty fast after the click but a couple waited a second or two before they went bang.

Its the primers in the rounds, I pulled the bullets on a few rounds of the .303 and pulled the cordite out and chambered and fired the empty cases. The primers kind of fizzled instead of going off with a authoritative pop like they should.

I've never PERSONALLY experienced it, but one of my favorite stories to tell at the range is when a friend of mine was shooting a 375 H&H over the hood of his truck. He pulled the trigger, and no bang. He is experienced with firearms, so luckily he didn't go swinging the rifle around. A "short" 5 seconds later, the monster 375 went off, and was an inch away from opening the car's engin block like a can opener.

It's a good story, but I'm glad it didn't happen to me!

Yes and in two firearms. The first was in my 35 Whelen.

The 35 Whelen has a very slight shoulder and I think that cushions the firing pin blow.

I bought this M1903 rifle action made into a 35 Whelen with a new stock and new barrel. I fireformed the cases and made sure when resizing these cases that they were sized exactly chamber length. I took the firing pin mechanism out, the bolt handle dropped easy and there was no back and forth bolt movement.

In cold weather, particularly with the ball powder AA2520, I got hangfires. I do not remember all the details of the malfunctions, but I do remember an unusual delayed recoil. It was as if combustion was taking time to build.

Before the next trip I changed out the mainspring, firing pin tip, and used Fed210 primers, the most sensitive on the market. My loads were only stick powders only. Previously I had slight hangfires with some stick powders, but with the primer and mainspring change, and the warmer weather next session, no hangfires.I stopped using AA2520 as I now knew ball powders had issues.



I also had hangfires and squibs with a well used M586. The previous owner had shot something like 50,000 rounds of 38 Special rounds for PPC practice. It is an unusually accurate revolver. All his loads were 148 LWC and federal primers. I was using 158 12.0 grains AA#9 WSP primers and again, it was cold.

I had hangfires and squibs. Pictured is one of the squibs that lodged itself in the barrel throat. It took a long shafted screwdriver and a block of wood to knock the thing back into the case. As you can see the primer looks well hit. There was powder lodged against the base of the bullet, it had a clumped crunchy texture.

Again it was a case of ball powder, cold weather and worn out mainspring. I replaced the mainspring and at the next session, which was only about five degrees warmer, no hangfires or squibs.

Tap rack bang.

Had some with surplus 7.62x25 'subgun' ammo. About two seconds between the click and bang.

I did and mine were some POF 303 BRIT ammo from the 40's. A click and about a half second later POW.

I too had some short hangfires with surplus 303 British. The headstamp was GB, early 1950s. There wasn't more than 1/4 of a second delay, but you could notice it on some of them. I still have most of that ammo, I'll probably finish it off shooting stuff offhand at close range. I also had one dud with it. That was kind of scary after all of the short hangfires. That's when I came to love that you can recock a Lee-Enfield without opening the bolt; I think I retried that round 3 times before I felt confident opening the action. That GB ammo came on the worst stripper clips too. They had a really rough phosphate type finish and you could maybe strip one round off of them using them normally.

Yes. Had a 22lr hangfire with Federal automatch ammo. As the temperature dropped through 32 degrees, my groups got lower and lower. Several times I was convinced I had squibs, but bore punches indicated a clean bore. Then the hangfire. I was done. I've never shot another round of that stuff. It is unnerving, even with a .22.

Only hangfire I've ever had in my life.

one of my favorite stories to tell at the range is when a friend of mine was shooting a 375 H&H over the hood of his truck. He pulled the trigger, and no bang. He is experienced with firearms, so luckily he didn't go swinging the rifle around. A "short" 5 seconds later, the monster 375 went off, and was an inch away from opening the car's engin block like a can opener.

Click to expand...

Hmmmm? A short 5 seconds and it went off, experienced?........

Like I mentioned in the light primer thread I have had a few hangfires. My most recent was on a Kel-Tec P3AT firing WWB. The round fired almost a full second after the trigger went back to its rest position. Almost unnoticeable because of the timing but was very obvious on the video.

I have had more hangfires on the M249 shooting old 5.56 ammo.

When I first started shooting I bought some 357 mag cartridges out of a jar in a mom and pop sporting goods store for something like 5 cents each. I think I maybe bought 12.

When I fired them, two were hangfires. I pulled the trigger. The hammer dropped. There was something of a "sizzle." After a moment/second/lifetime the round went off.

I'm glad that I didn't go ahead, after the "sizzle" started but before the round ignited, and pull the trigger/rotate the cylinder.

I never asked the mom and pop, but I expect those loose rounds they were selling in that jar were probably reloads made by someone who didn't know what they were doing.

Once, 7 or 8 years ago when I was still fairly new to firearms. A friend and I were shooting his new AK47 type firearm. We were standing a few feet apart and he was shooting it and 'click' nothing happned, but he new it wasn't empty. Since he knew less about guns than I did he started to hand me the gun and it went off! Fortunately we were both very safety minded and he had the gun pointed downrange, though the bullet hit the ground a few yards in front of us. It definitely rated a ten on the brown pants index. It was also a valuable lesson I'll never forget. We were shooting Wolf at the time. I still shoot wolf in my SKS and have never had it happen again.

The few I had were with WWII surplus .303 British and the delay was no more than half a second. Sort of a click BANG.

I always have been weary of ejecting misfires. Once the primer is dented it could become hyper-sensitive and the jolt of extracting the round could be enough to set it off. I know someone who had a .45/70 case explode upon ejection. We have all read the warning:

In case of a misfire keep the firearm pointed in a safe direction for 30 seconds and carefully unload AVOIDING EXPOSURE TO THE BREECH.

Seen quite a few, but the only ones that had a real delay was as others have mentioned 8mm Turkish stuff. Everything else was just enough delay to hear the hammer drop separate from the ignition. That turkish stuff took between 3 and 15 seconds to go off if it went at all.

Took my brothers Remington 700, in 30-06, to the range. Pulled the trigger, nothing. About 5 seconds later, BOOM. Scared the s*** out of me. I ejected the spent case and loaded another round. Pulled the trigger and again nothing for about 5 seconds. Them BOOM again. I quit shooting that rifle for the day. I took the rifle home and took it apart. It appeared the bolt was filthy and the firing pin was hanging up on crud. After a few seconds, the spring tension would win out over the crud and the firing pin would fly forward. Cleaned the cra* out of the bolt and it shoots just fine.