Rounds that don't fire.

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SomeKid

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Every time I take my Ruger MKIII to the range, I always encounter about 5 shots that simply don't fire. Strikr hits the rim of the .22LR, but it doesn't fire. I wait, and slowly unload the bad round.

Question: Would it be a horrible idea to reinsert the round, and try to fire it again?
 
you know, my local range has a dud box. one day i asked, what do you do with the rounds that fail to fire?

"we take'em out and shoot'em again."

once you're sure it's not a hangfire, have another go at it.
 
How many rounds fired does it take those 5 to occur? The worst incidence rate that I've had was 2-4/100 from some Federal Gold Target which is not the cheapest ammo. Henceforth, I will not buy Federal Rimfire. Maybe switch ammo or see if your gun is clean, enough dirt or manufacturing debris could impede firing pin progress. With CCI, Eley, Wolf, or my cheap favorite Winchester I would not expect 5 failures to fire in several bricks.

As for your question, sure, re-fire away. I wish I had kept my record, one of the Federal shells looked like a wagonwheel, 8 firing pin strikes with no light-off.
 
FTF's -

When I have FTF's on an autoloader - and it seems to always be an autoloader, either my wife's Beretta pistol or her 10/22 Ruger - I put 'em in my over-30-years-old High Standard 9-shooter revolver or my Dad's over-75-years-old Remington bolt action and they always have gone "bang," as far as I can remember.

I'll admit I use them for plinking or for ground squirrels and use fresh loads for anything serious.

GrayBear
 
I've re-shot 'em before -- no problem AFAIK. Unless your gun has a problem with the firing pin, or there's some crud in the receiver preventing the rounds from seating firmly, I'd suspect poor-quality priming in the round. I've had an unacceptably high number of FTFire incidents with Federal Gold Target and Remmington Gold. And this with a very nice, reliable Hammerli .22.

CCI is known for having high quality priming. I use it (usually Standard Velocity) and very rarely have FTF's.
 
I've noticed that rimfire ammo today seems to generate more misfires than it did 25 years ago. IMHO quality control has gone down.
 
They 'spin' the priming compound into the rim of the case. Sometimes a spot or two (or more) doesn't get any priming compound, so when the rim is struck, there is no ignition. Yeah, I go ahead and rechamber the round and fire it off. If I get more than two or three solid firing pin strikes and no ignition, I usually just pitch the round (dud box, if available). I'm not stubborn enough to keep trying to light it off after that. As long as you aren't seeing light strikes (unusually shallow impression from the firing pin), it doesn't matter what the gun is -- it's strictly the priming. If you have a complete strike and no ignition, it wouldn't matter if you'd hit that exact spot with a punch and a 10-pound sledge -- it wouldn't have fired.

If you are getting light strikes, check to see that there isn't anything keeping the round from fully chambering and the action from fully locking (residue, etc.). If that's okay and it persists, check the firing pin channel for residue/obstructions/burrs.

Haven't shot a lot of Federal or Remington, so I'm not sure about the rate of misfires noted in some of the posts. However, I have shot a lot of CCI (mostly MiniMag solids for target and HP for small game) and I've had very few that don't light the first time, which seems to match up with several other people's experiences.
 
I generally have about 1 misfire per 75 rounds. I said 5 just because I cannot recall having fewer than 5 in an outing. I do not confine myself to any brand, having done CCI, Remington, Federal, and others.

I admit it, I go for the cheap stuff for plinking.
 
in a friends p22 walther remington is squat

in a friends p22 walther remington is squat

federal is more reliable

best luck is with any flavor of the cci stuff, according to walther its very ammo picky and the guy we talked to on the phone said stick with cci as it seems the most reliable, also was told the hotter rounds worked better in that particular gun, the subsonic's dont cycle the slide hard enough, but as with any firearm, as it gets used and plenty dirty, the FTF's and misfeeds get more frequent at the end of our shooting session.

Ok, back to the original point of this posting, we have kept all the so called dud rounds and one day went out and just tried firing off these hand chambering one at a time and out of about a 100 or so only had one true dud that we tried to fire off 4 more times before giving up on it and throwing it away, the rest fired off just fine second time around
 
Rounds

SomeKid; I had a MkII for a while and cleaned it after shooting. One day I started getting misfires,took it home a while cleaning noticed a buildup of burnt powder on the bolt face and on the chamber were the bolt slams into it.Make sure those areas ar clean and also the slot on the side of the chamber were the extracter slides into when the bolt is closed. Dirt buildup in these places will cause the bolt to not close fully,cuasing a lite strike of the firing pin. The build up can be only miniscual and cause a problem.
 
Clean guns deliver fewer failures to feed, fire, and extract than dirty. Some ammunition is just a waste of money. Sometimes, you just get a bad round—but paying more doesn't necessarily get you more.
 
Keeping my pistol clean is not an issue. Much as I deplore the way Ruger made the III (PITA to break down, tougher to re-assemble) I still like the little plinker, and like all my guns I do what I can to keep them cleaned and oiled properly.

Thanks for all the responses.
 
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