Silly, dumb and dangerous!

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Well they say there is no dumb question but here goes.

What is a set up round getting built with primerless brass?

I'm missing it somehow. Might be a senior moment.
 
Folks who charge a case and seat a bullet every time are running on borrowed time!
Click to expand...

Could someone expound on this for me? It would seem that the safest way to load would be to charge a case, inspect it and then seat a bullet. That way there is no chance of being distracted or missing a case while checking a full loading block.

I use a chargemaster to load rifle rounds and will charge a case and then seat the bullet and place the completed round in the box while the next charge is being thrown.

I cant see how this is anything short of fool proof (as the charged case never leaves my hand untill it is in the press with a bullet on top.

What am I missing?

Edit: rcmodel, about once every 3 years I manage to send a Philips head driver tip right though my thumbnail. Mine will grow back in about 4 months but I am pretty young (32) so maybe that has something to do with it.
 
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Man alive after the 6th year I'd stay FAR away from phillips head drivers and switch to sq. head. Mobile home and the RV Industry learned that long ago.

Believe me if you can miss a loaded case in a loading block the next step is to give up reloading. An empty or light charge "even a 45 ACP" sticks out like a sore thumb. Pun intended.
 
My scariest goof was also seating a bullet in an uncharged case (and then "firing" it). At the time I was charging and seating each case individually. Afterwards I changed to charging the batch and inspecting powder level before seating.

Bunnielab, I'd say you could make it work either way but the first way requires you remain focused for a longer period. Fifty checks and 50 chances for a lapse, versus one. Scanning all cases in the block should make it easier to spot light or heavy charges too.

If there's a downside to charging the whole batch first, I guess it's that the charged cases are open longer and something could find it's way in...more powder perhaps. There's always something to watch out for.
 
Although this is not the forum for it (is there a driver tip enthusiast forum out there somewhere?) I will state that for "normal" stuff the square drive is better but if you have to drive at a weird angle or in a cramped space Phillips wins every time. Most of my accidents have involved me hanging off a ladder or jammed into a space clearly too small for me. I work in the theatre so I am always having to do stuff that a sane carpenter would never attempt.

To drag this back on topic I used to occasionally de-prime live primers if they had been seated sideways or upside down. I was always really "careful" and tried to be gentle. Then one day I brought a primer to work and set it off by placing it on the floor and dropping a metal brick on it. To see how loud it would be if I accidentally set one off you understand.

That pretty much cured me of decapping live primers. There was a damm hole (small, but still a hole) in the cement floor.
 
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Someone I know really well was loading his favorite load for a Remington 700 6.5x55 Swede: A Nosler 125 Partition with 48.0 gr VV N-160, which is fairly close to maximum. Going from memory he loaded a few rounds but instead of using N-160 he mistakenly substituted 48.0 gr of N-140. Quickload calculates that load to produce over 80,000 PSI. The sound of the shot was different but he couldn't really say if it was louder than normal. He had to pound on the bolt with a block of wood to get it open. There was no primer at all in the primer pocket, the headstamp was unreadable and smoke slowly drifted out of the barrel and action. He was shooting through a chronograph and the velocity was 3058 fps, more than 200 fps faster than the correct loading.

He never, never ever loads from memory any more.
 
bunnielab You can deprime live primers all day long by just using common sense. Remember primers are set off by impace not by pressure. To deprime just use gentle pressure and remember the case is contained in the shell holder and sizing die and the power of the compound isn't enough to blow anything up. For safety sake tho whenever reloading wear shooting glasses. Don't forget them when shooting either.

Thats supposed to be safety glasses.
 
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I thought I made a mistake once, but I was mistaken.

I can only remember 2 mistakes. Soon after starting to reload, was using steel dies so I had to lube pistol cases. I poured too much of the old RCBS case lube on the lube pad (looks like a stamp pad) and wound up contaminating the powder in one round. It squibed on me and I had a stuck bullet in the barrel and some oily looking powder behind it.

The other one being too gentle when priming and was not seating the primer to the bottom of the pocket as I was worried about "crushing" the primer like they warned against in the loading manual. They all went off after the 2nd hammer strike. Didn't have the internet then, we didn't even have PC's then, so I had to get help the old fashioned way, face to face with the old guy who owned the the gun store in town.

Other mistakes over the years where caught before completely assembling the rounds, like accidentally using large rifle primers in .45 acp cases and other things that should be noticed and corrected by a careful reloader using proper QA before completing the round.
 
bunnielab - when I was a super-noob I did the 'primer test' too, but in our shop. We had a dented .270 round and had a friend pull it for us (didn't have a puller at the time). After dressing in my finest bombproof garb (a welding coat, gloves and safety glasses) I managed to very gently back out the live primer with my lee loader depriming rod. So, now we have 1 live primer just laying around. My dad was standing there and I said: 'shall we find out how powerful a primer is?' to which the reply was :scrutiny: I re-outfitted, grabbed a hammer and laid the primer on the concrete floor. Smac-BANG! My ears rang for about 5 minutes. Wasn't expecting it to be that loud. The next look from my dad was :eek: We looked at the floor, there was a crater in the shape of the primer, with the anvil embedded in the concrete.

Luckily, no one was hurt, and I got a valuable lesson on why to use primercide (WD-40) before depriming live rounds.

The only other boner move so far was catching my thumb in the press.
 
You aren't listening. Impact is what sets off a primer. Impact like a hammer blow. Impact like droping a brick on it. Impact get it.

Pressure as in shoving, pushing, gently does not set off a primer.

How often do you think your gun would go off if when you pulled the trigger the firing gently pushed against the primer?

I've pulled a few thousand primers and have yet to have one go off PUSHING it out.
 
the most dangerous mistake i have made was not paying very close attention to the reloading manual. there had been several loads using the same powder (for reduced loads), the next page had a load i decided to try, but i did not notice that the powder was different. big suprise when i touched it off! way over pressure! i knew there was a problem the split second it took when it fired. when i tried to open the bolt, it was hard. i quit shooting went home and tried to figure out what went wrong. i had a gunsmith check the gun, wich thankfully was fine. it took me a while to figure out what went wrong, but it is a lesson i will not forget!
 
Greetings,

Guys, I think I beat you all with making a primer going off.

It was July 1980 (Yes I remember clearly), I was young and stupid (13 years old) with some other friends very stupid. In that time, nails gun were using mostly blank type small cartridgesin brass. It was almost like wyou pick up a 380 case and crimp the mouth. Those were held by 20 in a plastic loader (like a belt chain, but straight) There was a lot of residential construction going around. We put our hands on some that were still not used.

We then found a nice crack in the concrete boardwalk, lined up SIDE BY SIDE 6 of them in the crack, picked up a hammer and my friend hit the first one while we were standing around.

They all went off

I ended up with a piece of brass in my tight and arm, my friend beside me got one in the foreheah, one other friend got a few srapnells in the chest AND the guy who used the hammer ended up with no arm at all.

Lucky us, only me had to go to the hospital because it was too deep in my leg. My 2 other friends were able to pull out the fragments with their fingers.

-----
Another stupid thing we did a lot was to put LOADED 12 gauge shells through a cord of wood and shoot them from 30 feet with our pellets guns. I wonder how we survived those shooting sessions...LOL

Thank you
 
One time, I was loading "warm" 44 specials to shoot in a Ruger Super Blackhawk. The load was 7.5 gr of Unique behind a 240 gr cast bullet. This was the first time I was using a new scale that I had just bought. The new scale had 10 gr markings not 5 gr markings as my old scale therefore I loaded 12.5 gr of Unique. The first shot told me something was wrong the cylinder would not rotate, I had to beat it out with a stick. The Super Blackhawk was fine. I never used that scale again.

I always check my charged cases with a flashlight to insure that there are no uncharged or double charged cases. (This does not help if you screw up the powder charge, as above.) Also I never put my powder scale away until all the bullets have been seated. Invariablely I will drop a case or knock one over spilling the powder.
 
Back about 8 yrs ago when I first setup my machine and started reloading on my own, I had left 2 jugs of powder on the bench and had run out of components, so the reloader sat for a couple weeks. When I came back, I couldn't recall what powder I was loading with. Fortunately, one of the jugs was Red Dot, and that's what was in the hopper, so it was easy to figure out. From that day since, whenever I switch to a new powder, a 3x5 card with the *exact* powder indicated is put into the hopper first. The powder flows right by the card with no issues, and I always know whats in the hopper. When I empty the hopper, the card is removed. I would not risk trying to remember what's in the hopper for 30 seconds, the card goes in first.

The reason for the *exact* powder is surplus IMR4895 can be different than a jug of commercial IMR4895.
 
I did make a mstake just recently : overloaded a .38Spl/158 gr LSWC non+P combination.
Sorry, but I still can't say what exactly went wrong

I don't think it was a double charge since an actual 2x the amount of powder I (thought I) was using would have meant over-max for a .357 Mag case, let alone a .38, and I doubt my .38 Sp revolver would have stood it the way it did.

That was the first time I had anything bad happen in 20 years of reloading.
 
Stupidist thing I've ever done?

Working up a .357mag load until I broke the frame lock on a Taurus 66 revolver.

Not so brightest thing I've tried? Experament with various small pistol primers, but no powder charge, to see which would push a swc all the way out 4" and 6" barrels.

-Steve
 
I have to start some where so this will be my first post on THR.. Some boards have a forum just for newbie introductions, I dont see one here. Ive been reloading for about a year now after taking 25 years off from it. The first few batches I had 2 high primers that didnt ignite. Since then I have learned the "feel" of a seating primer and have not had any problems since. The worst mistake I made was mis adjusting the crimp on some .308s and crushed the shoulder slighty on about 5 rounds. Quick eyeball inspection didnt catch the slighty misformed cases. At the range the first one I came across didnt chamber completely and got stuck. I knocked it out and didnt take long to find the rest. Other than that I have never had a squib load or a double charge.
 
If you are using a single stage press every time you load a tray full of shells put the tray under good light and go left to right with every row like you're reading. I always double check powder levels are same as well as powder being in each one. Be safe always.
 
Be sure to check the weight of your powder charge twice, then if it is right on, lock down the powder dispenser so that it "should" stay on track. Next, be SURE to re-weigh your powder load at least every ten charges to make sure that your load is not creeping to a higher, unsafe level. BE SAFE and you will enjoy reloading and, thus shooting, your reloads for a really long time.

Dave :neener:
 
Stupidest thing I ever did was to make up a bunch of .38 Special wadcutter loads, then leave the top of the plastic box off.
Later, I'm spraying WD-40 on a firearm and noticed that the spray is landing all over the backs of my .38 ammo, in the box.
Oh well ... no harm done. So I thought!
Darned WD-40 crept in around the primers, over the space of a few days, and deadened about half of the primers.
It's not easy pulling a hard-crimped wadcutter bullet. I pounded the inertia hammer and still couldn't get most of them pulled.
Ended up deep-sixing them at Badger Lake near Cheney, Washington, next time I went fishing.
Badger's a deep, narrow lake. Never seen a scuba diver there, so I figured they'd never be found or recovered. That was 25 years ago or so. They're probably six inches under the mud by now.

I haven't used WD-40 since. Not only will it deaden primers, it turns to a hard, sticky varnish over time. Terrible stuff. It will gum up car locks, padlocks and anything else you use it on.
For firearms I use any of the light oils. For locks I use silicone spray.
 

  • You can load .45 Colt rounds so light that the huge airspace allows delayed ignition occasionally;

  • In trying to load ultra light loads for my wife - didn't realize that relaoding manuals minimum loads listed can be just as important as watching maximum loads... erratic ignition and you need to remember your wife needs to feel her handgun is reliable... too light reloads that are erratic can shake her faith in her handgun being reliable;

  • Learned the hard way that there is some new brass with headstamping "NT" (stands for "Non-Toxic")... these are the same as regular .45 ACP cases, except they have small pistol primers. When you are running a progressive press with an auto-casefeeder, if you are cranking at a quick pace you will detonate the large pistol primer when it attempts to force it in the small primter pocket;

  • Youthful shortcut says that if a progressive press misses a primer on an otherwise fully loaded round, it might tempting to attempt to prime the fully charged case with bullet seated... this is a very dangerous roulette game that I fortunately wised up before losing a hand;

  • When you reload - then reload only... don't watch TV, don't chit-chat, reloading is very safe with 100% of your attention;

  • Always label your relaods... if you load 10 or 1,000, put a label on the batch so you know what you are firing later;

  • Don't shoot someone else reloads unless you trust them with your life (because you are);

  • Don't share your reloads, if you want to help a fellow shooter, offer to let him use your equipment and learn, give him manuals to read so that he can enjoy loading his own;

  • Only one type of powder/can on a relaoding bench at a time;

  • Don't buy into the "they always list loads that are less than maximum and it won't hurt to go a little higher"... volume changes pressures, fluid dynamics aren't for the hobbyist;

  • Stupid hurts.
 
Thanks to everyone who took the time to share their friends and their personal "mishaps in reloading". It makes for a great read and will improve noobs attention to detail.
 
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