I’m really Dumb!

[Jamie D Van Roekel]

I’ve done lots of dumb things in this life, but today I did one right up at the top of the pile.

I wanted to get a rifle in the truck because the crops are starting to come out and we will start seeing some coyotes and coons and such. So I grabbed a 30-06 out of the rack and thought I would take a couple quick shots to check zero. I didn’t see where the first shot hit, but there were some weeds in front of the target so I tried another. Still didn’t see anything. So down to the target I walk. On the way I thought I saw where a bullet had hit the ground but thought I must be mistaken. I get to the target and no holes. I thought maybe I had changed scopes from a different rifle and never re-zeroed. So went to about 30 yards and took a shot. The hole was a couple feet high. I remembered the spot in the ground and thought the scope may be loose. Felt everything and it seemed tight. While I was thinking I was rolling a round in my hand. I got a sick feeling. I looked at the round. It was a 270.

The rifle had a sleeve on the stock with ammo in it. I looked and there were 2 more 270 rounds and the rest were 30-06. I know what happened. When I took the rifle out of the truck last fall I filled the sleeve up and thought it was a 270 not a 30-06. WOW!!!

Did I do any damage to the rifle?

 

[Red Leg]

Since your hands seem to still be attached, probably not. We all do something like that sometime.

 

[Tra3]

I sent a .270 win down a 7 mm Rem mag barrel once (kimber rifle). There was quite a bit of gas that came out the ports on the side of the barrel since the case split. The gun never showed a sign of problems and shot just fine after that. Oh, I was at the range with my hunting buddies. At least there was someone to tease me (after it was clear that the rifle was ok!)
I am now much more careful, and double and triple check when I set up and take down at the range.

 

[dailordasailor]

I've dont that... Twice. All good. 30-06 down a 300wm and 243 down a 30-06. Had checked by gunsmith and no issues..

Both were at range and youd think i would learn first time but years apart i had ammo all over the table of the same brand/color and grabbed wrong stuff... 30-06 hit pretty damn close at 100yds in the 300wm but the casing split in half which is only reason i noticed.

 

[sestoppelman]

.270 in a .30-06 chamber just makes the brass look funny....
As an aside that is precisely why Remington pushed the shoulder forward on the .280 Rem: so it wouldn't chamber in the .270 or '06.

 

[Frederik]

You are lucky had a friend who did the opposite on a hunt in Namibia he fired a 30-06 in a 270 anyway he had some plastic surgery done after that on his face but was lucky to be alive.

 

[Jamie D Van Roekel]

You are lucky had a friend who did the opposite on a hunt in Namibia he fired a 30-06 in a 270 anyway he had some plastic surgery done after that on his face but was lucky to be alive.

God sometimes teaches us a lesson. The first thing I thought of was it could have been the other way. (I didn’t know if it would chamber), now I will be more careful.

 

[Frederik]

God sometimes teaches us a lesson. The first thing I thought of was it could have been the other way. (I didn’t know if it would chamber), now I will be more careful.

Jamie, I got it wrong just phoned him it was a short 308 win round that ended up in a 25-06 chamber. OUCH!!!!

 

[Hunter4752001]

I've done a similar thing by firing 44 Mag in a 454 Casull. Doh! Ruined the cases but no damage to the gun or me.

270 in a 30-06 shouldn't have much effect on the rifle. The unsupported neck will release the projectile which in turn will rattle down the barrel. Pressure will be very low because its effectively vented around the projie. If you had a suppressor fitted then you would have done serious damage as the bullet yawed, pitched and bounced its way through.

I gather this was one of the reasons why the 450 Marlin was made with a thicker belt than the standard H&H design.

 

[CBH Australia]

You are lucky had a friend who did the opposite on a hunt in Namibia he fired a 30-06 in a 270 anyway he had some plastic surgery done after that on his face but was lucky to be alive.

Jamie, I got it wrong just phoned him it was a short 308 win round that ended up in a 25-06 chamber. OUCH!!!!

Yeah, that could be a problem,

Hell he is lucky,

I don't tell many people I put petrol in my Diesel car but in a hurry at the servo and didn't know till the car started playing up down the road.

 

[Cam Moon]

Many years ago I heard a story from a gent who was a firearms safety instructor about someone inadvertently firing a .270 from a 30-06. No certainty of the truth of it, but stranger things have happened.
The incident he spoke of was a firearms owner was awoken from his sleep by a bear outside his home. He quickly grabbed a rifle and some ammo and went outside. He fired at the bear, and it ran off. Apparently he realized something was wrong when he shot, and with a quick check he realized his error. (.270 cartridge in his 30-06 rifle) He didn't see any immediate damage to the rifle, and set it aside and went back to bed with plans to do a more thorough examination the following day. Well, that morning he woke with a bit of a headache, and as the day continued, it got continually worse. He didn't feel well enough to examine it, but did at least sort his ammunition out so as to not repeat the same mistake. A week later his headache persisted and he still hadn't checked his rifle. A week later he was in the hospital. His headache was relentless and the Dr.'s were running tests. He went downhill in a hurry, but they did find the problem. He had a tiny piece of brass embedded in his brain. It was festering and he had a significant amount of swelling. Had they not discovered it, he would have died. Apparently when the .270 brass expanded and ruptured the end of the casing, this tiny little piece made it's way out of the chamber and struck him in the eye. It went clean through his eye and lodged in his brain. He didn't feel a thing at the time. When he realized his mistake he felt quite fortunate that he didn't get hurt and went back to bed. Little did he know that within a couple of weeks he'd be at death's door fighting for his life. Accidents happen all the time, but sometimes incidents occur that are completely avoidable. I believe that all of his ammo is now all separated and clearly marked. With some things we can never be too careful.

 

[CoElkHunter]

Yeah, that could be a problem,

Hell he is lucky,

I don't tell many people I put petrol in my Diesel car but in a hurry at the servo and didn't know till the car started playing up down the road.

Your lucky the engine didn’t blow up?

 

[CoElkHunter]

I’ve shot a 9mm out of a .40 S&W Glock. I knew something was amiss with the shot but no issues occurred. We were night shooting a course and reloading in the dark from two coffee cans which supposedly had 9mm in one and .40 in the other. Wrong!

 

[Wade J VanGinkel]

I've fired a .243 out of a 270.
No ill affects other than than feeling of stupidity.

 

[rdog]

Hunting pigs in a wheat crop one night with my 6.5x55 when i loaded the rifle i realized i had my sons 7x57 ammo with me it would not chamber, & drove 20 km back to camp for
correct ammo seen a lot of pigs but could not shoot them. hunting with a friend i was in
the Army with he had a 257 Roberts & a 303/25 he carried his ammo in a plastic bucket
mixed to together we often laughed about his " bucket of bullets"

 

[Forrest Halley]

I've done a similar thing by firing 44 Mag in a 454 Casull. Doh! Ruined the cases but no damage to the gun or me.

Did you know that a .50 AE desert eagle can almost lock up with a .44 magnum ahead of the shell in the chamber? The rim is just thick enough so that the hammer won't fall, but everything looks good on the outside. I had one handed to me at the start of a shooting session and it simply wouldn't fire. Ten pounds of trigger squeeze and still nothing. Upon closer examination the .44 magnum round popped out right behind the .50 AE round. That was something alright.

Another time someone tried to get a .30-06 to fire out of a 8x57. The bolt would not close and when asked to look at it I soon discovered this issue. When I extracted the round it was blatantly obvious to me the difference in rounds, but the military ammunition wasn't headstamped by caliber so an errant user could easily make that mistake.

This is why I load rounds into guns I shoot.

 

[JimP]

I think that sooner or later for those of us who shoot multiple calibers and or gauges will have this problem.

I was driving down a dirt road one time when some grouse crossed it in front of me. I grabbed my 12 ga and some shells and jumped out of the truck. I went to work the action of the shotgun and it jammed up on me. It took me a couple of minutes to clear the jam and I headed off after the grouse. When I got back to the truck I picked up the shell that had jammed. It was a 16 ga shell.

Now I have never owned a 16 ga, and only know of one other person who does and we hadn't been hunting together for over 30 years, so where did that shell come from? I went through the rest of the ones that were in that bag and didn't find another one.

Just on a side note, I hadn't hunted with that 12 ga in quite a while. When I am after waterfowl I am packing my 10 ga and when I was after upland game it was my 20.

 

[Randy F]

Sure glad you’re ok. Lesson learned. You’re not alone on that one. I nearly did the same thing but caught myself.

 

[CoElkHunter]

Keep your 12 and 20ga choke tubes separated also. This is a modified 20ga tube now “welded” inside a modified 12ga tube after I fired two rounds on a sporting clays course with my Remington 11-87. Somehow the 20ga tube stuck inside the 12ga tube when I took the 12ga tube out of the side pocket of my soft gun case. I had both 20 and 12ga tubes in the pocket. No more! Good thing shotguns have low pressure rounds because no damage was done.

 

[sgt_zim]

good friend of mine put a 308 through his 300WSM. Took a gunsmith to fix that.

I've put 7mm-08 down a Mosin Nagant. No effect on the rifle.