Most embarrassing or potentially disastrous reloading mistakes that you have made

[JimP]

All you need to do to have a embarrassing moment reloading is to start reloading. I have done most of them.

The first one was not putting any powder into a case that I was fire forming. It was a wildcat round that needed to be made out of a parent case. That primer managed to push the bullet about halfway up the barrel.

Another one was miss reading the powder charges for a pistol that I was shooting hard cast lead bullets through. If you don't know if you push a lead bullet too fast it really leads up the barrel. It took a lot of cleaning to get all that lead out of that pistol barrel.

Stuck cases, I've had them. But I have always managed to get them taken care of without damaging anything other than the case itself. My biggest problem is when I tear the head of the case off while the rest of the case is still in the loading die with the expanded firmly stuck in the case.

The funnier ones were when I seated the bullet too far out in the case and went to check it in the rifle, spilling powder all over the action when I extracted the case with the bullet still stuck in the beginning of the barrel. Or mixing up the powder charges of loaded rounds using the same bullet. It makes it real interesting when you are just expecting a pop and get a real bang out of it.

 

[lwaters]

Well I have shot the old chrono. It was a sunny day and not getting good reading. I got to low. I now do most of it on a cloudy day. At least it was a cheap one.

 

[Alistair]

Worst one I've had could have ended extremely badly.

270win, running boar competition. Second detail, in the running for some points for the season. Fired first shot, bang. Target comes running back out the other way, pull trigger, hmm, recoil seems pretty soft on that one and couldn't see the fall of shot (not surpirsing with a 4x scope on a moving target and I often dont really notice recoil on moving targets), no matter, cycle bolt, on aim for the next shot when I thought... hang on a minute here.

Unload rifle, raise hand, stop the detail.

I pull the bolt and look down the bore. No light to be seen. Sure enough, on examination there was the bullet, about 10cm down the bore. No powder in case and the primer had done just enough to get it going in the rifling.

Imagine if I'd taken the next shot...

 

[Ridge Runner]

The horrors of reloading.......

I got stupid once, had a friend help me reload some .45 Long Colt ammo for my revolver.

I wrote down the recipe to use, provided all the components to reload a hundred rounds.

After shooting what rounds I had reloaded I picked up a box my buddy had reloaded.
The first round didn't sound right and the recoil was light. So I fired a second round, same thing.

When I went to dump the remaining rounds out of the cylinder, the cylinder wouldn't open. A bullet was lodged between the cylinder and the barrel locking the gun up.

Needless to say how the conversation went when I got to his house. It went even worse when for him when I went through his set up and found all his mistakes/shotcuts/ideology nonsence he thought when dealing with reloading, and reloading compents, mainly powder and grain weight.

Another mistake on my part is not using M41 small primers, instead I used CCI small rifle primers when I started reloading my 6.8 SPC. I had 3 of the CCI primers detonate while repriming brass in my press. I stopped reloading and called CCI about the problem, then called Hornady as I was using their brass, from the ammo I spent at the range.

That's when I found out military specifications require a thin bushing be used with primers when priming cases to prevent primers from being dislodged during fully automatic firing of various weapons. Proper reaming of the primer pocket removes this bushing allowing use, in my case, any small primer.

And lastly missed putting a powder charge in a case or two. Or loaded a charge, seated a bullet, then realized the case wasn't primed.

In regards to bad primers: a few years ago I bought a 1000 count box of primers. I reloaded around 200 cartridges, went to the range, out of a 100 rounds, 25 had bad primers. Same problem with their loaded ammo. Seems I wasn't the only person to complain.

 

[Daggaboy375]

Eons ago, the first reloads I attempted were for my Super Blackhawk in 44 mag. Loaded up 50. If I remember it was 24 grains of WW296. After I finished I realized that I had misread the scale and put 12 grains instead. Logical neophyte thinking said that the rounds would be half as powerful. I decided to ask some more knowledgeable than I if it would be alright to fire them.
I learned about SEE's and kinetic bullet pullers that day.

DB375

 

[Bob Nelson 35Whelen]

My mistakes consist of putting a primer in backwards in my 32/20. Still went pop but no recoil. Eject round and shake head.
Number 2 load for Whelen AI using a long established recipe of 748 and magnum primer load 3 grains under max. Smoke pouring from the action and firm bolt lift. Can't explain that one.
Mate shot my Chrony while sighting in.
Bob.

 

[steve white]

My gunsmith/buddy had a guy bring him a Weatherby rifle with the fore end snapped off by recoil. Said he could NOT get the bolt to open. Asked, were you using factory ammo, he replied, "no, but with this caliber/powder combo, you just scoop the case full, then compress it." The bolt would indeed not open. Had to unscrew the barrel, and there was the case, brass flowed into every orifice, welded to the bolt face. Careful measurements of all components, especially the chamber revealed that nothing except the trigger guard, butt pad, trigger assembly and floor plate could be salvaged. Everything else was a loss. But, that nine lug action had at least held together!

 

[Forrest Halley]

I once bounced a bullet off a cardboard target 5 feet from the muzzle. Was loading 125 grain 9mm bullets in a .357 snubnose with 2.5 grains of clays and had a squib. It left the nose indentation in the cardboard and the lube ring hanging on the target. Sadly, we could not find the bullet.