RE: Hangfire: The delayed reaction
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I don't believe I've ever had a hangfire with a rifle.
Maybe half a dozen on pistols, particularly wheel guns in my youth. My father and uncle were NOT particularly fastidious loaders and maybe made a mistake every 1000 rounds or so.
Probably 10 trap rounds over the years. I only remember one that was a loading problem. All the others were bad primers.
I have one step more, and probably because of the guns I use. I look at the hang fire to see if there is a dimple on the primer. No dimple is a faulty firing pin and the round is safe to handle. That is after the 30 seconds and before it hits my hand.
I've hit the deck several times. Rookies always seem to turn towards me on the trap line, no matter which side I'm standing on :)
I'm always frightened breaking open the shotgun. I point it down range and hold it at arms length with a finger up to open it. I do not want a hangfire to eject to the ground...
Ah yes, the checking of the round part was deleted on purpose as it would have made the post far too long; That's a post for another time and will touch on investigating the fault, trouble-shooting, reloading and the disassembly of the round as well. This post is about 1100 words so I figured I'd get to it next time. Come to think of it, all of that above might be three posts. Lol.
I've had a few close calls with new shooters over the years and I'd rather not have any more, but it'll probably happen. Hopefully I don't get my face shot off.
My hangfire's have all been rifles of some sort and I can put it down to shoddy supplied ammo, never with my own reloads. It happens I guess.
Lastly, breaking open a shotgun with a shell that failed to fire should make anyone nervous! 🙄
I think I've had 3 failed primers (that I remember). I always used CCR primers, they were really good that way. I don't know, maybe 3 in 100,000 rounds? I remember 2 at least where there was no powder. Loaders are wonderful things but even the best will hang up once in a while.
All the rest were firing pin problems. I shot an Ithaca a lot, and had to rebuild that link twice in the life of the gun.
The old Smith and Wesson pistols with direct firing pin (rather than a hammer block) tended to break a pin every now and again.
Primers are generally pretty good these days. I use Federal which are great, but I've still had a few issues. Broken firing pins can do it as can ones worn down also. It doesn't take much I guess.
You ever had a squib round? I've been luck and never had one in my sport shooting. I do so much run and gun handgun shooting I'm surprised I haven't. It's not something It want to happen though considering I'm often unloading rounds pretty quickly. My rifle reloads are all hd led and rechecked, precision hand loads, so never had one. I weigh each round after loading and have two check-steps in the loading process.
I've never had a squib round. I've had a couple of 'puffers' but they always got the wad out of the barrel.
We weren't that precise with our shotgun rounds. The doctor that stitched up my eye suggested that I never use dynamite to blow stumps and that I not load shotgun shells. I didn't, but I had a partner that had a high end loader and I'd help him with everything but the actual lever pull.
We would occasionally have a powder charge or a shot load fail to drop. Most of these we'd catch right away but I had at least two make it into my gun with no powder. We used a light charge (.75 oz) and it wasn't easy to tell when the shot was in. I was in charge of gathering and loading the boxes so I KNOW exactly who to blame :)
I have never loaded a shotgun shell, all my ammunition production has been rifle and handgun. I guess the process is the same. Just different.
The biggest difference is the crimp. Gotta have the machine/collets for that.
Yeah, it's different in that way. The projectiles are encased. I don't shoot much shotgun really, so just buy my shells off the shelf.
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