Case blew out on the cartridge. 2 holes in the extractor groove. Got a face full of powder but thank goodness for the safety glasses. 5 round groups except for the bottom right which was 3 rounds. Was going to shoot 2 more but when the casing blew, my appetite for more shooting was over for the day. .308 hand loads.

Nice groups, glad you are OK.

Glad your safe. Do you know why the case blew out? Haven't had that happen to me and don't want it to. Is this something that happens often? Saw some pics of pistol brass that blew out not too long ago.

No real idea why it happened. 1st time for me. Hopefully just a one off.

What was your load? How many times had the brass ben fired?

yikes! glad your alright!

"Sounds" (airquotes) like a case head separation but I'd need more info to be certain. If you handload long enough, chances are you've had one or will have one. More of a when, not an if. This is one of the main reasons, if not THE reason that bolt action rifles have a hole in the reciever in front of the bolt lugs. Specifically for case blowouts. You can minimize this by not full length resizing every single time. Also, you can check the inside of the cases with a feeler gauge to see if they're getting thin. You can feel the ditch in the case in the web area, just in front of the belt/head. If you've got it (the ditch), toss the case.

X2

+1

Should have been once fired brass. Not sure of the load. It wasn't loaded by me. As said though no problems before this.



Good info thanks. Although I don't reload, it's info like this that keeps me interested in the forum and the sport.

The ammo he was running was my 168 A-max bulk ammo, which is loaded on the once-fired LC brass. I am thinking that one of these cases had been weakened and had a case head separate. The ammo is shooting good, for sure. There should be no issue I see. This ammo is loaded to a medium pressure load, and not near a hot load. This is the first I heard this happen with this lot of ammo. I have spoken with splash, and discussed it. Another thought, since it's very muggy out and misty today, is that some moisture got into the chamber or on the ammo and caused a pressure spike. But not sure if that was the case here.
I have stood on the throttle with some slightly over max loads and had several separate on me with some 155 A-max out of my Surgeon bolt gun. But that didn't surprise me, since it is thick LC brass, once-fired stuff.

As Chad said. Ammo was definitely shooting good. This was the second target after zeroing the scope which I had just mounted. The first target was just as good of groups (after zero) as this one but I just wanted to shoot a clean target while I was in a good zone. I'll be getting some more ammo from Chad when I'm in his neck of the woods again.

Glad you are ok. Please post a pic for us to look at>

Yep all good here. Tried to get a picture of the case but the back end is covered in powder and the cracks are in the extractor grooves are hard to see with just a cell phone to take pictures.

if you were asking to see what my face looked like, I would be afraid to post a picture and be forever known as "Splash, the man who broke the internet." And that's before the powder residue. Definitely a wth just happened moment. Probably doesn't help that I'm a left handed shooter using a right handed bolt gun.

Well there is the bloody problem.

I was refering to the failed brass. Would be nice to see a pic even if it was a crappy one.

ha! A lifelong problem. It started as an eye dominance thing as a young kid shooting open sights. There is some saving grace. I usually hit what I'm aiming at.

Here ya go. Pretty hard to see but it's the best I could do. You may be able to just see the crack on the shoulder of the extractor groove. There is also a small hole on the other side that I couldn't make visible to the camera.

Chad says the loads are medium pressure and if so, that looks to me like it was just a single defective case to me. I've had inexplicable and nontypical case failure myself, once or twice. It just happens.

My thoughts as well.

I had a case separation shooting some ammo loaded in once-fired or brand new LC 5.56 brass in my bolt gun one day. The separation was not in the extractor groove or in the usual area like jeffbird's photo above...what was extracted from the chamber looked like 9mm or .38 Super brass. Just one of those oddball failures.

I have witnessed a factory round blowing the extractor out of a bolt gun and just recently factory Match ammo blowing primers so stuff happens but it is rare.

Reason # 107 i don't hand load for other people.

That's not a case head separation like I thought was the problem. I have not see a case blow in that area around the extractor groove before.

Here, from another forum:



Failure at extractor groove