Wrong cartridge

[jims]

I was at a range today and a fellow shot his .270 over his chronograph. His speed before was about 2950, his next shot was 1550. He said the chrono must be wrong. When he extracted his brass the end was blown off, he then discovered he had inserted a .243 and when he fired it blew off the case from about the shoulder forward.
I tend to think the chrono was correct. The gun was inspected, no apparent damage etc. He later shot it again with good accuracy and speeds around 2950 fps.
A different combination potentially could have been much worse. Not good to have two rifles and two cartridges together and yet I have done that also in the past but fortunately with no mix-ups.

 

[n8dawg6]

dont have two types of powder out on your reloading bench, either ... been there, done that

 

[smong2000]

Wow, glad he didn't have a .308 with him :shock:
Did he hit the target?

 

[corey012778]

reading this reminded me of something I read on another site.

http://www.sksboards.com/smf/index.php?topic=37326.0

 

[jims]

A larger caliber instead of a smaller one could indeed have been bad. No, the target was not hit.

 

[ShawnT]

I would say that the chono was reading fine. Since he shot a smaller caliber bullet throught a larger caliber bore (3 sizes larger) the bullet would not have been engraved by the rifling, and would have had a lot of blow by, therefore not generating much pressure. Case seperation would have been due to the over size chamber. It more or less blew the bullet out. It's also a wonder that he did not have some blow back in the action, as I doubt the case seal too well on the chamber.

ShawnT

 

[richdeerht]

I've seen what happens when a .308 Win round is fired in a .270. The gun I saw was wrecked. Lucky the shooter wasn't severely injured.

 

[vabowhntr]

One coworker was shooting on our range at work, he had just picked up an Garand and was loaded it up with some ammo that he bought from another coworker who gave it all to him in a bag. Well, the first shot sounded funny and the second one did too, so I went over and took a look. Yep, there were 308's on the stripper clip! Blew the case out and made it almost straight walled. I was amazed that the action cycled. He took a look in the bag of ammo and clips of 308s and 30-06s were in there.

 

[Doohan]

wow.... you guys are making the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.. Lucky nobody was hurt!

 

[choc-dog]

I was at a range today and a fellow shot his .270 over his chronograph. His speed before was about 2950, his next shot was 1550. He said the chrono must be wrong. When he extracted his brass the end was blown off, he then discovered he had inserted a .243 and when he fired it blew off the case from about the shoulder forward.
I tend to think the chrono was correct. The gun was inspected, no apparent damage etc. He later shot it again with good accuracy and speeds around 2950 fps.
A different combination potentially could have been much worse. Not good to have two rifles and two cartridges together and yet I have done that also in the past but fortunately with no mix-ups.

This guy must have been shooting a claw extractor rifle because a firing pin strike on a push feed would likely push the case forward without detination of the primer....I think.

Chocdog

 

[jims]

It was a Weatherby Vanguard (Howa) in .270 Winchester. The cartridge that was damaged was a .243 Win.

 

[husky390]

A relative of mine has a Ruger Super redhawk in .44 mag, he also has several .41 mags. Well, his daughters boyfriend was shooting with him and he wasn't paying attention when loading. Luckily he loaded some light .41 mag loads into the super redhawk and the only thing it did was split the cases. The sad thing is he did not notice anything wrong until he had fired all six shots and tried to empty the cylinder.

This is the reason I got rid of all of my .44 stuff when I switched to .41 mag. I did this before hearing this story.

 

[jlynch34]

Be careful when reloading.

I reload 30-30, 270, 308 and 30-06. I keep all my storage containers marked well and try real hard not to mix them as all these bullets are close in size and shape.

Agree with N8 when I put powder in my measure I mark it with a label.