Well, it was bound to happen sometime...

[Guest]

I finally had one of those really stupid moments at the range today. I had a great time, but I didn't get to shoot my 8x57 much, as on shot number 10, I chambered the round, and it was tight to close the bolt. I stopped short of closing the bolt, and then it was stuck. I did what every red blooded man in america would do - I whacked the bolt handle with the heel of my hand. It came free, almost as if by magic. Well, I withdrew the offending round from the chamber, but it looked a little funny, what with no bullet, and all that 'magic dust' spilling out all over the inside of my action! I'm not sure what happened, as I don't recall changing the seating depth on these rounds, and wouldn't have seated them out far enough to engage. I'll have to check everything else for length, but that's not a big deal. I used a cleaning rod to tap the bullet out of the rifling, and all is well, sort of.

The main problem at hand is that I have one heck of a mess to clean up. I'm thinking I'll take the rifle out of the stock, and disassemble the magazine from the action, and then use q-tips to get the powder out of the lug raceways. Cleaning the chamber is no trouble - I have a brush just for that, and the bore is obviously no problem. Anybody else want to admit to having something like this happen, and share your rememdies? I'd like to avoid removing the scope (if I can) but I will take the whole thing apart if I have to.

 

[old #7]

I spent the last two weeks reloading for multiple guns. I wanted to shoot all through my new chrony.
Yesterday i had a dental appointment in the morning so I naturally took the rest of the day off to shoot. it was a beautiful day in the mid 50's and sunny with no wind. Perfect right?
I got to the range and as I was setting up I realized I didn't have my TRIPOD.
I fortunately had a laser level tripod in my truck box and I used a string line to tie the chrony down.
If I didn't have the laser in my truck I would have turned around and went home.

 

[FOTIS]

If I can count the times that I was at the range and could not shoot due to my stupidity................ :evil:

 

[onlybrowning]

I once had my sizer die adjusted about 1/8 of a turn too far down, and put a slight bulge in my shoulder of 50 .308 cartridges. I did not chamber a round at home to check them, so 30 minutes to the range, 10 to set up, 3 minutes to swear a lot, then 30 to drive back home again.


ps: Now I usually try one in the chamber before I leave.

 

[Antelope_Sniper]

Last weekend my rifle wouldn't group for me. Ok, step one, check scope mounts....HuH??? Oh that's right I was out of Lock-tite when I remounted my scope last fall.....

 

[nodak7mm]

Lemme see.

Got all the way to the range with no ammo.
Got all the way to the range with wrong ammo.
Got all the way to the range, forgot targets.
Got all the way to the range, forgot key, walk in and carrying all my "Stuff"..
Got all the way to the range, crap thats right, we cant shoot on this day.

And my all time favorite: Shooting my chronograph the second time...

Your powder mess can be resolved easy, nothing a little compressed air cant get out.. Been there b4 too... Should not have to remove scope.... Unless your load was 104.5grs of AA#2 and you were holding your rifle upside down when you finally got the bolt open....


Heck, welcome to the he-man women hater shooting club... :grin: :mrgreen:

Rod

 

[Guest]

Your powder mess can be resolved easy, nothing a little compressed air cant get out.. Been there b4 too... Should not have to remove scope.... Unless your load was 104.5grs of AA#2 and you were holding your rifle upside down when you finally got the bolt open....


Heck, welcome to the he-man women hater shooting club... :grin: :mrgreen:

Rod

So a can of compressed air and some safety glasses and I'm on my way? (I don't currently have an air compressor that I can get to.) I was concerned the Win748 would end up getting into places it didn't belong (alright, so it already has!), but I was worried it would get stuck (via the compressed air) in those places. Have you done this compressed air resolution previously? Thanks.

Also, when do I get my membership card, and who's teaching me the secret handshake?

 

[bullet]

Lemme see.

Got all the way to the range with no ammo.
Got all the way to the range with wrong ammo.
Got all the way to the range, forgot targets.
Got all the way to the range, forgot key, walk in and carrying all my "Stuff"..
Got all the way to the range, crap thats right, we cant shoot on this day.

And my all time favorite: Shooting my chronograph the second time...

Your powder mess can be resolved easy, nothing a little compressed air cant get out.. Been there b4 too... Should not have to remove scope.... Unless your load was 104.5grs of AA#2 and you were holding your rifle upside down when you finally got the bolt open....


Heck, welcome to the he-man women hater shooting club... :grin: :mrgreen:

Rod

+1 ON ALL OF THE ABOVE :shock:

 

[nodak7mm]

Honestly, its not that big of a deal. However my compressed air is provided by my air compressor. Yepper, I use dried shop air alot in my cleaning..

Tah heck with the canned air, not enough umph. Anyways, your action is a combo of forged and machined ferrous metals. Kinda like a tool.. Okay your tool got a tish dirty, cant drop it in the parts washer with optical sighting device. So you take the action, previously removed from the wooden holding fixture. Cover the optical sighting device well and grab the can of Brake Kleen (self evaporating type) and spray the crap outta it.. Then doubly blast the fire control mechinism, let it dry then hit it again with light fluid or Jet A or LPS 1, whichever is handier. Now using your favorite light lubricating erl, such as LPS 2 or Rem Erl or whatever is handier, wipe the entire asembly down, inside and out. Regrease the bolt lugs, make sure the chamber and bore are clear and clean. Reassembly, put back in safe and go have a Miller.

The gist of my rambling procedure is that, a firearm is like a fine tool, it can take alot of carefully applied "abuse" and not be harmed. And I am not attempting to come across like a smart aleck, its still oh-dark 30 and havent had enough coffee yet. Plus I always run a few degrees off center.. :lol:

Have a great day.... It s Friday....

Oh yeah, part of the initiation ceremony is to be able to name all members of the Litttle Rascals/Our Gang and sing the entire song list from REO Speedwagon,s "Hi-Infidelity" album.. :twisted: :twisted: :lol:

Rod

 

[Guest]

Well, having seen brake cleaner dull and pit the finish on some blued steel before, I'll be trying something else. But I understand about the rifle being a tool in a manner of speaking. No offense taken.

As for the initiation, I still have Hi-Infidelity somewhere around here on 8-track, would it be alright if I played it while I sang?

 

[nodak7mm]

"Take it the run, Baby, if thats the way you want it Baby"..... :lol: :lol: :lol: (Sorry, couldn't help myself)

Have a great day!!

 

[Guest]

Just for the record, I 'discovered' the solution (pun intended) to my problem sitting on my shelf this morning. I have an as yet unopened can of Birchwood-Casey Gun Scrubber that has a straw-tip applicator that I can insert into the spray nozzle! So, this evening after the kids are asleep, I'll be pulling the action, wrapping the scope in a couple of shop towels, and spraying out the action (with the barrel pointed downward into a plastic bowl with more shop towels in it). I suspect I should be able to get all the powder out in safe fashion, and then just clean the rifle as I normally would. I don't know about y'all, but I'm feeling better.

 

[FOTIS]

Once upon a time there was a hunter named XXX.

XXX had 2 identical senderos one in 300 win and in 7mm stw. He had made 2 boxes of handloaded ammo.
1 in 180 grain at 3100 fps for the 300
and one in 7mm stw 140 BT's at 3500 fps.

October came around and XXX packed the truck and went elk hunting 4 hours away.

The next day at 0400 hours XXX pulled out a box of 300 Wim mag ammo and guess which rifle??????????????? :evil:

After that lesson it never happened again. Range or hutning!!!!!!! :wink:

 

[Guest]

As soon as I track down the reason on this one (I've been unwilling to chamber another round until I get it cleaned, for obvious reasons, though all rounds measure exactly as they are supposed to...) I won't make that mistake again, either. I will post a follow up.

 

[bullet]

Once upon a time there was a hunter named XXX.

XXX had 2 identical senderos one in 300 win and in 7mm stw. He had made 2 boxes of handloaded ammo.
1 in 180 grain at 3100 fps for the 300
and one in 7mm stw 140 BT's at 3500 fps.

October came around and XXX packed the truck and went elk hunting 4 hours away.

The next day at 0400 hours XXX pulled out a box of 300 Wim mag ammo and guess which rifle??????????????? :evil:

After that lesson it never happened again. Range or hutning!!!!!!! :wink:

POP, I when hunting with my brother we packed everything in the car except my bullets. Three quarters of the way there I thought about my bullets and check the car and low and behold just as I feared I had forgotten my bullets. There was an old 30-30 my brothers car that had been in the trunk for 6 months (you have to know my brother). It was a little rusted and had open sights. I ask him have you shot it and he said no but the guy who let me have it said it shot good. Well we had to go to the woods or miss hunting for that day. I took the 30-30 and said to myself "I can't believe you forgot your bullets." Not 30 min after day light here comes this big buck about 50 or so yards away. I thought this is just great. So I put the sights right on the heart and pulled the trigger and the buck dropped in his track and never moved. I guess the guy was right when he told my brother it would shoot good. But I always check for my bullets now.

 

[Antelope_Sniper]

Dubyam, when I was younger we had a similar problem with my Mom's .270. The barrel had became Jugged(?), and the gun had to be rebarreled.....I hope this is just something with that lot of ammo.

 

[buckfever]

Well :? .
Shot a rod on my cronogragh with my Dads 300 bee
Forgot ammo on a doe hunt.
Forgot targets.
Some how I forgot to but powder in a case but found it when I gave it a shake and didn't hear anything.
But the worst of all I forgot to buy my deer tag about 10 years ago so all I could do was hunt Grouse :x .
I'm sure theirs more.

 

[SakoSteve270wsm]

About 10 years ago I went to the range,paid walked down to the bench I was going to use got set up and my target all ready and had to wait a few minutes for the cease fire to go down range to set up the target.For some reason that I still don't know to this day,I got up and walk over to the bench and removed the bolt from my rifle.Looked down the bore and there is a cleaning patch half way down the barrel !!!! :shock:

I check the bore every time I go now :!:

 

[Guest]

Alright, so I have an update. The rifle is clean. Clean as a whistle. I don't think there's a speck of powder, powder residue, copper, lead, fingerprints, or anything within a city block of that gun right now. I am a happy man. (Of course, I wouldn't be up in the middle of the night doing this except the kids are all asleep and the wife is away at a ladies retreat for the night with some folks from the church.)

After getting everything cleaned out, I tried (carefully) one of the other rounds in the box. Apparently, I'm an idiot. I somehow managed to seat every bullet out too far, and they all engage the lands when I try to chamber them. At least I did not just cram them in and shoot them all - I bet the pressures would have been insane! Anyway, a trip through the seating die again, and all is well. Of course, I took very careful measurements before I seated them all deeper, so I am sure they are right this time.

Thanks to all who shared stories of range foul ups. I hope to be back maybe Thursday or Friday of this week, and see what these loads will do.

 

[JD338]

I have forgotten to bring ammo to the range before. ALso forgot my shooting muffs once. I did have plugs so I still was able to shoot. Now I keep my shooting muffs in my PU.

Last year opening day of deer season, I left my B-I-L's house to head to the woods. I got about 8-9 miles away and realized I forgot a somewhat important piece of gear. I turned around and headed back. My B-I L asked what I forgot and I said "nothing important, just my gun".

JD338