Whoops is the one thing you don't want to hear your surgeon say. Maybe that's why they have general anesthesia...
I'm a careful reloader with 50+ years experience. Last weekend, I had an incident that I'm going to report, just as a FYI for other experienced, careful reloaders.
I had loaded a series of test rounds for my FN 98 Mauser/Shilen 6.5x55. I was weighing loads on my Ohaus 10-10 as always. That scale had a problem with the weight jumping a notch and I had Superglued a pencil eraser where the beam hits bottom, just to keep the weight from jumping. That has worked pretty well.
I was shooting 100 NPT's with JB's 42 gr. RL-15 load, when the chrono read 3,577 fps and the bolt froze. I managed to open the action without a mallet, but it took some muscle. The primer was blown, but I got no blow back, even with an "H" type (not a "C" type) 98 Mauser. I had no idea what had happened until I was able to open the action.
I pulled bullets on the other rounds and weighed the RL-15. Yep, 52 gr., not 42. The weight had jump a notch, 42 to 52 gr. A 100 gr. Partitions at 3,577 fps is a bit more than one would expect from a 6.5x55, even with Campfire loads...
So, word to the wise. Be careful. These things can happen. And I was at my deer lease, a remote 6,000 property with only faint cell phone coverage. And, I was the only one out there. Sorta scary when you think of what could have happened. Guess my angel was working overtime...
DF
