Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Have you seen a modern Rifle action blown up???

Happened on a pig hunt in California - I didn't see it, but I saw the results about an hour later. Dude had an eye beat shut and a junk rifle.

IIRC it was a little "experiment" (aka "hey hold my beer and watch this ) using a pistol powder in a rifle case, a vice and a long string on the trigger.

I wasn't there, but I have a part of the receiver,and my buddy found the barrel about 75 yards from the firing line.
The rifle was a 338 Lapua, Nesika action.
cause was a major mess up of powders.
Seems a boat load of Unique or whatever the guy used for fire forming cases got full loaded behind a 250 grain bullet.
Touched it off, and things when " BOOM"!!
barrel was split, receiver top was busted, bolt held IIRC....
Cat

Rancho Loco, what kind of action is that, and did it have a blind magazine?

Happened in 2005 - 7mm mag Wby w/ floor plate. Known handloads, undetermined cause.

Brent's a top notch western hunter and fish killer, hunts big game mostly with a bow now, but not because of the boom.

Speaking of blown up actions- whatever happened to the report, here on the 'Fire several months ago, about a Wby MkV blowing up and seriously injuring the shooter? Have neither seen nor heard anything about such an incident actually happening.

There were the Sako SS rifles with a batch of barrels with the sulpher that didn't "mix" entirely with the molten steel--of course, this happened at the foundry, and was kind've out of Sako's hands. But the photos of two different rifles that came apart were as about as catastrophic rifle blow-ups as I have seen.


Casey

Guy I used to work with was working up some .270's for his Remington pump, testing loads at an out-the-shop-window range he had set up. First shot blew the rifle to smithereens, he wasn't hurt, but glad he had eye and ear protection. When he stopped shaking and started picking up pieces he noticed his reloading manual was open to .270 Weatherby, not .270 Winchester. He wasn't sure if he'd just inadvertently opened it there or not. He sort of suspected that a breeze through the open window had flipped a page on him and he didn't catch it.

I saw the nose of a Rem. 700 bolt in .308 Win. blown off.

What was so strange, the shooter said this was the second one he had to do this. Actually, the first, because the bolt was the replacement Rem. fitted after the first blew off.

He said he didn't know why it happened. I would suspect the loads.

I was given a Rem 7400 in 270 recently with the action in about 10 pieces in a sandwich bag. The product of a mislabled powder overload. Everything blew out the bottom and the shooter was unharmed. Due to cracks and mangled metal, the only salvagable part was the recoil pad.

That looks like a Weatherby Vanguard VGX, is it not? I have seen a Vanguard let go myself. Vanguards are made by Howa

Not the action buttttt



Jayco

Seems to be a common theme, so far. No one's been seriously injured. Says something, at least, for the design of the rifles.

Modern steels are amazingly elastic. It would be interesting to know peak pressures that were exerted to cause these catastrophic failures. One would imagine they are in excess of 100 kpsi.

The only one I've seen was a Ruger M77 MkII lightweight in .270 Win that was fired with a .308 Win round in the chamber. The bullet apparently exited the barrel at some incredible velocity. The gas vented into the magazine well, expanded the magazine box sideways, and split the walnut stock into pieces. The bolt could not be hammered open, but the barreled action appeared otherwise intact. The shooter was not wearing eye protection, and got some "stuff" in his eye. If he were wearing proper glasses, he would have been uninjured.

I was impressed how well the Ruger held up.

I have heard of alot of firearms blowing up,but most of them were operator error.Either the wrong powder/barrel obstruction or even ice in the barrel formed from rain.

As an example,there were 45-70 destruction test which is rated at normally,43,500 PSI MAP for the Marlin,also tested was the Winchester Big Bore action(Not the AE which is weaker) and they started falling apart in the 62-65,000 PSI range with repeated firing testing for the use of the 454 Casull at 65,000 PSI.

None blew up,just started mangling the action to where they could not cycle anymore rounds.Many reports using AA #7 in place of RX-7 have been above 83,000 PSI locking everything up but not blowing anything up and after one shot,they were okay according to gunsmith who checked them out..

I can only imagine what it would take to blow a bolt action apart in one round.Seems it would have to take a beating from multiple rounds to give way and from operator error,not the firearm.

Jayco

I have seen a lot of pictures, never really seen ond go in anyones arms....Have had a sticky bolt, locked up bolt, blown primer, thats about it...but you put 60 grs. of Bullseye in your 30-06 as opposed to H4831 and you will get some fireworks..

I have done some tests to blow up guns in a tire..couldn't blow up a Jap Arisaka no matter what I tried...hard to blow up a Mauser of any kind, they just puff of like a baloon and maybe split at some point, but as intended by Paul Mauser they do not fragment..A M-70 Win. will come apart like a hand granade and fragment all to hell, but it takes and awesome dumb load to blow one up.

Not present, but saw the results. In no particular order: An Enfield jungle carbine w/shattered barrel, from the front of the chamber forward. Destroyed the stock and part of the shooter's left hand. WWII bring back, no problems for many years, until the guy had it D/Td, scoped, reblued, new wood. Owner had no idea why, it just went poof in buck season! He had fired a box or two of factory ammo through it, to zero the scope and for practice, with zero issues.

Ruger M77V in 220 Swift at the next range over. Blew parts out of the bolt, injuring two people. IIRC, part of the extractor was blown out and hit someone behind the shooter; Shooter suffered severe lacerations to his hand.

Browning Citori at our club's trap range. One barrel exploded ahead of chamber, destroying the Citori. Shooter claims he did nothing wrong, Browning refused to hear about it, because shooter was using AA reloads, according to him?

Consensus of opinion at the time, was that the guy was an idiot and had done something stupid, but no one could agree on what he'd done? He claimed to be innocent of any wrong doing.

I blew the extractor off'n a Savage action once, but it was my own fault.

Monkeying with a 60gr Partition load in a .224 wildcat, probably far too short of an OAL, for starters (they're stubby little bastards)? Primer blew, shouldn't have tried to squeak one more load cycle from that brass. Extractor easily reassembled, found out the gas escape routing is very good on the Savage 110 action.

here is a video of a plugged barrel blowing up

blow up

Does a Remmy 760 in 30-06 count as a modern action?

My Uncle has one hanging in his basement that looks like an M-80 went off inside a tuna can. It put him in the hospital for a few days and inspired a conversion to the "cult of the bolt action".

The cause of the failure was never explained. But the rifle has hung, for over forty years, not far from the reloading bench as a constant reminder towards vigilance.