Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Confusing 308 and 30-06 based cartridges danger

How often does this. A person fires an 30-06 cartridge down an 270win or 280 chamber/barrel? Or maybe an 308win down an 7-08?

This has had to have happened at some point? I'm curious about the obvious outcomes. I guess one should be extra vigilant when having similar cartridges based on similar cases. I've not thought of it much but now that I'm older it scares me a bit.

I once fired a 7X57 in a 270 Model 700. Had to knock the bolt open with a hammer, otherwise it didn't damage a thing. I would not want to do it again. I'll agree about the being older part, as we often overlook things that we shouldn't.

How are you going to get a cartridge with a .30 caliber bullet to go in a chamber that has a smaller neck?

The bullet doesn't reach the throat or is set back when closing bolt.

Know of a guy who fired a 308 in a 280.

No Idea how the loading went.


Gun wasn't ruined, caseing was though.😁

If it is set back that means you would have to push pretty damn hard, a 30-06 isn't going to chamber in a 270 regardless, case neck would have to be squeezed down as well, try that with a bullet in the neck, ain't happening. .031 difference in neck/bullet diameter.

If a bullet in a 30-06 doesn't reach the neck area of a 270 there are other issues.

Same case so even an empty 30-06 brass shouldn't allow for closing of a bolt in a 270 chambered rifle.

A 280 won't chamber in a 270, shoulder is farther forward on the 280.

I could possibly see an SA cartridge chambered in an LA gun but even then the bullet/neck diameter would have to be smaller than neck area of the LA chambering,, that is as long as the SA cartridge reaches the neck area which even a 2.8" 308 based cartridge should.

If this is confusing somebody they probably shouldn't be messing with firearms.

Bunch was zeroing rifles for deer season and some of his in-laws from Newport News was in and they were drinking heavy .
One of them picked up a 223 Savage 10 and apparently didn’t know any better or was to drunk to be handling firearms .
But he opened a box of 30 carbine and then couldn’t understand why the bolt wouldn’t open .
According to the owner it took a bit to figure out what happened .
Took him to a local gun smith after trying to rubber mallet the bolt open .
Smith ended up unscrewing the barrel to get the action open and the case was in the chamber in two pieces .
No bullet in the barrel or chamber , that Remington 110gr some how blew threw the barrel.
Must have been one fugged up bullet come out that barrel .
Smith examined barrel and chamber bolt functioned and put it back together .
He still had the rifle and still shooting it when I last saw him 20 or so yrs ago
Kenneth

I've picked 243 win brass out of the range bucket that was obviously fired in a larger bore. Most likely a 308, or 7mm-08. Case necks badly warped with the spent primers sticking out from the lack of pressure. 10 or so shells were so fired. Must have been a slow one to catch on

I once talked to a guy who asked what I was shooting. Told him 280. He then explained to me how I could fire 270 in a 280, because it's "smaller," but that I could never "go up" and fire a 280 in a 270. People are scary. (And no, this guy would have zero clue about interchangeable 32s, etc. He's just scary.)

I admittedly don't know all the case dimensions off the top of my head, so maybe they just couldn't chamber, but this seems like it would be an issue with the pairing of brand new shooters and lots of new 6.5s catching on.

That situation can be a problem and could be disastrous.

A gunsmith friend showed me a Ruger No. 1 .25-06 that his customer's college age son shot a .308 in while shooting prairie dogs. Not sure how he even got the cartridge in the gun, but it sounded as if alcohol may have been a part of that. All it did to the number was crack the forearm if I remember correctly. Gave me a new respect for that design.

Back in the day of being a Range Officer, we had a guest who wanted to try some lighter bullets.
He had a 30-06 to shoot (thank goodness) so besides having 30-06 ammo he acquired some lighter
loads----some 280 ammo and some 270 ammo. He said they are all made from 30-06 ammo you know.
Seeing he was having some trouble, found the situation as noted above. Sent him home immediately with some
very strong advice on calibers and ammo.

An acquaintance recently fired a 308 down a 270. The 165g GMX actually made out the muzzle. I think it's at the gunsmith now getting the bolt opened....

Probably not a good idea to shoot 7mm-08 and .308 at the same time very often. That is unless you like inaccuracy and newly fire formed .308 brass. Don’t ask me how I know. But absolutely no danger as that the pressures were actually a lot lower with that .280 bullet scraping down a .308 barrel.

That said, I don’t see any way that someone could accidentally chamber a 30-06 in a .270 or something like that. It just won’t fit.

Exactly the reason that I sold my .308 and every cartridge in the house with that head stamp. Taking both my .308 and 7mm-08 to the range with the same type SST bullet in each and not reading the correct head stamp on the .308 cartridge trying to go into the 7mm-08 chamber... Thankfully it doesn't go, but it sure made a memory. Those were both factory loads, but what worries me with so much handloading going on these days is all the guys making different caliber cartridges from different head stamped cases.

I was shooting my 7-08 once when my dad was shooting his 308 gas gun. He fired a 5 round magazine off then complained he wasn’t even hitting the target. Then I found I was missing 5 cartridges from my ammo box. It didn’t hurt anything, it just fire formed to 308 with lousy accuracy.

I once fired a .257 Roberts cartridge in a .270 (Model 760).
Smoke came out of the action, which was a pretty good clue that something was wrong.
Turned out the .257 case had been formed from a .270 and was in a box with .270 ammunition with the same headstamp. Upon further examination we found that the box held .270 factory loads, .257s that had been formed from the same brand of .270 brass and .257s that had been formed and loaded but had not been trimmed, i.e. cases left the same length as .270 cases. It is the most egregious example of handloading that I have ever seen.
The rifle and ammunition were recently purchased by a friend at an estate sale.

It's easy to chamber 270 in 3006 which I did by accident and all that happened was bad groups but it would be very hard to force 06 into 270, the bullet diameter of 308 would have to be crammed into .277 and you will know something is wrong.

Long time ago I didn't know I had factory 7mm Weatherby cartridges and didn't pay attention touching one off in an Rem 700 7 rem mag. If I recall it fired as I was camming the bolt closed. I do t think it closed completely as I got a rush of gasses but it really frightened me. No apparent damage but it made me realize I need to really pay attention to details.

I have heard of guys shooting 30-06 ammunition in Arisaka 7.7 rifles and 5.56mm in 300BO AR15 rifles