# What happened here



## woody007 (Sep 3, 2017)

Gday fellas 
New to the forum here and was curious to see if anyone could shed some light on what was the possible cause for this to happen to my underused Model 627 8 shot revolver I purchased in around 2010 with a little over 1000 rounds put through it. I was using a little over 5 grains of AP50 and a semi wadcutter projectile of 158 grams. The cylinder appears to have opened up and the projectile has taken my scope off and sent it flying over my head and into the other shooters behind me some 8 to 10 meters behind me. I'm a bit shattered that this could happen and have not seen anything like it in my 22years + in IPSC prac pistol. Thanks in advance.


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## DJ Niner (Oct 3, 2006)

Any sign that there was any type of barrel obstruction, like a previous bullet that didn't leave the barrel?

Any bulging of the barrel at any point? Is there a dark "ring" visible when you look down the barrel at a light source?

Did the last round successfully fired BEFORE the incident have any different characteristics (lighter recoil, less noise/report, no hole in target)?

Lacking any evidence of an obstruction which could raise pressures, then I'd guess it was an ammo problem. 
Perhaps a double-charged case? (Is that physically possible with that powder and charge weight? I've never used that powder...)

The only revolvers I've seen with that level of damage either had plugged barrels or bad ammo (usually double-charged with powder).


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## Steve M1911A1 (Feb 6, 2008)

Well, to begin with, a bullet of "158 grams" would weigh 2,436 grains. That's an awfully heavy bullet!
I'm sure that you meant to write "158 _grains_."
Right?
:smt083

There used to be rumors of a deadly, pistol-destroying fault called "detonation," usually caused by a very small charge of very fast powder that had placed itself in the wrong orientation, in comparison with the primer flash-hole.
Some pundits said that it really could happen, while others opined that the real villain of the piece was a double charge of powder (which might be unnoticed, if the normal charge was small).
I'm not familiar with AP50 powder, so I have no idea of the volume of the charge you were using. Was it small?

You state that the pistol which self-destructed was "underused." Perhaps the ammunition, also underused, had been badly stored, and the powder had been effected by heat. Deteriorated powder could cause a "kaboom" like yours.

It's even possible that an insect had built its cocoon in the pistol's barrel, and the obstruction acted like a stuck bullet. That would cause a "kaboom."

Were any of those conjectures useful?


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## woody007 (Sep 3, 2017)

Gday fellas thanks for your replies. The only thing I could think of is I double charged it but with the weight of the bullet and amount of powder used was probably in minor power factor for the discipline. Even with that you would have thought that with that pressure that the projectile would have travelled the easiest way out not up and out of the top. All my equiptment is stored correctly and is dry, new powder ( AP50 medium fast burn pistol powder ) and primers ( federal small pistol ) so nothing wrong there and it didn't have a projectile stuck up in the barrel. One thing I did notice is how thin the cylinder wall thickness is and possibly had a hairline crack in it and with detonation may have weakened it beyond its limits. When I compare the powder load with my race gun .38 super hc custom tanfoglio which run a 125grain projectile with 8.8 grains ap100 powder (slow burning ) to make major class I sort of thought that a magnum gun could handle the pressure. A typical load with a 200 gram progy with 5 grains of ap50 is 960 fps as the manufacturer states. AP50 equivalent is red dot, pb, ,w231, hp38 and aa2.


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## Steve M1911A1 (Feb 6, 2008)

I had another thought...
Obviously, *DJ Niner* had the same thought. But here are some more details:
What if the previous shot had been a squib...maybe just the primer, and no powder...which just barely lodged its bullet in the barrel.
In the heat of the moment, you didn't notice the lack of noise and recoil, and you went on to fire your next shot.
The next bullet was stopped by the previous one, and it stopped in the forcing cone, bridging the gap between cylinder and barrel.
Therefore the expanding gas from that last shot had no place to go, so it escaped by blowing the cylinder out.


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## desertman (Aug 29, 2013)

When you mentioned that hand loads were used. I think you may have answered your own question.

I guess you could always check to see if there is a bullet still lodged in the barrel if it was indeed a squib. If not then you probably charged that round so much so that it blew the cylinder apart before the bullet even reached the forcing cone. I'm guessing that if the previous round got stuck in the barrel and another were to follow you would have blown the barrel apart with the cylinder remaining intact? Obviously that would depend on how far up the barrel the first round had travelled. At any rate what you had was a hand grenade, hopefully no one was seriously injured. As Barney Fife might say: "That thing went blew-ee, Ang".

As for me I gave up on hand loading not necessarily for the above reason. It bored the shit outta' me. There was just too much to have to keep track of leaving no room for error. Before you even start the cases have to be thoroughly cleaned, measured and trimmed. You also have to keep track of how many times the cases were reloaded as they get work hardened and brittle with each use. Kinda' like bending a piece of metal over and over again until it breaks. I've seen some people picking up used brass at a shooting range with the intention of re-loading them not knowing whether those cases had been previously re-loaded or how often.

Hand loading is the type of thing that you really have to be dedicated to it and knowing exactly what you are doing every step of the way. Along with the understanding that the chances of something going wrong are greater than with factory ammo. Paying particular attention to each and every round that is fired. As you apparently found out. No offense intended as my comments are directed towards those who may be considering it.


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