in reloading whats is the worst thats happened to you ????

[hound13]

I was just on another sight looking around and come across a thread about things that happened to guys in the reloading process, or when they tried to fire there rounds and the gun would jam. most ive done is put a primer in wrong or too much powder and it was a double charge . id like to here your experiences of stuff that has happened to you guys over the years !!!!!!. so mayby we can all learn something out of this , thanks for the input !!!!!!

[Bayou52]

Well, let's see. In the past 40 years or so, these various gaffes come to mind:

Uniflow powder measure running out of powder and not realizing it,

Primers not completely seated especially when using the universal priming arm,

Upside down primer insertion,

No primer inserted at all and powder dribbling everywhere.

Each one of these gaffes was caught in time. I've certainly learned from my mistakes over the many years!

Bayou52

[GhostHawk]

My worst happened three days ago. Got distracted by a phone call, was reloading a small batch of 7.62x25 for my CZ-52.

Put the Red Dot powder charge in before they were primed. No big deal, didn't really even spill much.

Just had me shaking my head and telling myself to watch it.

I "May" have damaged a gun reloading once a long long time ago.
Cost me a new bolt, and gunsmith to remove the old one and reset head space.

It scared the **** out of me and I took a long break from reloading, and got real careful when I came back to it.

[hithard]

Worst thing. ....saved a lot of money reloading, but spent twice as much shooting, spent even more of that saved money on new guns......

[fast ronnie]

Primers in upside down. (before I got an RCBC bench autoprimer).
No powder in case. Dad wasn't happy! Stuck bullet in bore.
Double-charged cases. I always check with a flashlight and haven't had one slip through.
Wrong powder charge. One grain too much and had to disassemble a hundred rounds.

And My personal favorite
Forgetting to clean media out of flash holes and having to remove a hundred live primers.

[Jim_P]

I have a RCBS Chargemaster. Pouring a pound of powder into the hopper with the dump valve open.

[EDG]

Not buying a RCBS A2 for $50.

[shoot-n-lead]

In my younger years, blew a Model 49 S&W to smithereens...still not sure how it happened.

[EddieNFL]

Many of the above. Once pulled the wrong powder out of the cabinet. Realized the mistake as I was filling the measure. Had I not caught it the results would have been ho-hum (real close to what I intended). In 41 years I haven't damaged a firearm (knocking on wood).

[rondog]

When I first started, my grandson would watch me, I think he was 10 or so. One day, he decided he'd "help" me by making a few rounds for me, after I'd stopped for the day. Trouble was, I'd turned off my Lee powder measure, so it wasn't dropping powder. The resulting squibs cost me two 1911 barrels on my next range trip! Made my butt red.

[hound13]

in another forum I asked the same question and guys were blowing up vacuum cleaners by picking up primers.!!!!!!

[2ndAmendmentNut]

Worst thing I have done is bought a mould in a caliber I "wanted" to have a gun in. Eventually found a gun in said caliber, but didn't really like the mould. Then I got in on a group buy for a mould I knew I would like, but sold the gun.

[chsparkman]

In 1999 I loaded a box of 50 .38 special with no powder. Didn't find out until 13 years later. Stuck two Boolits in the barrel, but I noticed right away both times and my BIL was there to fix it. Took the rest home and pulled all the boolits.

Since I got my LNL AP I've loaded lots of rounds with no primer. Makes a mess with Bullseye. I had a hard time getting the rhythm down..."down to size, forward to prime"... It's better now.

[NavyVet1959]

My first reloading mistake was when I was just starting out. I was loading some .357 rounds and I didn't seat the primer deep enough, so the cylinder would not rotate. So, although a revolver is pretty dependable, you still can screw things up.

Sometimes, I'll forget to put a primer in and end up dribbling powder all over the press.

I've spilled powder in the carpet and had to vacuum it out. I used a shop vac with a piece of paper towel over the hose end to act as a filter and was able to recover probably all of the powder.

Dropping primers in carpet sucks though. I have spend quite a bit of time on my hands and knees trying to find a stupid primer so that I don't vacuum it up with a rotary beater brush type vacuum and finding out whether they really will set off the primer. I much prefer a solid smooth surface for my reloading room -- stone, ceramic tile, wood, vinyl floor, etc instead of carpet. If you spill some powder or primers, it makes it easy to just sweep them up.

Accidentally loaded a 10mm 215 gr load with Alliant Promo (Red Dot equiv) instead of with Longshot (which I *thought* I had in the powder measure). It "disassembled" my RIA 10mm and mag, but no damage even though the pressure (according to Quickload) was considerably higher (167K psi) than the 10mm SAAMI rating. That one kind of stung.

Be careful out there...

[RobS]

Spilling powder...............can piss a person off as it's just a waist. Then the other side, loading 20 some rounds before realizing that I didn't turn on the powder measure; talk about a load that saves on powder.

[jmorris]

I have a friend that owned a printing company and he gave me a lot of Lynotype. After melting down a pot full from "cold" I was adding to the pot and it volcanoed like I was putting in ice cubes.

Lead went 19' high to the celing, on my safty hat/mask, welding jacket, gloves and some found bare skin on my wrist making a bad burn.

[30Carbine]

The worst I have ever had involves primers. loaded up some cci 400's in 30 carbine went to the range first 5 no problem then, click no bang so I dropped the mag. ok I let it sit in the sled for about 20-25 minutes while I shot a few others. came back to it pulled the bolt back round went flying out hit the concrete pad and boom she went. no one got hurt but I may have tinkled a little bit. so well once in a life time thing right nope. put the mag back in loaded another click no bang again let sit same thing happened when it hit the concrete pad. I got a call into cci right now this happened last weekend. and no it's not the powder tried Winchester primers with the same powder and all banged.

[MrWolf]

I have been lucky so far (knocks on head). Missing primers, spilled powder, and one squib. The squib was actually on a 12 gauge which normally not that big of a deal in an over/under. Except the only time it happened my son and I were shooting in a competition and he got it. Primer was just enough to cause some shot to dribble out the barrel. He lost the bird cause of that. I felt like ... Wish it had been me it happened to.

[bedbugbilly]

Upside down primers . . .

Getting interrupted while loading and not removing what was on the press and starting over didn't drop a charge which got me a "squibb" next time at the range . . but I caught it. Could have been worse . could have done a double charge . . it taught me that when interrupted, stop, remove what's on the press, dump powder if necessary and start over . . .

And as has been mentioned . . saving money by reloading only to spend twice as much on more reloading things and guns . . .

[762 shooter]

The first 50 rounds I ever loaded back in 1972 were 44 mag. I was supposed to load with 24 grains of W-296 but read the scale wrong and loaded them with 12 grains.

Figured it would be alright, just under powered but asked some reloaders just to make sure. Learned about SEE events then purchased my first and only kinetic bullet puller that day.

I may have dropped some powder into non primed brass, but I'll never admit to that, unless you have video.

762