BP substitute and a blown barrel

[waksupi]

Take a look , and form your own opinion.

Strange break.

http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=20336.0

[tomme boy]

Was it a hammered metal barrel? Damascuss? The steel they used back then was not the best. It looks like a cast iron break to me.

[waksupi]

That is what I am thinking, too.

[stubshaft]

Some of the posts seem to think it may have been damaged slightly before the final shot.

[tomme boy]

One thing it might be from. The pins that hold the barrel to the stock, a rusted bore. The metal was weak from being a damascuss. Rust got between a layer of the twisted barrel. Along with were the pin was. This could cause a very weak area. Then the gun was fired.

I worked in a hot an cold forging factory for several years. We made all kinds of gears and bolts, ball joints, nuts, and all kinds of stuff for Cat. I have seen all kinds of dies and punches break while in use. We would get in some metal every now and then that would have inclusions in the steel. Strange things happen when you put preasure to steel. Stuff really came apart on cold forming. We had to have two layers of 1" Lexan as gaurds. We had a carbide punch let go one time when the feeder fed two parts on a balljoint. It went through both pieces of lexan and hit the operator. He felt a slight poke when it happened. He had a small red spot on his side. We did not think anything of it. Later that night he collapsed on the floor. He was tken to the hospital and had to have emmergency surgury. A small part of that punch was shot into his liver and he was bleeding internally. It was the size of a grain of salt is what they said. This press was a 8K ton capable press that came completely to a stop when it blew.

This is why a respect reloading. I know what can happen to metal when over stressed. Just remember this one thing. You might get away with a few high PSI loads going off. but it is a time bomb waiting.

[longbow]

I am with you guys saying it looks like a cast iron break. Any soft iron or steel would stretch and tear. That looks more like a brittle fracture ~ very granular edges.

I don't think Damascus would fail that way either. I could see it parting at a bad weld or laminated inclusion but again, I wouldn't expect such a granular looking edge.

I know a guy that blew up a replica muzzleloader by overloading and multiple balls. It failed at a dovetail for a barrel wedge but split along the length of the barrel a ways. No fracture like in this photo.

[Boerrancher]

I have seen a lot of cast steel and Iron breaks over the years growing up around drill rigs, and farm equipment. That barrel was cast iron or a poor quality steal casting. Now what exactly caused the break I don't know. If you look at it closely there is no evidence of a crack being there for any length of time as there is no oxidation spots. I know a lot of guys use the BP substitutes but over the years since Pyrodex and Triple 7 came out I have heard of and seen more guns blown up with them, so I try to stay away from it. One thing, I wish there would have been more photos of the other pieces. It is hard to tell exactly what happened only seeing the one piece. It is like finding a piece of a jigsaw puzzle on the ground and expecting to discern the whole picture.

Best wishes,

Joe

[waksupi]

I recently read an early account of fur traders in Canada, commenting on the gun barrels on the muskets traded to the Indians. They were of such poor quality, that after very few shots the damascus would come apart, looking much like a corkscrew.

[tomme boy]

My grand father told me of this happening to some of his family. He said a few people were killed. This was told to him by his father who was a full blood Creek Indian. His mother was white. Anyway, he had a old shotgun that was a damascus barrel an that was when he told me of the story about the guns.

[Longwood]

I have seen a lot of cast steel and Iron breaks over the years growing up around drill rigs, and farm equipment. That barrel was cast iron or a poor quality steal casting. Now what exactly caused the break I don't know. If you look at it closely there is no evidence of a crack being there for any length of time as there is no oxidation spots. I know a lot of guys use the BP substitutes but over the years since Pyrodex and Triple 7 came out I have heard of and seen more guns blown up with them, so I try to stay away from it. One thing, I wish there would have been more photos of the other pieces. It is hard to tell exactly what happened only seeing the one piece. It is like finding a piece of a jigsaw puzzle on the ground and expecting to discern the whole picture.

Best wishes,

Joe

I have seen many breaks that looked very much like that.
I agree with you completely.
It was a brand new, clean break.
No sign of rust or a previous crack that I can see.
What caused it?
I would not adventure to guess.

[405]

That looks really odd to me. Have never seen a firearm barrel or action blown with a fracture that looks like that. Blown Damascus doesn't look at all like that. Even cast parts (at least cast parts of good steel) that blow from excess pressure tend to flare out some near the fracture line. That break is nearly straight across, with no flaring or bending and the grain structure of the metal is EXTREMELY coarse. If I were to guess-- a poorly cast barrel of poor quality iron/steel of some alloy? Also, unless that barrel was very short to begin with or the photo distorts the perspective, the break looks like it's well forward of the breech area- so maybe a bore obstruction is a possibility.

[451 Pete]

If you magnify the picture you will see fairly evenly spaced light brown markings that would have been under the barrel. To me this looks like a hammer forging that used to be done with iron strips that were wrapped around a rod to create the rifling hole prior to straightening and the rifling of the bore being done.
Iron was very commonly used in this type of barrel manufacture well into the late 1800's as good steel was expensive and sometimes hard to obtain and considered by many smiths to be unnecessary for black powder and black powder pressures.

just my thoughts ... Pete

[Mk42gunner]

75 grains of "synthetic" powder seems like a lot to be putting down a .32 caliber barrel to me, even without anything on top of it.

It was also stated that the rear part went to pieces. Sounds to me like whatever powder was used was way to fast burning, and the forward portion acted as a projectile or bore obstruction.

Whatever caused it, I would not have wanted to be holding the rifle when it blew up.

Robert

[Boerrancher]

I would almost bet that had it been regular Black Powder, that gun would still be intact. Due to the make up of black powder the most pressure it will ever build up is around 36KPSI, no matter how much you pour down the bore. Even a hammer forged Iron barrel that heavy should withstand that pressure as long as there is no barrel obstructions. The one other scenario that I didn't see brought up, was if this happened during a reenactment could the muzzle of the gun been accidentally stuck in the dirt? This we will never know, but if it was then it wouldn't have mattered if it was charged with a substitute or true black.

Years ago when Pyrodex first came out I bought a pound of it to try. Before I got it shot up I ran across an old gun smith that wouldn't even keep it in his shop, and told me some of the horror stories he had seen with various guns that had been fired with pyrodex. He still had a few laying around his shop for people to look at. After that I soaked my pyrodex with water and flushed it down the toilet, and went back to shooting true black. I understand that in some areas it is impossible to get the real black powder, so people have no choice. If I was reduced to not being able to buy black powder, as has been proven in this forum it is not that hard to make, I would make my own.

Best wishes,

Joe

[gandydancer]

most Damascuss barrels where made for shotgun barrels and hand forged is just what they are. hand held hammers beating white hot steel strips around a dremal or rod shaft of gauge or rifle caliber. a lot of rifle bbls where made of rod iron as where some of the 1st gen colt single action frames. that rifle barrel looks to me like rod iron. that looks to me like 75 grains of whatever dumped on top of a loaded rifle and touched off. I have put as much as a 110 grains of BP in a muzzie with nothing just powder and what it will not burn it will blow out. I must admit it was not an old rifle. but then I have been wrong many times before. GD

[Omnivore]

Not enough information.

All blown barrels I've seen were obviously bulged, and that one didn't appear to have any bulge at all. It looks more like a brittle cast piece that was swung hard onto an anvil to break it. Or was that 75 grains of C4?

[waksupi]

You know, the only steel of that size I recall seeing break like that, is old well drill rod. I wonder if someone bored one on out, and rifled it?

[Fly]

That look,s more like cast than damascus . I must agree with gandydancer every
damascus barrel I ever saw was for shot guns & such.Hand forged strips of steel
forged over a iron rod.

That barrel was cast.
Fly

[waksupi]

I have seen some damascus rifle barrels. The nicest one I ever saw, was on one that Monte Mandarino made, and is in the back over leaf of the book "Steel Canvas". When I first looked at the barrel blank he was working from, I never expected it to be so beautiful when finished.

[waksupi]

Here is a picture of Monte's damascus barreled rifle.

[largom]

I can't help but wonder if his black substitute was'nt smokeless. Also said the gun was an original but not where it was made.

Larry

[Good Cheer]

It was .34 caliber and had a 75 grain charge in a column in that small diameter. Maybe had pressure waves cascading up and down the bore as the charge was consumed.
People with serious strain gauge equipment have found that multiple pressure spikes due to rebounding pressure waves are not uncommon in firearms.