Titan ReloadingRepackboxLee PrecisionLoad Data
Inline FabricationWidenersMidSouth Shooters SupplyReloading Everything
RotoMetals2
Page 4 of 16 FirstFirst 1234567891011121314 ... LastLast
Results 61 to 80 of 320

Thread: What to do with a low number 1903?

  1. #61
    Boolit Master gew98's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2011
    Location
    Rural KY
    Posts
    807
    Quote Originally Posted by Dutchman View Post
    I'm with you 100% on this issue.

    Hatcher is the authority on this issue, not de Haas.

    And low numbered 03 are still coming apart when the threshold of safety is exceeded. What's the distance between safe and exceeded? I never heard of one blowing up on a wednesday so I'm only going to shoot mine on a wednesday so I'll be safe. The logic of Darwin candidates is heavy in this forum on this subject.

    http://m1903.com/03rcvrfail/

    The response to the above by a friend or mine:

    "His article is a perfect example of making statistics tell the story you
    want them to tell. While I'm not a statistician, I am a mechanical
    engineer [NASA] who helps run a hazardous research and development test
    operation. I not only have to know statistics but the limitations of
    statistics. Often, it's my *** that's going to perforated by high speed
    metal chunks if I get it wrong.

    In his article, the good doctor shows that he has a good grasp of
    statistics, but a poor understanding of the limitations of statistics.

    In the article, he takes the known historical data and shows that based
    on this data, firing a low-number M1903 is safer than a lot of common
    activities. Absolutely true, based on the data at hand.

    But here's the limitation - While his conclusion is true for the whole,
    his conclusion is faulty for a particular single rifle.

    Here's the problem - we don't have enough statistical data to determine
    the distribution of M1903 low-number receiver strength. Looking at a
    particular specimen, you cannot tell if it's better or worse than
    average. Nor can you tell how much better or worse than it is from that
    average.

    Given the poor process control that Hatcher documented (heat treatment
    by eye), I'd say that process variability is quite high, meaning that
    there will be many guns that are much better than average. Conversely,
    there will be many guns that are much worse than average.

    Even if we knew the distribution, we don't know any fatigue behavior: we
    don't know the relationship between heat-treatment-related-strength and
    how many rounds of a known pressure that receiver design will take
    before catastrophic failure at that strength. Could be one. Could be
    one thousand. Could be infinite.

    So it boils down to this - while on average, firing an M1903 is safer
    than some average daily activities, firing a specific M1903 may be far
    safer or far less safe. NO ONE CAN TELL!

    While the doctor says I may have a 1 in 100,000 chance of one blowing
    up, if that one in 100,000 happens to be the one in front of my face, I
    have a 1 in 1 chance of getting hurt or killed.

    Here's the other little tidbit I'll toss in there that the doctor
    doesn't address. Back in Hatcher's time, the Government's assessment of
    the worth of a soldier's life was pretty low. I'd bet that back then, a
    soldier's life was viewed to be less than that of a rifle. (see note
    below) So any sort of judgment of past cost versus benefit (IE:
    scrapping rifles versus potential soldier death) must be looked at
    through period assessment of soldier life. Or, better said, it's NOT
    that the Marine powers that be thought that the chances of failure were
    low, it's that they didn't see the *consequences* (cost of soldier
    death) of failure being high, so overall, the risk was acceptably low.
    Keep the rifles. Replace the dead soldier as they fail."
    by B.H. 1-11-09
    I agree... just let the banner waving fanboy types blow one up at this late date...just one.....thats all it takes. I collected japanese rifles at one time but NEVER would shoot the last ditch variants....same thing with VK & VG98's when I was into WW2 german rifles..... why take the chance to blow you or a friends head off ... why ?.
    No , I did not read that in a manual or stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night.... it's just the facts Ma'am.

    What's the difference between a pig and an Engineer ?
    You can argue with the Pig.

  2. #62
    Boolit Master JHeath's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Location
    WA state/ BC mountains
    Posts
    619
    Spare us the "banner waving fanboy types" rhetoric, it's not helpful. Dutchman's opinion carries a lot of weight with me, but his engineer friend must understand how scientific skepticism works.

    I rig aerialists for performance and gauging risk is part of my work.

    Say I heard there's a vampire in the graveyard that will drink your blood at night. Why take a chance going there? Only a Darwin-award candidate would take a needless risk, right?

    The question is, which way does the presumption cut? Should we assume the story is true? Assuming the story is false is taking a needless risk.

    But some people want to know if there really is a vampire in the graveyard. That's skepticism, and it's healthy.

    I heard that Glocks Kb, a lot of them. Should we throw away all Glocks, or get to the bottom of the story? On one hand, why take the risk of shooting any Glock? On the other hand, why throw a way a good gun?

    I heard that last-ditch Arisakas are iffy. I also heard this might be a misperception, confusion of actual Kbs of "school rifles" which are not the same as last-ditch Arisakas. Is it stupid for me to look into it? After all, why take a chance? Well why take a chance on shooting a Glock, or on meeting a vampire? Maybe the story is bunk, or true, or something in between.

    What if the situation were that we didn't have the serial number range on the Springfields? Suppose all we know is that some Springfields are known to be brittle. So the cautious people would say don't shoot ANY Springfield, they are all wall hangers. But some daredevil did some research and he says it should only apply to certain low-number Springfields. He's got one in the 1.2 million range and he shoots it. Is he a Darwin-award candidate? Well it depends on the facts. And the slogan, "why take a chance?" doesn't always answer the question. If it did we'd all be wearing tinfoil hats.

    The engineer is right about the possibility of meeting a 1:1 risk. But a 1:1 risk of what? Apparently the worst Springfield discovered by proof load Kb'd at 80,000lbs, and others Kb'd at "over 75,000lbs" due to 8x57 cartridges. The SAAMI limit for .30-06 is 50,000lbs.

    From that, it appears the LNS's present an unknown statistical chance of encountering a rifle that won't survive a 50% overload.

  3. #63
    Boolit Master

    Hamish's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2011
    Location
    Edge of The Crab Orchard National Wildlife Refuge
    Posts
    3,569
    http://www.jouster.com/forums/showth...-From-GB/page7

    Not presented as fuel or support for or against either side of the discussion, I simply found it interesting in context with this thread.
    More "This is what happened when I,,,,," and less "What would happen if I,,,,"

    Last of the original Group Buy Honcho's.

    "Dueling should have never been made illegal in this country. It settled lots of issues between folks."- Char-Gar

  4. #64
    Boolit Master

    lefty o's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2012
    Posts
    2,187
    lets look at things from another perspective. we all know some 03's have had catastrophic failures, and we all know people win the lottery. now you just have to ask yourself, how lucky do you feel. if you feel lucky, at least shoot it when no one else is around, so you dont have collateral damage, if by chance you got the winning #.
    what i know of them is they were heated so hot during heat treatment, that the carbon was cooked out of the steel, making them brittle. i also understand that all metals have a limited fatigue life, and everytime you fire a rifle you impart stresses to the steel. so, rolling the dice if you happen to have one of them thats is a touch on the brittle side, its possible you could fire 5,000 rounds through it without a problem, its also possible that you might fire 5rnds before failure. now i imagine brittle steel, and i know when it fails, it doesnt require anywhere near 30,000 or 40,000PSI to explode. so do you have a ticking time bomb, or did you win the lottery? your gun, your face, your life, just dont shoot it near me!

  5. #65
    Boolit Master

    lefty o's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2012
    Posts
    2,187
    Quote Originally Posted by Hamish View Post
    http://www.jouster.com/forums/showth...-From-GB/page7

    Not presented as fuel or support for or against either side of the discussion, I simply found it interesting in context with this thread.
    the pics on page 8 of that thread on jouster tell a heck of a lot.

  6. #66
    Boolit Master JHeath's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Location
    WA state/ BC mountains
    Posts
    619
    Quote Originally Posted by lefty o View Post
    lets look at things from another perspective. we all know some 03's have had catastrophic failures, and we all know people win the lottery. . . now i imagine brittle steel, and i know when it fails, it doesnt require anywhere near 30,000 or 40,000PSI to explode. so do you have a ticking time bomb, or did you win the lottery? your gun, your face, your life, just dont shoot it near me!
    I know some Glocks have had catastrophic failures. I know some N-frame Smiths have had catastrophic failures. Name every model that's had a Kb and you won't shoot anything.

    Ross Rifle, anybody? Again, it's fact dependent. Assemble it correctly and it's fine. But they've killed people, so why take the chance? Maybe we should weld them all shut and wall-hang them. "Don't shoot them next to me!"

    Do we know that the metallurgy of LNS's creates a risk of a low-pressure Kb? Or are we imagining that? Maybe you're right, I don't know. Or maybe this brittle steel degrading is on the level of being afraid of vampires.

    I know, I know, "why take a risk?" I'm not talking about taking a risk. I am talking about having a conversation about what the risks really are, without somebody calling somebody else reckless for even asking the question.

  7. #67
    Boolit Master
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Posts
    4,635
    Both 03's that failed me on firing pins weere using a a quantity of 1940 dated ball in chargers in bandoliers. One rifle had a rusted pockmarked firing pin tip and the other did not.
    Using a rifle that had a "rusty pock marked" firing pin? That sounds like user error to me.
    I expect that ammo may have been a contributing factor as well.
    Milsurp ammo once its out of the can might degrade in many ways not obvious to the eye.
    The most dangerously degraded ammo I've run across was 7.62 ammo not more than 10-15 years old at the time.

    A .303 Enfield sent its firing pin shaft and cocking piece into the shooter's face awhile back, pierced primer blew the firing pin back hard enough to break off the collar despite the vent hole in the bolt head. Stuff happens when the shooter doesn't examine a used and abused rifle closely and replace any parts that should be replaced.

    One piece firing pin conversions have been available for the Springfield 1903 since the 60's at least and probably before that.

    As for the young man who died thats tragic, and points up something I've tried to impress on those who think any particular rifle has a perfect safety record. They demand "Documented evidence" then ignore it when its finally dug up and presented, much like the Wolf Huggers and with the same sort of sliding scale to increase the birden of proof.
    Same goes for some STEN Gun fanboys who shall remain nameless. You can post cause of death "accidental discharge of STEN Gun" from news stories and official lists of casualties and first hand accounts by veteran British officers by the dozens to no avail.

    PS
    I'm still waiting to see some evidence that "the Sten Gun walks away with all the trophies" at submachine gun competitions.

  8. #68
    Boolit Master

    lefty o's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2012
    Posts
    2,187
    Quote Originally Posted by JHeath View Post
    I know some Glocks have had catastrophic failures. I know some N-frame Smiths have had catastrophic failures. Name every model that's had a Kb and you won't shoot anything.

    Ross Rifle, anybody? Again, it's fact dependent. Assemble it correctly and it's fine. But they've killed people, so why take the chance? Maybe we should weld them all shut and wall-hang them. "Don't shoot them next to me!"

    Do we know that the metallurgy of LNS's creates a risk of a low-pressure Kb? Or are we imagining that? Maybe you're right, I don't know. Or maybe this brittle steel degrading is on the level of being afraid of vampires.

    I know, I know, "why take a risk?" I'm not talking about taking a risk. I am talking about having a conversation about what the risks really are, without somebody calling somebody else reckless for even asking the question.
    while glocks,smiths, even the old 1911 have all had KB's, they havent had catastrophic failure. much less failure due to metallurgy. in almost any other instance outside of the world of -03's, all the other firearm failures ive ever seen, or heard of can be directly related to bad ammunition(factory or handloads), plugged bores, or even wrong cartridge fired in the gun. so bringing up a glock in an -03 discussion, aint exactly apples to apples. virtually every model of firearm ever made has had failures, but only one i know of has ever been attributed to bad mettalurgy (the 1903 springfield). when comparing risks (everytime you pull a trigger, you take some risk), you do have to be realistic. if you know of mettalurgical failures of a glock, or smith&wesson, im all ears, but as of yet ive never heard of a single one. the risks realistically are, even if you have a low number 1903 that had all the carbon cooked out of it (not all of them are bad, just some)during heat treatment, there is a very realistic chance that it may never experience a failure, but at the same time the 1 in a million chance exists that it may fail catastrophically causing untold harm or death to the shooter, or innocent bystanders. this is why my take is hang it up, but if you choose to shoot it, dont do it near me. no one can force anyone to shoot or not shoot a low number 03, but at least think about it, and if you choose to do so be smart about it and dont endanger nearby people. of course i no longer shoot anyone else's reloads either, i learn after 1 mistake. roll your dice, take your chances.

  9. #69
    Boolit Master

    nhrifle's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2012
    Location
    In The Sticks, NH
    Posts
    1,396
    I have a 1903 made by Springfield, SN in the high 200K (it's in the other room and I'm comfy or I would verify the actual number) that I have had for years. Shot countless numbers of rounds of military surplus and civilian ammo through it before I became an active rifle competition shooter, whereupon it became a dedicated shooter of cast boolits. The Lyman 311299 over 10 grains of Red Dot became my standard load, and with that load and that rifle I can clean an NRA 200 yard target on any given day. I think I was in my second year as a competitor when one of the guys looked at my rifle and told me I shouldn't shoot it. So I did the research and, lo and behold, my rifle was deemed to be unsafe to shoot.

    I love that rifle. Yes, I know the risks, but I continue to shoot it to this day. It is my choice, and if the receiver lets go I will have no one to blame but myself. I feel confident that the rearward bolt thrust produced by my load is not significant enough to put any real stress on the bolt or receiver. I will not, however, fire any full house loads through it. That's why I also have a Remington 1903A3.

  10. #70
    Boolit Master JHeath's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Location
    WA state/ BC mountains
    Posts
    619
    "Metallurgical failure" depends on what you expected the metal to do. Stuff a Redhawk full of Bullseye and plug the barrel and it will suffer "metallurgical failure." But it will happen at maybe 250% of the design load.

    It sounds like the worst of the LNS's will suffer metallurgical failure at 150% of the design load. From what I see, it took an abnormal load to Kb them, and the failure mode is cracking where bending would be preferable.

    How does that compare to a lot of other guns we take for granted? That guy next to you at the range shooting the Iver-Johnson top break -- what's his margin of safety? Probably no better than a LNS but we don't freak out about it. The guy on the other side with the MAS 36, is his margin any better than 150%? I never bothered to check.

    If an LNS can Kb with a normal load I share the concern. But it sounds like that's not the problem. It sounds like the problem is relative -- it blows at 150% when it's supposed to blow at 250%. IF that's correct, then maybe it's a manageable problem, just like a Redhawk is a manageable problem but with a greater margin.

    Not that I'd bother to buy a LNS just to save a few bucks. But I am interested in how people over-perceive certain risks and never think about others. Like people afraid of flying but cheerfully riding in cars.

  11. #71
    Boolit Grand Master


    Larry Gibson's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Location
    Lake Havasu City, Arizona
    Posts
    21,300
    "while glocks,smiths, even the old 1911 have all had KB's, they havent had catastrophic failure. much less failure due to metallurgy. in almost any other instance outside of the world of -03's, all the other firearm failures ive ever seen, or heard of can be directly related to bad ammunition(factory or handloads), plugged bores, or even wrong cartridge fired in the gun. so bringing up a glock in an -03 discussion, aint exactly apples to apples. virtually every model of firearm ever made has had failures, but only one i know of has ever been attributed to bad mettalurgy (the 1903 springfield). when comparing risks (everytime you pull a trigger, you take some risk), you do have to be realistic. if you know of mettalurgical failures of a glock, or smith&wesson, im all ears, but as of yet ive never heard of a single one. the risks realistically are, even if you have a low number 1903 that had all the carbon cooked out of it (not all of them are bad, just some)during heat treatment, there is a very realistic chance that it may never experience a failure, but at the same time the 1 in a million chance exists that it may fail catastrophically causing untold harm or death to the shooter, or innocent bystanders. this is why my take is hang it up, but if you choose to shoot it, dont do it near me."

    And that is the exact problem here; there is no proof any LSN'd '03 ever had a catastrophic failure due to "attributed to bad mettalurgy". Like all the others mentioned the cause was "directly related to bad ammunition(factory or handloads), plugged bores, or even wrong cartridge fired in the gun". That is exactly the same as you point out with all other firearms. It was also the exact point of my previous post.

    As to the injuries of the LSN '03 failures compare all the injuries from "all the other firearm failures ive ever seen, or heard of". You will find them almost identical. The real "problem" if there actually is one, if from the fear mongering statements such as "but at the same time the 1 in a million chance exists that it may fail catastrophically causing untold harm or death to the shooter, or innocent bystanders. this is why my take is hang it up, but if you choose to shoot it, dont do it near me. no one can force anyone to shoot or not shoot a low number 03, but at least think about it, and if you choose to do so be smart about it and dont endanger nearby people."

    Again, no dog in this fight as I don't own a LSN '03 (but would if the OP wants to give me his?) but I have shot a lot of service loads in a few and lots of cast bullet loads also (mostly the 311299 or 311284 over 4895 w/a Dacron filler of with surplus 4831). I choose to consider facts. The fact is shooting is inherently risky with any firearm. The actual accidents, firearm failures and injuries tell us that. Yet we all assume that risk. I do not make my decision based on emotional sentiments not based on facts. That is my decision, everyone is free to make their own w/o all the "whoa is me, the sky is falling, the world will end and you will kill everyone on the firing line by even thinking about shooting a LSN '03 talk".

    If it so dangerous firing LSN '03s without using bad ammunition (I don't use that in any firearm), w/o having a bore obstruction (I go to great lengths to avoid that in every firearm) and w/o shooting the wrong ammunition in the '03 (I also go to great lengths to avoid that) Then show us the facts (not the emotions). Show us the documented failures of '03s w/o any of the above causes that just "failed" due to the metallurgy. Show us the documented fatalities of shooters and bystanders of such failures. Show us facts, not emotion. But again, your choice to shoot or not is yours, I could just do w/o the other is all.

    Larry Gibson

  12. #72
    Boolit Master
    Join Date
    Apr 2007
    Location
    Annapolis,Md
    Posts
    2,664
    I'll side with Larry on this one. I have been shooting low # '03's for over 40 years with never an exciting moment, albeit with mostly low pressure cast loads- but that's pretty much 80-90% of my shooting with everything. If the failure rate of LN '03's is provably higher (from simple metal failure vs. "stupid human tricks") than any other rifle made in the millions, I'll jump off the bandwagon right quick. The only low number rifles I would automatically cast a wary eye upon would be those built after we got into WWI and before the heat treating was changed. The problem never raised its ugly head until they started running the heat treat department 24/7 and hired on a bunch of newbie heat treaters- leading to the infamous "shifting light phenomenon" blamed on the inaccuracy of the heat treating. I would actually be wary of any vintage Springfield fitted with an early straight handle bolt made with simple carburizing more so than the very early receiver it may be riding in, too. Statistically, any rifles made in quantities of hundreds of thousands or millions are sure to have failures- documented or not.

    Edit: As for the unfortunate instances quoted above by our erstwhile forum member, my heartfelt sympathies go out to the lad who was killed when a LN rifle let go. But, how do we know for a fact 30+ years later that a hot-rodded handload or some other dumb trick that would have laid-low any rifle wasn't the cause of the blowup? Even eye witness accounts of the incident could easily be fudged in the interest of belaying blame away from some human being? I don't know, and neither can anybody else. Primers/cases in a batch of vintage ball ammo can be compromised to a fare-thee-well by improper storage or storage adjacent to nefarious chemicals the fumes of which could do un-noticeable harm to ammo components. Case in point: I stashed a couple bandoleers of nice clean 1950's British arsenal .303 MKVII ammo in a "junk" drawer along with a couple partial used bottles of Sweets 7.62 Bore Solvent. After lying neglected for the best part of a decade, when I went shoot up the ammo it was spotted with green verdigris (or something of that nature) that pretty much wiped clean with towels and steel wool. I had misfires, hangfires, and cases that cracked upon firing. It had to have been the ammonia vapors from the Sweets that caused it, since another couple bandoliers out of the same sealed case that were stored in a drawer across the room all by itself was perfectly fine and exhibited none of the squirrely behavior that the "contaminated" stuff did. I could've taken that spurious but nice looking ammo to a show and foisted it off on some poor unsuspecting schmuck and no one but me would have been the wiser. Instead, the remainder of the unfired ammo now lies under five years worth of garbage in a landfill somewhere.
    Last edited by gnoahhh; 07-14-2014 at 12:22 PM.

  13. #73
    Boolit Master

    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Location
    East Tn
    Posts
    3,785
    Pointing to the "statistics" as proof is no more reliable here than anecdotal evidence simply because we don't have all the numbers, not even close! Does anyone honestly think that every incidence of every, if any, failure is documented? Gew98 points out a serious incident and gets BS called on him because someone else has never heard of it or can't find documented record of it, come on now! It's highly likely that there could have been many failures in the civilian sector that were never reported as such, especially from 50-60 years or so ago. It's a known fact these things were improperly built and they have a known defect, it was enough to cause serious concern to the military at the time. A military that had every reason to want to keep these rifles in service so they would have all kinds of incentive to find another reason for these failures, sure they were pressed into service but battlefield injuries from blown up rifles (if indeed there were any, who knows?) would likely have been just listed as causalities of the battle, would any of the brass been willing to admit substandard rifles were pressed into service?


    The bottom line is most of the rifles are probably ok but some are not and if you have one of those that is not all the statistics anyone can dredge up is not going to protect the shooter, it's a guessing game as to which ones are safe but the potential results of guessing wrong could be catastrophic! This is a known defect and it's irresponsible for someone to downplay the hazards to others just because they don't want to believe it themselves!
    Last edited by oldred; 07-14-2014 at 03:18 PM.

  14. #74
    Boolit Master

    lefty o's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2012
    Posts
    2,187
    seems no one wanted to look at the link put up to the jouster page, one look at page 8 of that will tell you a complete different story to compare against other guns blowing up. guns with good steel in them dont shatter into pieces like that. good steel bends to failure, it doesnt shatter like that. if something can shatter like that, you are sitting on a grenade. if your all brave enough, hey its your eye's/life, not mine, but dont shoot it around me.

  15. #75
    Boolit Master

    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Location
    East Tn
    Posts
    3,785
    Sure some of us looked at it and it's well worth checking out but those who don't want to admit there's a problem will find a way to dismiss that evidence just like all the rest, as for the rest of us it was just more evidence of what we were already aware of. In any case thanks for posting that as it's a real eye opener (or permanent eye closer as the case may be!) and I am sure lots of folks saw it. That very well may have been one of those undocumented cases I firmly believe are out there and if so how many more are there? When one of these things blows up, and it apparently does happen as evidenced by that link, and no one is seriously injured would it be logical to think it would become part of the documented statistics either way? Obviously these things are not blowing up everyday in mass numbers but if a person owns one and decides to shoot it how many times and just how often would it need to blow up, really? Obviously it has happened in the past and apparently fairly recently so I ask again is it not being quite irresponsible to downplay this very real hazard and recommend to others they ignore the warnings?

  16. #76
    Boolit Master

    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Location
    East Tn
    Posts
    3,785
    Hatcher also made an observation on the 1903 receivers:

    "It is almost startling to note how sharply the failures stop about the numbers marking the change in heat treatment, that is, at approximately No. 800,000 for Springfield and No. 285,507 for Rock Island, in spite of the fact that the record continued for twelve years after this change in heat treatment went into effect."


    If I am reading this right Hatcher is pointing out that it is "startling" how sharply the failure rate dropped during the next twelve years after the heat treating method was changed, and that does not mean anything at all?

  17. #77
    Boolit Master

    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Location
    East Tn
    Posts
    3,785
    Try to laugh it down if you like but Hatcher's note "it's startling to note how sharply the failures stop about the numbers marking the change in heat treatment," (the higher numbered rifles) pretty much tells the story.

  18. #78
    Boolit Grand Master


    Larry Gibson's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Location
    Lake Havasu City, Arizona
    Posts
    21,300
    Quote Originally Posted by lefty o View Post
    seems no one wanted to look at the link put up to the jouster page, one look at page 8 of that will tell you a complete different story to compare against other guns blowing up. guns with good steel in them dont shatter into pieces like that. good steel bends to failure, it doesnt shatter like that. if something can shatter like that, you are sitting on a grenade. if your all brave enough, hey its your eye's/life, not mine, but dont shoot it around me.
    I did bother to look at that thread as I've looked at it before. On page 8 I believe you are referring to the blown LSN '03 in post #73(?). Here's the photo of the blown case that caused the damage. Note it was that round that caused the damage not the poor heat treatment of the receiver. Given the apparent very high pressure that round generated I am amazed that LSN '03 held together as well as it did. Note on the photo below (same one as in that thread/post) the indication of extremely high pressure in the expanded primer pocket, the expanded case head and the rupture at the case head. Also note that even though the claim is "normal load" the case to the right is not the same head stamp as the ruptured case and probably was "normal". It should be blatantly obvious the ruptured case was because of an SEE, extreme overload or a bore obstruction. It was the ruptured case that destroyed the gun. The heat treatment of the receiver did not cause the destruction.

    "Good steels" do shatter and cause very similar destruction of newly made and newly designed firearms when the cause is the same as we see in this case. There was a site that showed numerous such destroyed modern firearms with quality steel and heat treatment. The injuries to the shooters in those were similar as with the reported LSN '03 shown. I will look for it and post it if I find it. If anyone else has that site please post. It will be very enlightening to the unenlightened.

    Larry Gibson

    Attachment 110617

  19. #79
    Boolit Grand Master


    Larry Gibson's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Location
    Lake Havasu City, Arizona
    Posts
    21,300
    Quote Originally Posted by oldred View Post
    Try to laugh it down if you like but Hatcher's note "it's startling to note how sharply the failures stop about the numbers marking the change in heat treatment," (the higher numbered rifles) pretty much tells the story.
    It's also "startling to note" how the failures stopped once that bad lot of ammunition was used up. Coincidentily that occurred just about the time the DHT receivers started to be really used. Also note Hatcher lists several similar failures with DHT receivers. Point is the "failure" was not of the receiver but of the ammunition used or from bore obstructions (still a common problem in the services). The Ordnance department goes to great lengths to ensure quality of ammunition these day, unlike they did back then. Any defect shown to be ammunition caused which can cause damage to weapons or personal and the entire lot is recalled and destroyed period.

    Larry Gibson

  20. #80
    Boolit Master

    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Location
    East Tn
    Posts
    3,785
    Hatcher specifically pointed out the sharp drop in failures in rifles SO MARKED under the numbers when the change in heat treatment occurred, ["startling to note how sharply the FAILURES STOP ABOUT THE NUMBERS MARKING CHANGE IN HEAT TREATMENT"], clearly he was referring to receivers with low numbers and not about the time the change was made in ammunition. You then state definitively that the failure was of the ammunition and not the receiver when you have no way of knowing that! You might, or might not, be correct but your OPINION is not a definitive fact, Hatcher was clearly referring to the LSN receivers when he made that statement so it would seem his opinion is somewhat different than yours.

Page 4 of 16 FirstFirst 1234567891011121314 ... LastLast

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •  
Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check