An unusual case failure.

Andy said:
I just loaded up a batch of 50 nickel-plated 303 Brit for their fourth firing, so nickel-plating does not guarantee short case life. Lots of firings out of some nickel 30-06, 243 and 44 Mag as well.

I wonder if that batch missed the final annealing?
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OK .......... I gotta ask .......... where do you find nickel plated 303 Brit ???? I don't think I'd buy it or use it since it would be harder to resize & reload but damn it would look sweet! One round for the 303 collection might be cool too!
 
BigUglyMan said:
Ted, you posted that then went to bed? Way to stir the pot!
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Bedded a 9.3X62, had a good sleep, company for brunch who stayed until after noon, took the 9.3 out of the stock, back in the zone now. :)

Interesting replies. This is the first time I have ever seen this type of failure, but obviously others have seen it before.

We noticed it right away, because we never throw away brass at the range, but I am wondering what might have happened if it had happened to the guy in the excitement of a hunting situation?

mbogo3, is that how the 280 ended up being destroyed?

Ted
 
boltonscouter said:
OK .......... I gotta ask .......... where do you find nickel plated 303 Brit ???? I don't think I'd buy it or use it since it would be harder to resize & reload but damn it would look sweet! One round for the 303 collection might be cool too!
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It's discontinued Remington. I can't break up the set of 50 unfortunately - nice to use in competitions where there are 10 other guys shooting 303 Brit.
 
Eagleye said:
Ted, I wonder if this might be one of the rare times when the bullet makes a
metallurgical bond to the inside of the neck. [I have seen this happen a couple of times]

When it was fired it pulled the neck off, then shed it as the bullet entered the rifling.

Was the piece of neck you removed split?

Regards, Dave.
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Hi Dave,

The piece of neck was not split. I think I may have it around here still. Will post a picture if it is.

Possible that it could have been some type of bond taken place. I have seen that with regular brass cases, as well. I always seat the bullets a tad deeper before trying to pull them with my RCBs collet die. Many times there is both an audible and tensile crack when the bullet seat deeper.

Rick tried, gently, to chamber a round to see what would happen. The bullet of the new round jammed of course, and could not be chambered. We got it out with a bristle brush pushed into the neck, and then pulled back. The piece came out with the bristle. Easy fix, but am still wondering how tight it might have been jammed in an exciting moment.

Ted
 
Sherlock Gnomes said:
I just saw a Hornady 22-250 case in brass that had separated in the reloading die. The neck was scored all around the rim at the shoulder. Once fired only too.
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Sometimes odd things happen. I just removed a broken forward section of a .223 case from a friend's rifle. The case was a Lake City, first time reloaded, minimally resized. The break was about half way up the body of the case, way farther forward than typically caused by case stretch. The only explanation I can come up with is that the case had been annealed too far down when made.
 
I had the same failure with sellior and bellot 22-250 i fired three rds from a new box and two failed the same,i pulled the rest with incredible resistance, I actually broke a hammer type bullet puller,punched the primers and threw the rest of the box in the scrap brass bucket.
 
I was thinking the same thing. I've got a lot 300 WM brass that the Old Man originally bought in 1993 and reloaded at least 3 or 4 times since then, maybe more. Only problem I ever had was that I ripped a rim off a case that got stuck in my sizing die.
 
I doubt that the nickel coating had much to do with this failure other than possibly being more prone to mating with the jacket material. I suspect a flaw in the case forming process causing a slight fold at the failure junction, super hardening it during the remainder of the forming process and causing it to fail before the case length even expanded to fill the chamber. Add this to a somewhat bonded bullet/case neck and voila we have this failure.
That's a new one for me too, Ted, never had one do that. I'm going to guess this is a quite old factory round, that's been shelved for a decade or two?? I'm sure there are metallurgists who can confirm or deny this, out there, but I've heard that nickel plating of brass will cause the brass to lose it's elasticity and take on more properties of the nickel over extended periods of time. This is also what happens when the bullet welds it's self to the case neck, that there is actually a transfer of elements between the two metals, or possibly just from the nickel to the copper of the jacket material.
I know copper will, for a fact, draw carbon from a brush if left in contact and unmoved for an extended period of time.
 
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I had a failure like that in a Rem. 700, calibre 6mm Remington. But the end results were much worse - the gun was damaged beyond repair and I consider myself lucky, as I only got a good whack on the cheekbone, slightly sore shoulder from recoil, and a bunch of small drips of blood off the front of my face below my right eye. Lucky I had glasses on or I likely would have got some small bits of junk in my eye.

In my case (no pun intended) the bullet took the neck down the barrel with it. I can't imagine what the pressures must have been. But there must have been quite a spray of metal coming out of the end of the barrel; my Chrony which was set up survived but has a lot of spots and dints where junk hit it.

I had just annealed a batch of cases as per directions from my Lyman reloading book. The cases were probably on their 4th or 5th loading. I have been afraid to anneal ever since, just chuck the cases after a few loadings.

It really scared me, in fact it took a couple of years to even go back to the range.......





 
Should have mentioned: the dent in the case shoulder is from the steel rod used to knock the case back out of the chamber. After the shot the action was pretty solid. I tapped the bolt upwards with a piece of wood, that part went ok but when I tried to pull the bolt back by tapping on the handle I knocked it off - the silver solder gave up.

At the case head brass flowed any place it could, even replacing part of the "three rings of steel". No longer a rimless case......slightly enlarged primer pocket too.....
 
I have always found nickle Plated cases FAR easier to size.

Incidently, I just went through an issue with bulk Winchester nickle plated 280 rem brass.
Out of 200 cases, around 15 of them were actually 270 win cases with 280 rem headstamps!

I fired three of them before I noticed the BRIGHT ring around the case head! Upon measuring ALL the other cases, the 280case guage found 12 more mixed within my batch!

Unbelievably poor quality control! Terribly dangerous mistake for them to make!
I took the remainder of those cases, and expanded the necks up to 308. Then partially sized the cases untill I got a crush fit when I closed the bolt. At least I saved thoses cases, and made use of them.

If you want to see the details of my measurements on these cases, look up the thread in:

http://www.canadiangunnutz.com/forum/showthread.php/995532-Perplexing-issues-with-a-280-Rem!
 
I'm a little suspicious of nickel plated brass myeslf.

Several years back my brother purchased some factory Winchester ammo, 338 win mag, nickel cases, 230 grain Failsafes. He fired 6-8 rounds and found that accuracy was terrible, and that the rifle sounded "off". He examined his fired brass and found that they had significantly split necks. Examined the new, unfired rounds and found a couple had split necks before even being fired. Not impressive for $65 a box ammo :(, so back to the store it all went.
 
I'd look elsewhere for the cause before I blamed a nickled case.
"...Thought Federal brass was supposed to be soft..." It's known to be softer than other brands. That case failed for another reason.
 
Copper and nickel are capable of combining in a solid solution - which is what all the various alloys of the two metals are (eg Monel). Its not unreasonable to think that these two metals could stick together under certain environmental conditions. After all, copper is used as a prep coating for various types of chromium and nickel plating.
 
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