DON'T let the bolt slam home on an already chambered round

CanuckR

CanuckR

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But You know better than that........ So did I.

So I was at the range, I had been running a new 10.5 AR pretty hard, decided to heat up the M14 a bit.
Ran a few mags through her, I guess while I was bombing up mags I put an extra round in my pocket, after my last mag ran out I threw the round in the chamber dropped the mag out and as I smacked the cocking handle to let the bolt fly home I realized what I just did. Too late.... I had a slam fire, that fired out of battery, causing a case head separation, as well as the right locking lug to get sheared off the bolt. Luckily I was shooting a few lanes over from anybody, I escaped almost unscathed, just a small cut on my nose and a small piece of the metal stuck in my finger I dug out after the range day.
I found the right bolt lug but was unable to find the case head, or any of the bolt guts.
Doesn't appear to be any real damage to the rest of the gun, but I haven't looked too hard yet.
Here are some pictures.

So if ANYONE has a spare M14 bolt they want to part with please let me know. I don't see a point in putting a USGI bolt in it, the gun is used for CQB type shooting more than anything else. But I may have to.







The last picture shows a small deformation in the receiver from the bolt.
 
Damn! And a VERY good reminder for anyone running M14 rifles to LOAD FROM THE MAG!!!

Glad you were not more seriously hurt!

Thank you for posting, it's reinforced the LOAD FROM THE MAG rule for me!

Cheers
Jay
 
Wow! I feel pretty stupid because I didn't know you weren't supposed to do that. Thanks for the lesson, I'm glad it never caused me a problem.
 
Like I said. I knew better. I have many times hand loaded a round and closed the action 1/2 to 3/4 of the way before letting the bolt go with absolutely zero issues. Or I ride the handle closed and give it a smack with my hand to ensure the bolt cammed into place. No personal issues with that either.
Complacency (sp?)... that's pretty much what happened.
Hopefully others learn from my mistake.

Can someone post a picture of their M305 barrel at the feed ramps like I did. Chalkriver mentioned perhaps a missing piece of barrel. I went and looked, and I THINK it was machined that way but am not 100%.
Thanks
 
I remember reading this in the Springfield M1 Garand manual. Guess its the same for the M14.

"Always load the M1 Garand from the clip. Placing the shell directly in the chamber allows the bolt to slam forward harder
than it would if the shell had to be stripped from the clip. When this occurs the inertia firing pin can come in contact with the
cartridge primer with sufficient force to cause a "slam fire". A "slam fire" can occur even if you are not pulling the trigger and
even if the safety is on. The use of handloads increases the chance of a "slam fire" and should not be used. When releasing
the bolt to load a cartridge in the chamber you should always hold the gun firmly and keep it pointed in a safe direction."
 
boss351cleveland said:
What ammo were you running ? This is why its better to shoot ammo with hard Milspec type primers in the M14 and Garand , If you reload use Winchester or CCI milspec primers. .
Click to expand...

Yes AND NO... Yes, use milspec primers, but even then, NEVER place a round in the chamber of an M14 & let the bolt slam onto it, NEVER!

Cheers
Jay
 
They were hand loads, using CCI 200 primers, I don't think it was the primers fault. I've run well over 1500 rds of hand loads through this gun all using cci 200's. 45 grains of WC735 with a 110 gr. fmj bullet. I've normally been running the 150 fmj's but thought I would try the 110's because they are cheaper and inside 100M it doesn't matter.
I don't think it was a powder/primer problem.
 
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