Possible cause of BPS misfire

[yorgi]

Had myself an opportunity at a standing turkey at less than twenty yards yesterday but my workhorse BPS unfortunately let me down...

Mounted, aimed and pressed the trigger only to hear a "click", turkey exited the scene but as luck would have it another less-lucky one appeared shortly after.
The second shot fired properly, no issues, nice deep firing pin dent on the primer. I have owned this gun for over twenty years and this is the first time I've had such an issue.
Maintain it religiously after the end of every season, disassemble, clean, lubricate and reassemble properly.

Could this be an isolated incident or should I be looking to replace a part? Shells were Winchester Longbeard.

 

[cosmic]

I dont think you can draw a firm conclusion. However, I would try to fire the dud again. If it doesnt fire, then I would assume bad ammo. FWIW - Winchester shotgun ammo, with the exception of the AA shells, seems to be winning the race to the bottom. The primer on the dud looks wierd...

 

[yorgi]

Thank you cosmic, now that you mentioned it I can see that, will try to fire the dud next time i'm out.

I have been touting the Longbeard shell as the cat's derriere for a long time now but this incident marred my opinion of it. In addition to the misfire, a post-mortem on the second turkey revealed multiple (dozen plus) #6 pellets that had entered the neck skin but had failed to penetrate the flesh. Normally, you would not expect to see this in a twenty yard hit.

 

[Lodi]

Could this be an isolated incident or should I be looking to replace a part?

An "isolated incident", that is something that should be answered by you rather than asked.

~ Check that the firing pin moves freely and that it does not have burrs.
~ Check for debris in the area of the Lock and it's recess in the barrel.
~ Check that the hammer moves freely.
~ Weak Hammer Spring?

 

[Lastgun]

Looks like a combination of light firing pin strike plus off center primer contact equals no ignition.

Depending on the shape of the primer anvil the off center light firing pin strike may have missed pinching the primer cup to anvil completely.

 

[bb07]

I dont think you can draw a firm conclusion. However, I would try to fire the dud again. If it doesnt fire, then I would assume bad ammo. FWIW - Winchester shotgun ammo, with the exception of the AA shells, seems to be winning the race to the bottom. The primer on the dud looks wierd...

Definitely a strange looking primer. Mfg defect?

 

[BattleRife]

I don't see anything unusual about the primer, other than it's struck way off-centre.

 

[IanON]

Primer is all squishy looking, kinda bubbly...

 

[270 totheend]

The misfire appears to have a radial ring on the primer inside the battery cup. The OP also doesn’t say if the primer is flush with the battery cup or if unfired shells are/are not.

 

[kamlooky]

Pull the pellet end of the shell.
Drain contents including powder.
Cut the crimp off.
Try it again.

 

[yorgi]

The misfire appears to have a radial ring on the primer inside the battery cup. The OP also doesn’t say if the primer is flush with the battery cup or if unfired shells are/are not.

Was unsure of what to tell you, so I checked, defective shell had primer flush with head, pic below.

Pull the pellet end of the shell.
Drain contents including powder.
Cut the crimp off.
Try it again.

Thanks kamlooky, I did! Had to cut the shell really-really short to remove contents, the only way I could load it was to remove barrel, insert and reassemble. Fired the empty hull and it went bang!
After removal I noticed that brass base of shell was caved-in and primer lifted up from pocket. I don't think I can read anything from that, probably due to the fact that there was no mass ahead of the explosion.

So the primer did not appear to be faulty, the second firing pin dent is obviously more substantial than the first one which points to a gun rather than ammo issue.

Dumb question ahead... shell in question was loaded on opening day, first thing in the morning. Under any other condition, I load the shells from the magazine with authority, in this case I eased the action forward gingerly as to not wake up the forest. Old habit I have is to always pull back on the forend after loading to check it's properly locked it's an OCD thing...did it this time as well. Could the soft closing of the action have caused the misfire?

Attached some pics of the innards of the Longbeard shell, thought it's components look interesting enough to share.

 

[Lodi]

Could the soft closing of the action have caused the misfire?

If the action was not fully closed and lock-up not attained a misfire can occur.

 

[Al Bear]

Nothing wrong with the gun. I’ve experienced misfires in both shotguns and rifles. When a misfire happens , there’s no back pressure on the primer so the dimple is kinda feeble looking compared to a dimple on the primer of a fired shell. I’ve tried to reload the misfired primers into empty shells and keep pulling the tigger until they fire. - waste of time. Finally I threw them into a bonfire and they popped nicely. My guess is the anvil was missing or defective.

 

[just having some fun]

Unless you can repeat the problem, its a random occurrence

first day ????? in 6 months or more of not being used = Gremlins

Watch out for the GREMLINS


DO Not feed Gremlins after Midnight

 

[kamlooky]

I've done this numerous times to check the operation of the firing pin on used shotguns.
Never ever have I seen what has occurred in your example of the spent primer.
I'd try it again with a different shell.

Something frick'in weird going on there.

 

[sjstrey]

The only way you’ll know if it was an isolated incident is to wait and see. Give it a good cleaning including the bolt, then shoot off a few rounds.

 

[Brassman66]

For peace of mind I would pull the Firing Pin and inspect carefully. If everything look's OK then its likely the Shell.

Few weeks ago I bought at a very attractive price a used Norinco 1897 Winchester clone Trench Gun. First Shell fired second Shell not. Upon inspection I found the Firing Pin was kind of Stuck so I took everything apart (quite easy to do) and found the Firing Pin had an all mangled up Coil spring. Replaced the Coilspring with a shortened Coilspring taken from a Fountain Pen and no problem since.

Cheers

 

[cosmic]

Well - My WAG is that the primer pocket had not been drilled for a flash hole. All the primer pressure was directed at the shell base, causing it to distort.

 

[kamlooky]

Well - My WAG is that the primer pocket had not been drilled for a flash hole. All the primer pressure was directed at the shell base, causing it to distort.

Well that there is just good thinking.

Pull the primer and see what mistery lies beeneeth.

 

[AP]

Well - My WAG is that the primer pocket had not been drilled for a flash hole. All the primer pressure was directed at the shell base, causing it to distort.

Interesting - but why didnt the primer ignite when it was struck the first time.