Well, That Was A First!

[Luke'sScreenName]

Double

 

[Luke'sScreenName]

So, how bad did you jerk the trigger? Be honest! Lol.

When I was a kid my dad would frequently fool me with an unloaded chamber when sighting in to see if I was jerking.

 

[Andy in Gap]

Was it cold? There are cases up North here where low temps cause any excess lubricant to thicken and slow down the firing pin causing a FTF. Not likely in your location but something to consider.

 

[Gary Fowler]

It could also have been excess gun oil left in the chamber that soaked into the primer if you let the gun set for a long time with a round chambered. That is usually the cause of a misfire when none of the other issues mentioned here are present.

I don't have a lot of misfires on center-fire, but several lately on rim-fire shells.
My neighbor was having an issue with our 38 Special reloads not firing in his lever action gun. It would fire factory rounds everytime but not the reloads. My rifle fired the same round fine. He took it to a gunsmith and found that the previous owner had softened up everything on the gun so it was easier to shift a round and fire it during Cowboy Action Shooting. He softened up the hammer spring just a bit too much. I guess my reload primers were a bit harder than the factory round. After replacing the hammer spring, it worked fine.

 

[Gary Fowler]

Sorry you missed your deer by the way.

 

[Soundguy]

Gary, you might have seated your primers deeper too!.

 

[gwstang]

I didn't reload these, they came from a factory. I'll see if that round will fire by trying it again in a coupe of days. I've shot lots of deer, so no deer fever for me anymore. I do remember as a kid that I would shake like a tree in a hurricane...lol. I remember being around ten and sitting on a creek bank at a hunting club with my father. The biggest buck ever (looked like an elephant to me...lol) came out with a rocking chair on his head. All I could do was point and say big deer...big deer...My dad laughed and said why don't you shoot at it? I plum forgot that I had a 16 gauge with buck shot in it sitting in my hands. It slipped away and alas I was still a rookie. Got the next one though, a couple of years later. I've shot a buck off my front porch and off my back porch so there are deer around here for sure. Some of these people around here will shoot at anything, I tend to let 'em grow up a little at least.:confused2:

 

[nybirdman]

Was this Remington ammo;seems I remember them having a couple bad batches of center fire ammo.

 

[k0ua]

Look at it this way, go back 200 years, with a nice flintlock rifle on a damp day, you had about a 50 50 chance of the firearm going off or not. Depending on how dry you were able to keep the lock, its priming charge and main charge of black powder. Now a days we post on an internet forum the actual rarity of a round of ammunition not going bang when we did our part. Yes it is rare enough to note, and 200 years ago it was an everyday fact of hunting life. Go back 350 years to the matchlock era and you wonder why people messed with firearms at all. How do you keep a smoldering piece of treated rope smoldering to jam in the touchhole of your "smokepole". I think I would have really rather had a long bow or crossbow. We have come a long way. Soon perhaps we will have electronic smart guns that wont fire at all... We can come full circle.

 

[Arky217]

I know the feeling; reading this story makes me recall an incident I had 46 years
ago as a young greenhorn living in the Alaskan wilderness.

I stepped out of my cabin door one morning; the temp was about 30 or 40 below, can't remember exactly.
Not 20 feet from the cabin were fresh wolf tracks; I mean really fresh.
Quietly as I could, I went back in, got dressed and got my Win. 70, 30-06.
Didn't really think I would spot one, but I thought I would try since I was broke, and at that time, there was a
$50 bounty and a sure $100 for the hide.

Went only about a hundred yards when I spotted a small clearing about 50 yards away.
Small voice in my head said train rifle on clearing and wait a while.
Wasn't long that I saw a black wolf lope across the clearing, but I didn't have time to take a shot.
Again the voice said keep the scope on the clearing.
Amazingly, the wolf backtracked and actually stopped in the clearing, looking around.
I put the crosshairs on him and squeezed the trigger; nothing, not even a click.

Didn't take long to realize what happened.
Snow had fell onto the bolt, melted, ran onto the firing pin, then refroze.

So, there I was trying to warm up the bolt with my hand to loosen the firing pin, while,
for some reason, that black wolf continued to hang around in that clearing.

Then suddenly I heard a soft sound to my left and what do I see but
a huge brown head of another wolf peering at me from behind a spruce not 30 feet away.

We stared at each other for about 3 seconds, then it quietly went back into the bush.
The black wolf was still in the clearing and with my hand still on the bolt, suddenly, BOOM, the rifle fired.

After the noise of the rifle died down, I could hear both wolves running off.
I was rather sick from realizing how foolish I was not to have left my rifle on the outside wall
of the cabin. You can be sure that is where it stayed from then on !