Thread: What happens when a 50 cal rifle blows up.

Those glasses sure did their job, plus some.

That was a terrific explosion alright, he was damn lucky the piece that missed his head and took has hat off did miss otherwise he wouldn't be here today. One lucky dude, God must have been watching over him.

Originally Posted by Mohawk .308

Bloody lucky alright, I think I’ll stick to my 308..

Seen a 308 do way worse

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Originally Posted by Bol Tackshin

My bad typing, sorry. Yep 1000 yards / 900m it was. Terrifying!!!

Yeah that video is terrifying. Cuts the ear off his muffs.

Originally Posted by BRADS

Seen a 308 do way worse

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what happened ?

A couple of things too come outa this situation

YES PLEASE EVERYONE WEAR PROPER EYE PROTECTION ( & I mean at least specked polys ) when doing range - gong - sight in - practice.,

WTF is this guy shooting ? sorry for my ignorance but a "break open" 50bmg ( yes has a screw cap ) shooting some old army flame throwers just looks like an accident waiting to happen.

GOB BLESS lol

Would bet my 50bmg Noreen would not have failed like that.
Seams like a piss weak design.
Always have safety glasses on.


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Originally Posted by akaroa1

Wow
The fail safe was only to close the breech correctly and not an over pressure fail safe

I guess they assumed that in over pressure the barrel stub would expend and the threads would not let go
The back thrust must have been colossal to overcome the shank expansion and strip those threads
I wonder what if any destruction testing was done by the manufacturer ?
I also wonder if there was significant throat erosion starting in the barrel and it was riveting the projectiles
There is never just one thing that goes wrong
It's a cluster F of things that contribute to total failure
I know this from experience

I reckon the round was oiled inadvertently or charged with the wrong powder.

There are thousands of screw breach artillery peices out there that worked just fine.

Originally Posted by norsk

There are thousands of screw breach artillery peices out there that worked just fine.

Aye, but were they not usually fitted with some sort of recoil dissipating system and positioned skywards, hence if it did vent out of the breech it would be directed downwards? (still a bad day though!)

Originally Posted by caberslash

Aye, but were they not usually fitted with some sort of recoil dissipating system and positioned skywards, hence if it did vent out of the breech it would be directed downwards? (still a bad day though!)

No

Interupted thread breeches preceeded mechanical recoil dampning.

Interupted thread breeches have half the amount of bearing surface as a entirely threaded breech plug does.Breech plugs being introduced in the matchlock age continuing to today in modern reproduction muzzle loaders still using a threaded breech plug.

Where ever the the barrel is pointing makes no odds
If the breech lets go .

Interrupted thread typically has a much different (meatier) cross section profile, like the old rear-locking Remington bolts. What the maker seems to have used there is a standard triangular profile thread. It is basically the same as a pipe bomb end cap, and those are expected to let go... Also, as that end cap heats up, it’s expanding and less of the thread is meshing. It would still be doing up tight, but the meshing would be a lesser surface area progressively.

Originally Posted by Mohawk .308

Tell us more....

I think you'll find that story is permanently suppressed

The word "detonation" springs to mind, a seriously dodgy "someone-elses-hand-load". With detonation, guns just don't hold up.

Interesting how the fail safe "ears" broke off and in the process the frame broke. As akaroa1 said, not a fail safe, seemingly there just to make sure the breech cap was fully screwed on.

I wonder if the gun would have failed more safely if tempered towards more toughness, less hardness/brittleness @gundoc?

Also, it would perhaps be desirable to deliberately weaken the front of the barrel hinge so that if things blow the barrel flies forwards on the receiver if that cap goes back. The safety "ears" might have a better chance to work then. Designing towards "safe failure" instead of pure faith in that screw lid seems in order -- the assumption being that "detonation WILL happen", eventually, to someone.

He called it a freak accident but I think he was playing Russian Roulette with his supply of dodgy ammo.

Also the manufacturer's claim that the piece was good for 85,000 psi seemed a bit light but have since found this data for proof testing a 50 BMG -

"Small arms proof testing
A small arms proof round is loaded to a higher than normal service pressure, stressing both the gun barrel and breech during firing. This can be due to a heavy projectile fired using the standard propelling charge, the standard projectile fired with a different propellant type or weight, or combinations of charge and bullet weight to give the required proofing pressure. Minimum proof testing pressures are specified by the owner of the cartridge specification, such as C.I.P. or SAAMI for most commercial cartridges or NATO EPVAT testing for appropriate military cartridges.

An example proofing round for the .50 BMG (12.7 × 99 mm) is the "cartridge, caliber .50, test, high pressure, M1". This uses the standard-weight .50 BMG M1 round propellant (240 gr of WC860), but a bullet weighing 999 gr (+/- 11 gr). The M1 proof round gives a proofing pressure of ~65,000 psi, 11,000 psi (~17%) above the standard service pressure."

So the manufacturers claim of 85,000 was well above proofing load of 65,000. So what the hell was the cartridge that he fired loaded with??

What actions are actually safe ? Are Martini style actions the safest ? Confirms to me that having a powerful cartridge loaded to starting loads is a lot better than trying to squeeze the last fps out of a lower powered round.