Thread: bolt failure P14

very lucky

eddystone

Originally Posted by Sideshow

Do you know what the original caliber used to be?
Was the bolt head machined to fit the new caliber?

.303 rechambered by reputed gunsmith

Wow!
Glad you were not more seriously hurt!

Yes wasn’t blaming the GS. Also very glad your ok!
Out of the millions that were made someone has to get the lemon you may never find out why this happened. Could have been the last pore from the pot. Could have been the bolt was dropped in such a way that it was weakened. Might even have been a double load.
At lest you still have all your digits and toes....you may not have wanted new undies for Christmas and I don’t want to ruin the surprise, but...

In saying all of the above if you do find why I am interested.
Load wise do you have any more of the same? Maybe pull those and weight them.
Not sure how you could go about having the bolt tested.
Most of us have the wall of shame for reloads gone astray....that’s sure a good one to put up there. with them if you don’t then wow what a way to start

A full inspection of all the bits is needed to come to any conclusion, however I wouldn't mind betting it was an Eddystone action. They are notorious for being as hard as the hobs of hell and a bit on the brittle side. They were perfectly fine with .303 loads at around 45,000 psi but the .264 and similar magnums run up 60,000 psi. At those operating pressures it does not take much to get a case head failure which is what I suspect has happened, putting high pressure gas into the bolt body through the firing pin hole. The black carbon in the hole is a good clue, and the gas pressure would have forced the firing pin backwards opening the passage for the gas which has then put the strain at the rear of the lugs inside the bolt body. There is some faint evidence of a previous crack that could have totally given way. What saved you from massive trauma was the bolt design that makes the root of the bolt handle the safety lug. The Winchester actions are the preferred choice for magnum conversions. BSA used the old P14 and M17 actions for their post-war sporting rifles and removed the original markings during construction.

Yes have heard Eddystone have questionable receivers.

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

oh well...find a new donor action to fit the barrel to....you got away with it without major injury...to some extent the rifles action "failed sucessfully"...Ive read elsewhere about the metal being suss on some of the older mauser actions,particularly if they have been played with....will watch this with interest to see what the gurus have to say.

MD is this what you are taking about in the mauser 98 actions ,the video presenter talks about the diff in psi pressure between the 308 and 7.62x51 rounds, it might be why the p14 blew up, too much pressure
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5zFEKrA7o8

Was the chamber and brass clean and dry?

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...mh9m_s6O7zVuRe

Originally Posted by Sideshow

Yes wasn’t blaming the GS. Also very glad your ok!
Out of the millions that were made someone has to get the lemon you may never find out why this happened. Could have been the last pore from the pot. Could have been the bolt was dropped in such a way that it was weakened. Might even have been a double load.
At lest you still have all your digits and toes....you may not have wanted new undies for Christmas and I don’t want to ruin the surprise, but...

In saying all of the above if you do find why I am interested.
Load wise do you have any more of the same? Maybe pull those and weight them.
Not sure how you could go about having the bolt tested.
Most of us have the wall of shame for reloads gone astray....that’s sure a good one to put up there. with them if you don’t then wow what a way to start

yeah done all that mate, the remaining string was 61.2grs 2213sc, i use a rcbs electronic powder measure and double check on beam scales, there's not enough room in case for double charge and i keep a fairly good reload dairy and have good checks in place.

Originally Posted by Cordite

Was the chamber and brass clean and dry?

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...mh9m_s6O7zVuRe

yes it was mint minus the base.

Originally Posted by gundoc

A full inspection of all the bits is needed to come to any conclusion, however I wouldn't mind betting it was an Eddystone action. They are notorious for being as hard as the hobs of hell and a bit on the brittle side. They were perfectly fine with .303 loads at around 45,000 psi but the .264 and similar magnums run up 60,000 psi. At those operating pressures it does not take much to get a case head failure which is what I suspect has happened, putting high pressure gas into the bolt body through the firing pin hole. The black carbon in the hole is a good clue, and the gas pressure would have forced the firing pin backwards opening the passage for the gas which has then put the strain at the rear of the lugs inside the bolt body. There is some faint evidence of a previous crack that could have totally given way. What saved you from massive trauma was the bolt design that makes the root of the bolt handle the safety lug. The Winchester actions are the preferred choice for magnum conversions. BSA used the old P14 and M17 actions for their post-war sporting rifles and removed the original markings during construction.

your right on the money @gundoc it is a eddystone, its a bsa sportered rifle, i was running around that 58,000psi mark. im more then happy to send you the bits to analyze. the firing pin was forced back and was about 1/8th of a turn from releasing. as you pointed out you can see previous cracking, probably going to get all my bolts xrayed for cracks as i have a 30-06ai and a 6.5-06 both in P17 Actions.

Originally Posted by Sideshow

Yes wasn’t blaming the GS. Also very glad your ok!
Out of the millions that were made someone has to get the lemon you may never find out why this happened. Could have been the last pore from the pot. Could have been the bolt was dropped in such a way that it was weakened. Might even have been a double load.
At lest you still have all your digits and toes....you may not have wanted new undies for Christmas and I don’t want to ruin the surprise, but...

In saying all of the above if you do find why I am interested.
Load wise do you have any more of the same? Maybe pull those and weight them.
Not sure how you could go about having the bolt tested.
Most of us have the wall of shame for reloads gone astray....that’s sure a good one to put up there. with them if you don’t then wow what a way to start

it was a eye opener for sure, im healing fast, i even did a burn test with remaining case powder to compare with powder from the containers to confirm it was the correct powder. ive gone over everything i did and i am comfortable that i didnt stuff up. and bloody glad i didnt get a bolt through my face.

Originally Posted by mucko

it was a eye opener for sure, im healing fast, i even did a burn test with remaining case powder to compare with powder from the containers to confirm it was the correct powder. ive gone over everything i did and i am comfortable that i didnt stuff up. and bloody glad i didnt get a bolt through my face.

Always wear eye pro.

I saw a guy this year that had a Remington 700 blow and the bolt went back through his eye and took it out, so he's got one eye now. Apparently he got a significant payout from Remington after he got lawyers involved. He had no eye pro on, good impact resistant eye pro might have helped.

Originally Posted by gundoc

A full inspection of all the bits is needed to come to any conclusion, however I wouldn't mind betting it was an Eddystone action. They are notorious for being as hard as the hobs of hell and a bit on the brittle side. They were perfectly fine with .303 loads at around 45,000 psi but the .264 and similar magnums run up 60,000 psi. At those operating pressures it does not take much to get a case head failure which is what I suspect has happened, putting high pressure gas into the bolt body through the firing pin hole. The black carbon in the hole is a good clue, and the gas pressure would have forced the firing pin backwards opening the passage for the gas which has then put the strain at the rear of the lugs inside the bolt body. There is some faint evidence of a previous crack that could have totally given way. What saved you from massive trauma was the bolt design that makes the root of the bolt handle the safety lug. The Winchester actions are the preferred choice for magnum conversions. BSA used the old P14 and M17 actions for their post-war sporting rifles and removed the original markings during construction.

@gundoc interesting.

So in this case (obviously a bit more investigation needed) it wasn't actually the action that has failed? More so the case and that has found the weak point, in this instance a possibly weak bolt?
@mucko that's shithouse but thank feck you are ok.
On a lighter note you don't have a slightly used 264 barrel for sale?