Weird .22 Shot. What could be the possible culprit?

[CraigAPS]

So, I went out to the range today to finally sight in the scope that came with my Remington 597 which I had bought from a fellow INGOer. As I was shooting, I had a FTF. I ejected the round and fired the rest of the mag. Everything seemed to be working fine. I inspected the round that wouldn't fire, and it seemed okay. There was a small dent in the rim, but, obviously, it wasn't hard enough to set it off. I assumed it was a light strike and loaded the round. When I fired it, it just didn't sound right. Plus, there was A LOT of smoke coming from the chamber and the magazine was still smoking when I dropped it and the follower was blackened. I didn't have a rod or anything to see if there was still a bullet in the barrel, and I sure as heck wasn't sticking my face in front of the muzzle. So, I packed it up and put it back in the car until I had shot my handguns (It's half an hour each way to the range. I wasn't wasting a range trip to shoot my .22 for 15 mins and go home!). When I got home, I stuck a long piece of trimmer line through the barrel, then shined my bore light down the barrel. The line went all the way through, and I could see the light shining into the chamber when shining it into the muzzle. After this, I looked through the muzzle with the bore light in the chamber, and everything looks good in the barrel. Nothing in the chamber is deformed or anything. Besides shooting that FTF round, did I screw up? Could it have fired out of battery and that be the reason for all of the smoke? I was shooting Winchester Super X, which I've put over a 525 brick of through this rifle already. Do you think it was just a bad round? I'm going to disassemble the rifle and clean super well before shooting it again. At that time, I'll be able to look for any actual damage, but I'm curious if anyone else has ever had a similar rimfire issue? Thanks!

 

[Mgderf]

Bulk ammo?
Likely just a single bad round.
Most .22's are pretty over-built for the lowly cartridge.

Clean and inspect it, but I wouldn't worry much about it, unless inspection shows something.

 

[natdscott]

MGderf is right on. Don't worry about it, just clean and move on. Unless you has a squib (in which case you did the right thing, and STOPPED shooting..nice work), or the casing actually ruptured (which would be obvious), you're fine.

-Nate

 

[CraigAPS]

Bulk ammo?
Likely just a single bad round.
Most .22's are pretty over-built for the lowly cartridge.

Clean and inspect it, but I wouldn't worry much about it, unless inspection shows something.

That's kind of what I'm going with. We'll see when I have time to tear it down and give a thorough once over. Hopefully, I'll be able to get to it this week.

MGderf is right on. Don't worry about it, just clean and move on. Unless you has a squib (in which case you did the right thing, and STOPPED shooting..nice work), or the casing actually ruptured (which would be obvious), you're fine.

-Nate

I tired to find a super messed up casing, but everything I could locate when I policed my brass looked normal.

 

[sloughfoot]

I shot a 22cb out of a single shot rifle last week that must have been loaded to some super Magnum spec. It actually scared me and I had difficulty pulling the brass out of the chamber.

Totally wierd.

 

[indykid]

I have a Remington 597 and have to agree that it sounds like one bad round.

I can't vouch for the possibility of this guess, but I wonder if the light strike, or even if a normal strike on a dead spot on the primer ring could have caused enough of a bulge, not even visible to the naked eye, that could have led to the round not seating right and firing slightly out of battery or a slight gas leak where the light strike occured.

Regardless, I would just clean the rifle and head back out. My 597 looks like it was well overbuilt and should have no problems with a slight out of battery firing.

 

[Cameramonkey]

I shot a 22cb out of a single shot rifle last week that must have been loaded to some super Magnum spec. It actually scared me and I had difficulty pulling the brass out of the chamber.

Totally wierd.

Dont worry. One of these days you'll graduate and be able to fire a REAL rifle.

 

[CraigAPS]

I have a Remington 597 and have to agree that it sounds like one bad round.

I can't vouch for the possibility of this guess, but I wonder if the light strike, or even if a normal strike on a dead spot on the primer ring could have caused enough of a bulge, not even visible to the naked eye, that could have led to the round not seating right and firing slightly out of battery or a slight gas leak where the light strike occured.

Regardless, I would just clean the rifle and head back out. My 597 looks like it was well overbuilt and should have no problems with a slight out of battery firing.

I hadn't thought about that before, but it makes sense that maybe that first strike caused a gap in seal between the round and the chamber. That would explain the smoke and strange sound.

 

[gmcttr]

Possibly poor ignition from faulty priming, a light powder charge or contaminated powder...any of which could lead to low chamber pressure resulting in a failure for the case to properly expand and seal the chamber allowing gases to blow back into the receiver/mag area.

 

[billybob44]

You did the right thing..No plugged barrel..Clean+ Shoot....

 

[CraigAPS]

So, I finally got to break down and clean my 597 today. For the most part, everything looked good, but there is one thing that worries me. There's a small hole in the bolt underneath where the extractor is mounted. I have no clue if this is normal or not. I looked back at a couple of the videos that I watched on the disassembly of the rifle, and it seems like theirs have it. Do any of you who own a 597 have this hole in your bolt?

View attachment 58427
View attachment 58428

 

[Hohn]

That hole -- in that size and shape--is clearly not there on purpose. The edges are rough and show fracture. Other people may have holes there, but I highly doubt they have the hole that same size and shape as yours.

To my eye, it looks like a casting defect (internal porosity) that cracked through and is missing a small piece. Or, the hole may normally be cast in place, but your has has some casting flash near the surface.



That said, I don't see how this contributes to or explains the kind of phenomenon you observed. They may be completely unrelated events, with the rifle having that "defect" there since new.

 

[CraigAPS]

That hole -- in that size and shape--is clearly not there on purpose. The edges are rough and show fracture. Other people may have holes there, but I highly doubt they have the hole that same size and shape as yours.

To my eye, it looks like a casting defect (internal porosity) that cracked through and is missing a small piece. Or, the hole may normally be cast in place, but your has has some casting flash near the surface.



That said, I don't see how this contributes to or explains the kind of phenomenon you observed. They may be completely unrelated events, with the rifle having that "defect" there since new.

Just doing an image search on Google, I saw other 597 bolts that do indeed have holes in that spot. But, I couldn't see them clear enough to make out if theirs have similar rough patches. It looks like, to my very much untrained eye, that either the casting wasn't perfect and some excess material was left in the hole or the weird shot damaged the bolt. I'm not worried that it caused the weird shot, but more worried if it was caused BY the shot. I'm going to flip a coin this weekend. Heads: take it out and shoot it and see what happens. Tails: have the LGS gunsmith take a look at it, then take it out and shoot it and see what happens. I didn't take it apart and inspect every piece when I bought it. So, I haven't the faintest idea whether or not it has always been there.