Got a problem...223 case stuck in chamber.

[avboiler11]

Not all steel case is made equal.

A 55gr FMJBT like Wolf or Tula is almost certainly not going to shoot as good as Hornady Steel Match with a HPBT bullet.

Hornady Steel Match 75gr HPBT has proven to be sub-MOA for me.

 

[natdscott]

You could also try letting the bolt go home, then slam the butt on the ground.
The extractor should pull it out.

This is the field expedient version. Just go easy mortaring: you can apply gradually increasing force until it works, but if you apply too much force on the first go-round, broken receivers can result, and that be a one way street.

 

[natdscott]

To me if an AR won’t run steel case, it’s out of spec, steel case gets a bad rep, but I’ve run tens of thousands of rounds of the crap thru everything I’ve had.

I’ve seen a few ARs that wouldn’t run steel, turns out they had out of spec chambers

hehehe...or they were IN spec, but the spec was way GD different than anything you'd run steel case through.

I have no issue with steel casings in theory, but my rifles won't be seeing any of it. You and I have different ways of looking at the AR-15.

 

[deo62]

So, OP, has this issue resolved itself?

 

[jfed85]

So, OP, has this issue resolved itself?

Nope, Tried a wooden dowel down the barrel and a dead blow hammer and just broke 2 woden dowels. Next step is finding a brass dowel and giving that a go.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

Nope, Tried a wooden dowel down the barrel and a dead blow hammer and just broke 2 woden dowels. Next step is finding a brass dowel and giving that a go.

How much dowel did you have sticking out of the muzzle? Drop it in, mark and trim so maybe 1/4" to sticks out, then a lot of tappy-taps, not hard hits.

 

[jfed85]

How much dowel did you have sticking out of the muzzle? Drop it in, mark and trim so maybe 1/4" to sticks out, then a lot of tappy-taps, not hard hits.

Had about an inch ticking out, not much.

 

[jfed85]

FINALLY!
with a brass rod and a rubber dead-blow hammer I was having to hit the rod so hard that the end of the rod was sticking in my hammer.

Then em I decided to use a block of 2x4 on the end to give me more area to strike. Drove the rod straight through the block.

Finally I then put a pair of vice grips on the end of the rod to give me more surface area and that finally did the trick.

 

[gmcttr]

Good to see you got it out.

IMHO, both the plastic faced hammer and wood block, cushioned the blow to the brass rod. A brass or steel hammer (controlled so as not to strike the muzzle) would have been more effective.

 

[halfmileharry]

FINALLY!
with a brass rod and a rubber dead-blow hammer I was having to hit the rod so hard that the end of the rod was sticking in my hammer.

Then em I decided to use a block of 2x4 on the end to give me more area to strike. Drove the rod straight through the block.

Finally I then put a pair of vice grips on the end of the rod to give me more surface area and that finally did the trick.

Have you found out the reason it stuck in the chanber? I mean without any doubt..

 

[jfed85]

Have you found out the reason it stuck in the chanber? I mean without any doubt..

When I put the solvent in to clean it there was a weird gummy substance scraping out of the chamber (not a lot, but enough to catch my eye) Seems like what some guys had mentioned about the laquer coated ammo getting hot and then acting almost as a glue. That’s my assumption at this point anyway. I guess it’ll be brass cases from here on out for that rifle.

I’ll get it back to the range and run strictly brass and see if it has any issues.

The day the case got stuck i had fired probably 200 rounds of brass cases with zero issues, half way through the first mag of this Tulammo it started getting finicky. Then this happened half way through the second mag of tulammo.

 

[jfed85]

Good to see you got it out.

IMHO, both the plastic faced hammer and wood block, cushioned the blow to the brass rod. A brass or steel hammer (controlled so as not to strike the muzzle) would have been more effective.

I don’t disagree with you, but I also don’t trust myself.

 

[avboiler11]

Using a chamber brush after shooting steel case can mitigate issues like this.

 

[Floivanus]

FINALLY!

looks like quite a bit of carbon on that casing to me, dirty chamber? If that is carbon it probably is a good bit of the issue you had.

 

[worddoer]

When I put the solvent in to clean it there was a weird gummy substance scraping out of the chamber (not a lot, but enough to catch my eye) Seems like what some guys had mentioned about the laquer coated ammo getting hot and then acting almost as a glue. That’s my assumption at this point anyway. I guess it’ll be brass cases from here on out for that rifle.

I’ll get it back to the range and run strictly brass and see if it has any issues.

The day the case got stuck i had fired probably 200 rounds of brass cases with zero issues, half way through the first mag of this Tulammo it started getting finicky. Then this happened half way through the second mag of tulammo.

The cases that are colored grey are not lacquer coated, they are coated with a high temp polymer. The older lacquer coated cases are more of a greenish/brownish color instead of grey. Although it is still incorrect to state that the lacquer "melts". Please reference this.

All of those black splotches on the outside of the case is carbon. Looks to me like the chamber was dirty with carbon when you started shooting the steel cased stuff. Add to that the fact that your rifle has a tight chamber of the .223 Wylde type as you stated here, and you have a high propensity to have problems with steel cased ammo.

I have more info in the links below. There are a lot of rumors floating around that are incorrect and truths that a lot of people don't know.

https://www.theboxotruth.com/educational-zone-18-shooting-wolf-steel-cased-ammo-in-an-ar15/

https://www.ar15.com/content/page.html?id=268

When shooting steel cased, it is highly advisable that you clean your chamber before and after or things like this will happen. I have observed that the guns that tend to run steel cased ammo better are the guns with the looser 5.56 chambers.

 

[jfed85]

The cases that are colored grey are not lacquer coated, they are coated with a high temp polymer. The older lacquer coated cases are more of a greenish/brownish color instead of grey. Although it is still incorrect to state that the lacquer "melts". Please reference this.

All of those black splotches on the outside of the case is carbon. Looks to me like the chamber was dirty with carbon when you started shooting the steel cased stuff. Add to that the fact that your rifle has a tight chamber of the .223 Wylde type as you stated here, and you have a high propensity to have problems with steel cased ammo.

I have more info in the links below. There are a lot of rumors floating around that are incorrect and truths that a lot of people don't know.

https://www.theboxotruth.com/educational-zone-18-shooting-wolf-steel-cased-ammo-in-an-ar15/

https://www.ar15.com/content/page.html?id=268

When shooting steel cased, it is highly advisable that you clean your chamber before and after or things like this will happen. I have observed that the guns that tend to run steel cased ammo better are the guns with the looser 5.56 chambers.

thanks for the info. I’ll read up on the links.

 

[halfmileharry]

When I put the solvent in to clean it there was a weird gummy substance scraping out of the chamber (not a lot, but enough to catch my eye) Seems like what some guys had mentioned about the laquer coated ammo getting hot and then acting almost as a glue. That’s my assumption at this point anyway. I guess it’ll be brass cases from here on out for that rifle.

I’ll get it back to the range and run strictly brass and see if it has any issues.

The day the case got stuck i had fired probably 200 rounds of brass cases with zero issues, half way through the first mag of this Tulammo it started getting finicky. Then this happened half way through the second mag of tulammo.

That gummy stuff sounds like the old poly coating. That's what I had trouble with in my AKs. Same Tula stuff too.

 

[Floivanus]

The cases that are colored grey are not lacquer coated, they are coated with a high temp polymer. The older lacquer coated cases are more of a greenish/brownish color instead of grey. Although it is still incorrect to state that the lacquer "melts". Please reference this.

All of those black splotches on the outside of the case is carbon. Looks to me like the chamber was dirty with carbon when you started shooting the steel cased stuff. Add to that the fact that your rifle has a tight chamber of the .223 Wylde type as you stated here, and you have a high propensity to have problems with steel cased ammo.

I have more info in the links below. There are a lot of rumors floating around that are incorrect and truths that a lot of people don't know.

https://www.theboxotruth.com/educational-zone-18-shooting-wolf-steel-cased-ammo-in-an-ar15/

https://www.ar15.com/content/page.html?id=268

When shooting steel cased, it is highly advisable that you clean your chamber before and after or things like this will happen. I have observed that the guns that tend to run steel cased ammo better are the guns with the looser 5.56 chambers.

fantastic post, it’s easy to crap on steel case, but it is one of the widest used ammo types out there and is used by quite a few armies.

I’m with the thought of it being a maintenance issue too.

 

[Hohn]

Steel cased rounds don't expand and seal the chamber as well. They allow more carbon build up in the chamber. If your AR has a tighter cbamber, this can cause problems and you might want to avoid steel cased ammo.

Once that is out, I highly recommend that you clean your chamber really well.

My AR's run steel cased ammo fine...but they are not long range 1/2 MOA shooters. Some AR's just won't run with it.

Not that 200 rounds is much of an experiment, but my rifle ran it flawlessly. And afterwards, it ran brass just fine (with no cleaning), which is kind of a no-no to run brass after steel w/o cleaning.

This was Brown Bear and then Geco.

I think steel case is mostly a problem in shorter gas rifles. Rifle length seems to help. I'd think twice before running steel in a 14.5" or shorter carbine gas rifle or pistol.

 

[Hohn]

That is one seriously FLAT primer. Maybe it was an overcharge/doublecharge? I don't see how your rod could have done that flattening.