What Mistakes Have You Made While Reloading??

[Fullmag]

I blew up the dillion xl 650 primer tube while doing 10 mm auto reloads. Scared the SH.. out of me & my wife came running from the yard. It sounded like a gun shot in the garage. I could not hear from a moment and was patting my self down for holes. Luckily the primer rod was in the ceiling & I was not hurt, only my pride. called & told them I was ramrodding the machine & pushed to hard when I should have backed off.

Did you happen to to be using Wolf primers? If so then I've made that mistake also except for launching the primer alarm rod.

 

[Alamo]

I blew up the dillion xl 650 primer tube while doing 10 mm auto reloads. Scared the SH.. out of me & my wife came running from the yard. It sounded like a gun shot in the garage. I could not hear from a moment and was patting my self down for holes. Luckily the primer rod was in the ceiling & I was not hurt, only my pride. called & told them I was ramrodding the machine & pushed to hard when I should have backed off. They No BS warranty is 100% true. They laughed & sent me a new one free of chargeo

I always wondered what that would be like.

 

[Alamo]

I neglected to warn my friend that I hadn't yet told my out-of-state-landlord-and-girl-friend that I was reloading ammo in her house.

I had joined the Wheel Burners revolver club at Lake Piru in southern Californa and quickly figured out that reloading was the most economical way to supply my habit. Bought Dillon Square-Deal-B and went into business. This got a buddy of mine at work interested in reloading, so he did the same thing. My GF at the time had taken a good job out-of-state for awhile, rented her house to me for what I was paying for a tiny apartment. What a deal -- plenty of room for the reloading set-up. The first time she flew back to Los Angeles after I started reloading, I picked her up at LAX and we met my buddy at a restaurant in Santa Monica.

First time my buddy has met my GF. Introductions, and the first thing out of his mouth is some question about how many grains of gunpowder I'm using or somesuch. My GF's eyes get big, she turns to me and says, "GUN POWDER?! You have EXPLOSIVES in MY HOUSE?!"

My buddy instantly realizes he's let the cat out of the bag, but he was a combat marine in Vietnam, he's cool under pressure. He puts on his most innocent, sincere face and tells her,

"Nothing to worry about. It's no more explosive than baby powder."

 

[jgressley2003]

When I first started to resize the cases, I didn't realize that you had to run the complete length of the casing. I was running them until I knew the primers were punched out. Needless to say that my 223 reloads would not feed into the gun because there was a slight bulge in the side of most of the casings. Luckily I hadn't put too many together. Another time I decided to reload after work one night, I was pretty tired and of course I put powder in some casings that had no primers. Third thing, I've left the side open a couple times on my Chargemaster while filling it up and made quite a mess of powder. I definitely check that first now before I add my powder.

 

[Johncandy]

I tried to get one more load out of some 223 cases ( 5x fired ) and I knew it was time to toss the brass, the primers where seating way way to easily. After loading a medium charge of H335 with a 55 grain pill, on a few cases I went out back to test fire it. The result was a case head separation, that actually had enough pressure to cycle the action, pick up a new round, and push it into the remains of the spent brass. Upon extraction, I now have a nice looking reminder. A 223 case, stuck into the rear of another 223 case.

 

[ART338WM]

It's been a LOOOOOONG time since my last mistake but all of them save for one had two things in common: #1-I allowed myself to become distracted and #2-thankfully they were few and small in number. I seated the bullets two far on a few 338wms, seated a few primers in back wards in my .45acps and .357s, didn't seat a few primers deep enough in a few 45ACPs, but thankfully I caught every one prior to shooting them except for one. After reloading 1500 45ACPs with my Lee 1000 progressive press had one load that had no powder and I knew it instantly when the S&W 645 I was shooting went "POP" but didn't cycle and had near zero recoil. I to this day don't understand how I missed only one load in 1500 not having been charged with any powder. The remaining loads (about 380) all got pulled but checked out OK.

 

[geronimojoe85]

Well, I just made one the other day.
I was reloading some .45 ACP with red dot powder, earlier that day I was reloading some 9mm with bullseye.
I had both cans on the bench and when I finished with the red dot, I dumped a considerable amount into about an equal amount of bullseye. A few days later I went to load some 9mm and I notice red flakes in the powder measure.

I'm usually pretty good about keeping the powders organized and using them one at a time. Thank god I did it with red dot and not something like unique where I wouldn't have noticed so easily. A wake up call for sure, one at a time from now on.

 

[jimbo-indy]

Several years back, I had a brain fart and improperly set my RCBS 1010 powder scale while setting up the Dillon for a run of 357 Mag. The desired load was 10.5 gn of Blue Dot (near max load). I actually set it for 15.0 gn. Loaded up a few hundred of those. First time out, Bowling Pins a MCFG, the first shot was really loud and the cylinder wouldn't rotate. When we got the cylinder open, the primer fell out. It had jammed the cylinder. You could make out the printing of the case head on the recoil shield. Revolver was a GP100. Mr. Ruger saved my butt that day. No damage to the gun, worked fine ever since. Went home and pulled bullets, saved the powder and reloaded with correct charge.

 

[RMC]

One time I was so involved in loading up some 22-250 for prairie dogs that I burnt my pizza.

 

[mrortega]

How about after reloading for 20 years I got distracted and left my expander die in my single stage press and went to seat some bullets. The first one went down really whacky and I thought wth? I pulled the cartridge out and the bullet is seated nose even with the mouth of the case. Looks really cool. Ya think the pressure might be a bit high if I could even chamber and shoot it?

 

[npwinder]

Been reloading a couple years and made my first mistake a few weeks ago.

I was at the range testing some reloads in my 30-30 when one had no recoil. Checked it, primer was struck but the bullet never fired. Got home and pulled it apart, there was no powder. I remembered during that reloading session there were a couple cases my routine got out of whack. Thought I checked them all for powder and missed one.

Now I triple check everyone before seating the bullet. I also figured since the bullet never moved a bit in the case, that I'm crimping too much so I've backed that off as well.

 

[russc2542]

Found a cartridge with no powder. Everything else I checked afterwards checked out weight wise. Of course this happens shooting with a friend "hey lemme shoot a couple and see how my gun likes it". One round in a couple hundred and it's what I let someone else shoot

 

[Hookeye]

Only error was maybe too much case lube causing dimple at shoulder.
I don't run a progressive press.
Never a flipped primer or iffy powder charge.
I'm kind of a detail guy

 

[dyerwatcher]

I've made several mistakes over the years. Luckily my biggest one was not buying a Dillon 30 years ago.

 

[Fullmag]

I've made several mistakes over the years. Luckily my biggest one was not buying a Dillon 30 years ago.

Same here that thing makes some high quality ammo very easily.

 

[1911ly]

I always weigh my loaded bullets when I am done. I load in small batches "usually (25 rounds) so it's easy to double triple check and so forth, check and recheck. I did find a round about a week ago with no powder that my boy helped load. It only takes a few extra minutes to go over everything. I am hopeful I won't miss something but sh*t happens. I am not perfect. Be safe.

 

[Deereman7]

Oh wow. Well I forgot to lube cases and stuck one in a die. I did manage to get it out by drill and tapping the brass, bolt, and nut. Lots of silly things. I guess the worst was my 454 casull. I was working up new loads I loaded 10 rounds. Put one in shot and chroned it. Perfect. Primers were good, brass was fine. Put 2 in. Perfect. Put 5 in and after the second shot I pulled the hammer back and it wouldn't go all the way. The bullets from 3-4-5 actually pulled during recoil sticking them out of the cylinder a little. What a mess. I felt like an idiot. I had crimped them hard. But not hard enough. Now I know

 

[Fullmag]

Oh wow. Well I forgot to lube cases and stuck one in a die. I did manage to get it out by drill and tapping the brass, bolt, and nut. Lots of silly things. I guess the worst was my 454 casull. I was working up new loads I loaded 10 rounds. Put one in shot and chroned it. Perfect. Primers were good, brass was fine. Put 2 in. Perfect. Put 5 in and after the second shot I pulled the hammer back and it wouldn't go all the way. The bullets from 3-4-5 actually pulled during recoil sticking them out of the cylinder a little. What a mess. I felt like an idiot. I had crimped them hard. But not hard enough. Now I know

Case gage would prevented that. That is something I wish would bought years ago also.

A proper crimp dramatically improves accuracy.

 

[Deereman7]

Case gage would prevented that. That is something I wish would bought years ago also.

A proper crimp dramatically improves accuracy.

Id always crimped big bore handguns until I got a ring of brass from the case. You'd thought that had been enough. I actually had to taper crimp and then use a lee factory crimp die. Only thing that would hold them in. No signs of pressure. I actually found an old manual from a older freedom arms. It give the ins and outs of reloading the 454. Interesting read. Good info