I was out shooting my POF 415 today when something odd happened.
Well, how odd this was was not immediately apparently.

What I need is someone who can explain to me how this was possible.

So I pull the trigger and nothing happens except that the gun jams.
I go to GREAT lengths to avoid having a cartridge with no powder charge but apparently I still got one.
So I get out a cleaning rod and get the bullet out of the barrel.
Problem is, however, that the cleaning rod is now hopelessly stuck in the case.

I took the gun to a local gunsmith.  He says that this will be no problem because he has a special tool that can cut the case and get the rod out.
Worked like a charm EXCEPT that when they cut the case they set of the powder charge.  No damage was done because by that point they had a pretty large hole in the case so pressure could not develop.  Still the sizzling powder caught their attention.

My question is this.  The primer fired.  It bushed the bullet out of the case a bit.  Not a lot but some.   But if the primer fired why didn't the powder charge of off?

This makes no sense to me.  The primer firing pushed the bullet into the barrel but did not ignite the powder.  How is that possible?

Flash hole obstructed?  Primer may have had enough force to still push the bullet

The reloading section would be a great place to post this question, those guys are really good in tracking things down.

Sounds like your power was bad for some reason.  That or the flash hole was obstructed.

no primer hole

the bullet was jammed into the rifling whern the gas from the primer pushed the round forward

primer will look like this with a little soot around it



BTDT

So if I'm understanding this, you had a bullet lodged in the barrel AND the case was stuck in the chamber at the same time?
You said when you pulled the trigger "nothing happened" (your words), how sure are you that the bullet left the case? It sounds to me like maybe you had an oversized round, gun wouldn't go into battery enough to fire, you pounded the round out from the muzzle and thus pushed the bullet back into the case. The pointed tip of the bullet probably mushroomed the end of the rod.
Btw, it seems kinda strange to pay a gun Smith to get a cleaning rod out of a cartridge case. I meen how much could the cleaning rod be worth?
ETA, you said the primer fired, but how do you know? It would have a light dimple just from cycling in an AR. Sounds to me like it did not ignite.

The primer fired.  It was clearly struck as we saw when we got it out of the gun.
But the powder did not go off.  
There was unquestionably a proper hole for the primer to fire through.  That is guaranteed.
So if the primer fired why didn't the powder charge go off?

As to the stuck cartridge case.  Maybe that was just a problem with the dimensions of the cartridge neck.

I still find it odd that the primer went off but not the powder charge.  Maybe something wrong with the powder?

I'm thinking the primer did not actually go off. Maybe a bad or contaminated primer.

How can you say there was unquestionably a hole for the primer to fire through? Ya the hole was there but was it clogged?
Was it filled with spent powder of something else? I dont know why you cant accept it was a clogged hole for the primer charge to travel through.
A tiny bit of case lube or anything else can easily insulate it from touching off the powder.
It is the most obvious answer and you cant say for sure that it was not clogged.

no its not

do you have the case? Thought not.

do you have any other information besides speculation?

If you knew for certain you would not be looking on the internet.

the only answer is the case did not have a primer hole.

If neck tension is low, the bullet moves when the primer fires. Pressure does not build to burn the powder. 

A bullet may move forward out of the case neck on chambering, if neck tension is low. 

Spray case lube may have entered the case and contaminated the powder.

Were you using a magnum primer?   Ball Powder? How far down the barrel was the bullet?  I have seen ball powder start burning and stop for no reason. 

A good read from  Sierra  on loading for the Service Rifle. Loading link

Because I deprimed all of them, checked the hole on each and every case and double checked that when I primed them.

That is a very useful answer.  Thank you!

Yes that is a vary useful answer. I've seen similar events.

I can't help but ask though. How does a trained professional cut into a charged casing?

But before that one is answered. I don't understand how the cleaning rod ended up in the casing to start with.

Wouldn't the first thing you would do after having a misfire would be to eject the casing from the chamber?

Then you would check the bore for an obstruction and use the rod to clear the bore.

Something is really screwy here.

Motor

If there is no flash hole in the primer pocket - how does the ignition of the primer push the bullet into the rifling?

If there is no flash hole in the primer pocket - how does the burning powder push the primer cup metal back into the firing pin hole in the bolt?

This thread needed more pictures of the OPs incident.  

If powder was so dead the primer didn't ignite it, how did cutting into the case ignite it?

If the primer was hit by the firing pin the cartridge was chambered and the bolt was fully forward/locked.

I can see the bullet not being seated deeply enough and making contact with the lands hard enough to hang up.  Had it happen to me, heard of it happening to other people.  However, if the bolt pulled off the rim without extracting the cartridge, the cleaning rod should have been able to easily knock the cartridge out of the chamber/off the lands with very little effort.  If the bullet did leave the case neck and move forward into the barrel/lands then the case should have extracted easily.

Without pictures, without the opportunity if examine the rifle prior to the gunsmith working on it and based on lack of better description from the OP, it's hard to tell what happened.  Sort of like some of those damned accident investigations I used to get dragged into at work.  Guess, guess, guess, at what really happened and why.

The stuck case may have been from a bulged shoulder from over crimping?  Surely,  not from any pressure from firing.

The cleaning rod pushed the bullet into the case and rod got stuck?   Possible i guess.  But thats not what "getting the bullet out" means to me. 

This event  would seem to be one where you just had to be there. 

Many questions may go unanswered. 

Low powder charge resulting in too much case capacity? I have had large cases light the primer off without ever burning the powder. The bullet was lodged in the rifling.

I'm wondering if the OP wet tumbles his brass and if there was water in that case only when charged with powder. Or was this the first cartridge of his lot and the rest may be bad as well. I think something contaminated the powder to the point that it would not ignite but the primer did go off and push the bullet into the barrel. I would pull the rest of those cartridges and make sure.

Dud primer and stuck case. Or high primer and stuck case, I've had high primers get a perfect indent and not light as the anvil wasn't against the case when struck.

It's two things going wrong at once, but it's all that makes sense, since there was still a case in the chamber while trying to drive a stuck bullet from the bore.

Well I suppose it is also possible there was very little neck tension and the bullet travelled forward to the lands on chambering.

Mortaring the rifle would've likely unjammed the action in either case and made it much easier to diagnose.

ETA: You say the bullet was in the barrel, how far?

I've had this exact thing happen to me only I was able to get the stuck bullet out with a rod without getting the rod stuck.

I was using Wolf primers with H335. Kept getting slight hang fires until finally one didn't ignite the powder. When I pulled the charging handle back all of the powder poured out of the case and the bullet was stuck. Never used Wolf primers again.

I figure the pressure from the primer alone is enough to send the bullet into the rifling, even if powder doesn't ignite.

Contaminated powder, damp powder, or really poor neck tension could cause this sort of "bullet moved but there was still powder in the case" situation.

Primers are no joke.  There is enough energy in a primer to jam a bullet well into the bore, even without powder.  If the powder was contaminated or damp, it would not immediately ignite.  Water doesn't "spoil" smokeless powder, but powder thats wet won't ignite, or at least not well.

Really poor neck tension comes into play because some powders NEED to be contained to really properly ignite.  If the bullet started moving before enough of the powder had ignited, the rest might not light at all.

I'm really curious how the cleaning rod got stuck in the CASE.  I had one stick in a (9mm) bullet that I had lodged in a bore, but not the case itself...

I would say the tip of the cleaning rod went past the tip of the bullet and jammed between the chamber wall and the bullet, and all you had was "what you thought was a dud" because the bolt was to far back for the firing pin to let go in the first place, "built in safety" for round not fully chambered. So the hammer never "struck" the firing pin, you never had the "bullet" stuck in the bore, you had the fully charged round stuck in the chamber, got the cleaning rod stuck and freaked , ran to the gun shop before you thought it out.

per all of the above: primer went off, didn't light the powder, pushed bullet out of the case - this is called a squib

Trying to figure out how this special tool lit off the powder, need details on the tool, maybe when it was cutting the case and if the cleaning rod had a metal tip, it cut into the cleaning rod jig and caused a spark

Again.

How do you get from bullet stuck in barrel to cleaning rod stuck in casing.


If there was a squib you would eject the casing first then deal with the stuck bullet.

If the cleaning rod was stuck in the casing the bullet must have been inside the casing as well.  

Things don't add up.

Motor

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