Serious Head Scratcher is a contributed piece written by Marshal Smokin’ Justice aka Mark A Birmingham.
I have been involved with shooting for over thirty plus years now, mainly through Law Enforcement and the Security field. Even then, my shooting consisted of only training and annual / semi annual firearms re-qualification. As an Instructor I have seen almost anything people or ammunition could do on a range. Or so I thought.
Over the last year or so, I have begun to shoot more just for fun. I joined a SASS group and got my alias “Marshal Smokin’ Justice.” I also began just to plink with friends. Since all my cowboy guns are chambered in the infamous, but useful, .45 Colt, I thought now would be the time to start reloading. This got some raised eyebrows from those close to me, especially my wife.
I bought a Lee load master from my ammo source. Seems as though one partner in the business was only too glad to get of it. A customer had traded it to his partner for a Dillon, only to learn after the fact that half the pieces were missing. I took it off their hands for fifty bucks. Another seventy bucks in parts, and another hundred or so in powder, primer and bullets, and I was loading bullets!
After I loaded five or six, (a 200 gr. lead rnfp sitting on six grains of “ Hogdon’s” Tightgroup” and CCI lpp’s), I loaded up my Uberti Cattleman and let those puppies loose. Now, before someone goes to thinking, “this idiot is shooting guns in his back yard??” First, let me say, I live on almost four acres. Secondly, I have a mound of dirt out back so I shot them into the mound of dirt. I was impressed; not only did they work, but nothing blew up either. By the way, that was my wife’s biggest concern. After the test firing, I loaded another hundred and fifty rounds with only minor glitches from the load master’s finicky primer system. I then cycled all the bullets through all my cowboy guns, the cattleman, my Uberti walker with an R&D .45 colt drop in conversion, and finally, my Henry Big Boy also chambered in the .45 colt. All went through with no problems. I couldn’t wait for Saturday to come.
Saturday came and off to the range I went. I said the pledge and got to shooting. I shot my first stage no problem. My second stage was where the “fun” happened. I drew my first pistol, the Walker fire five rounds, with no problems. Holstered it, drew the cattleman, fired two rounds, then the cylinder wouldn’t turn.
Now what?
The Range Officer asks about the infamous squib and I say no. I holster the cattleman, finish with the Henry and my Stoeger Coach gun. I go to the clearing table and clear the Walker, the Henry and the Stoeger. I got my first good look at the Cattleman and I could see brass between the cylinder and the forcing cone. Now I was really surprised. I pulled the cylinder pin, but of course, couldn’t get the cylinder to drop out of the gun. The Clearing Officer was also scratching his head. We get a rod and pushed the obstruction back into the cylinder and removed the cylinder. I dumped all the spent brass from the cylinder, and low and behold, a 9mm piece of brass and spent primer fell out of a .45 colt shell. You can only imagine all the head scratching from all the other re-loaders.
The only thing to surmise is that on my last trip to the range for SASS, when my brass was picked up, a 9mm shell somehow found its way into my brass. Keep in mind, 9mm is not a round used in SASS, so that adds even more questions. When I prepped my brass for reloading I visually inspected every thing. I then tumbled all the brass and proceeded to reload. After firing my six test rounds, every thing was fine so I continued. Apparently when I de-capped the .45 the pin went thru both the 9mm and the .45. The new primer, of course, wouldn’t have made any difference. But the powder charge was loaded into and around the 9mm so when it was fired the main charge pushed the bullet down range, but the surrounding powder was just enough to push the 9mm in to the forcing cone and not down range.
This week when I prepped my brass, I visually inspected my brass, dumped the split and cracked ones. I then tried the old Simple Green over night soak after de-capping, of course. It really does the job. I then used an air nozzle to dry the cases and I visually inspected all the cases again. I then reloaded a hundred and fifty as before with no problems.
