Case head separation

[mark5pt56]

I need to take a couple pics of some case failures, etc. I certainly bet you won't be a magwell holder thereafter.

[NWPilgrim]

Case head separation comes from brass being resized too many times which stretches it out and therefore thins it at that spot and weakens it. Never heard of it happening to new brass especially quality headstamp like LC.

Does this manufacturer also load reman ammo? Perhaps they got some brass mixed up. Just don’t see how this could truly be virgin LC case.

[1168]

SNIP Years ago, I had a stuck round in the chamber that looked a lot like this, 1st, I removed mag., then, I closed the Butt Stock to the shortest position, next, while holding my carbine vertically, I banged the Butt Stock into the ground, at the sametime racking the Charging handle,... 2nd or 3rd hit, with the Butt Stock into the ground, I got the round out of battery.

I couldn’t get the extractor over the rim to grab it for some reason. I think the way the cartridge was jammed in there, the head wasn’t centered enough to slip into the bolt’s recess.

I really see no need to check head space on the gun unless this was a repeat problem.

You could easily drop some of their ammo into a case gauge to see if they're squeezing the brass down too much.

Not a repeat problem. Good point about the case gauge. I’ll have to check if I have any more from this lot. I think I do. I’ll see about getting a case gauge.

I need to take a couple pics of some case failures, etc. I certainly bet you won't be a magwell holder thereafter.

Luckily, in this case, it wasn’t catastrophic and the rifle (and my hand, which was forward on the ~12” handguard) is unharmed as far as I can tell.

SNIP
Does this manufacturer also load reman ammo? Perhaps they got some brass mixed up. Just don’t see how this could truly be virgin LC case.

They do also load reman. This was labeled new. I generally buy their reman or seconds, but the new was on sale. I’ve given the offending case and the next round in the mag to the manufacturer, as well as a couple other empties from that lot, so they can evaluate them for their QC purposes. I imagine it is possible for a used case or reman round to get mixed in with new somehow. I’m not sure if that is what happened or not.

[NWPilgrim]

They do also load reman. This was labeled new. I generally buy their reman or seconds, but the new was on sale. I’ve given the offending case and the next round in the mag to the manufacturer, as well as a couple other empties from that lot, so they can evaluate them for their QC purposes. I imagine it is possible for a used case or reman round to get mixed in with new somehow. I’m not sure if that is what happened or not.

Probably the janitor found a case on the floor that fell out of the recycle bin and tossed it into the loading hopper or something. If handling used cases at all, they should be extremely careful to never let components from that run or rejects to have any chance of finding their way into the new run. Like sweep the floor, disassemble and clean tool heads and hoppers, remove all material bins and restock left overs, empty the trash and recycle. Only then bring in the new material.

I am sure they have a practice like that and some yahoo got lazy. Hopefully the box info can narrow it down to the day and shifts involved.