My first out of battery

[OCArmory]

Well I had my first out of battery discharge today. I was shooting at On Target with my brother. I wasn't hurt as it was an AR with a ciener kit (.22). It was interesting. A bright flash and lots of smoke. It pushed the magazine down far enough to dislodge it. I am very happy it didn't happen with a .223 round. Any way just thought I would share.
Mike

[cryptkeeper]

What is an out of battery?

[elrcastor]

cartridge going off without bolt fully forward

[JeffM]

Did the same thing with a M261 a few years ago.

As far as I can tell the only thing that was damaged was the extractor, which was blown to god knows where. I still need another extractor, just haven't tried to find one yet. One of those "when I get around to it" projects.

Even with hearing protection my right ear rang for a good while after.

+1 to being glad it wasn't .223

[nikonuser]

What causes this explosion? Sounds like it could hurt you.

[Vtec44]

cartridge going off without bolt fully forward

As a noob, I'm curious to know why it does that. Is it because of a weak buffer spring?

[adamsreeftank]

I had the same happen with a Spikes 22 upper.

My conclusion is that a lack of lubrication + new upper may have caused the bolt to not travel far enough back to fully reset the hammer and it may have followed the bolt and struck the firing pin before it was fully forward.

After I pulled the shell parts out of the chamber and off of the bolt face and checked the barrel for a squib, I applied plenty of lube and ran a couple hundred rounds with no problem.

I kept the shell parts for posterity.

[OCArmory]

The 22 kit is an aftermarket design. It does not use the buffer spring. It is a self contained device that replaces your bolt and carrier group. My guess would be a weak recoil spring not seating the bolt closed. But it was far enough to allow the hammer to fall. Out of battery discharges are bad and in larger calibers can be disastrous. I have seen aftermath photos of some but had never seen one in person...... until today.
Mike

[Gio]

Sounds like fun stuff, I like not to think too much about how things can go wrong while shooting. I mean as in this kind of thing happening. It is bad enough you have to pay so much attention to your weapon and your surroundings already Glad you were'nt hurt, and that it was not a .223/5.56 round that it happened with. Better luck with the .22LR kit next time out

-Gio

[Linus]

I just gotta...

[AlexBreya]

it seems like an explosion of a .22lr wouldn't do damage to the gun. i may have missed this, but it still works, right?

[Black Majik]

Glad to hear you're ok. This actually happens quite frequently with the ceiner kit.

http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=3&f=15&t=333407

[Mississippi]

Glad your ok!

[fusionstar]

it seems like an explosion of a .22lr wouldn't do damage to the gun. i may have missed this, but it still works, right?

I can tell you first hand that a 22lr is plenty powerful to get your attention, I've had an out of battery several years ago with a 22 and it blew the extractor and magazine apart. But it wasn't a big enough explosion to damage the gun other than those 2 parts.

[OCArmory]

From what I can tell every thing is ok except the extractor. Just an attention getter.