Barrel damage from pulling a bullet?

[SgtErv]

If you weren't thinking you would have tried to fire with a barrel obstruction. Better safe than sorry.

I refinished an old gun and knew the bore looked fine after inspection with a bore light. However, I was nervous about it anyway, and the shots jumped everywhere. Then I got frustrated with being nervous and the shots jumped everywhere. Next time I shot it, everything was fine.

At first I thought there was some unseen or unknown damage, but it was just me.

Besides a bore light, if you can set your gun on sandbags or something and shine a really bright flashlight down the bore that works too, I like doing that better than a bore light. Let us know what you see. Good luck! And, again, glad you made te safe decision

 

[larry wv]

I had a Possum on the porch stealing cat food a few nights ago. I picked up the closest pistol which was a semi auto with military ammo in it. Followed the piece of scum ( hate them) till I had a clean shot and pulled the trigger. It didn't sound right! Of course the Possum took the opportunity to play dead. Anyway that made things confusing but having had several guns fly apart in my hands I checked the barrel and it was a squib round. Prob 2 inches down the barrel. In battle guns don't kick or make much noise. Hunting some what similar. Guys and gals if your weapon sounds a bit odd (not in a gunfight) check it out. Off topic I know but important.

Larry

 

[azmntman]

so he got away?

 

[larry wv]

Didn't get away he was still playing dead a few minutes later when I went back. He was a good actor but not very smart. :grin:

Larry

 

[hanshi]

I like possums a lot and feel sorry for the little guys. The only thing more pitiful than a possum is an armadillo - I'm from Georgia and just moved to Va a few years ago. Possums even make very nice pets; they're not dirty unless they've gotten into something nasty. A possum could cross a road over and over just to show an armadillo it's possible. :idunno:

 

[Rifleman1776]

Didn't get away he was still playing dead a few minutes later when I went back. He was a good actor but not very smart. :grin:

Larry

Possums are, far and away, the easiest animal to trap there is. Once, using a live trap trying to catch a racoon doing damage at my place, I caught a possum every night for two months until, finally, a 'coon was caught.
A friend of mine, who grew up in the country, says the way to kill a possum playing dead is to put your foot on it's head and pull up on the tail until the neck is broken. That is how he did it to bring them home for dinner.
I gave up trying to get rid of possums around my place after I figured out there are about 20,000 of them per acre in the woods around me. :shocked2: :wink:

 

[azmntman]

ff Grampa had a pet possum in his garage in WA Indiana. :thumbsup:

 

[fraungie]

Best way I found to dispatch was I used to carry a forked stick about the diameter of a 2"-2 1/2" in dia. When I ran a trap line. Pin the head down with the fork then grab them by the scruff of the neck with your left hand where the fork is hold the head down. place the sick perpendicular to the animal behind the head. center the stick on the neck and stand on each end pinning them down. Let go of the neck. Stand up grab the tail and pull the body up forward over the head while still standing on the stick. This will break their neck. You will hear it crack like someone cracking their knuckles. This works on fox, racoons and any animal you can lift over their heads. This leaves no holes in the fur and they skin clean. Never tried it on skunks LOL. I used a .22 on them before I got into muzzleloading.

 

[pondoro]

I dry balled once , worked some powder in through the nipple hole, shot the ball but it stuck about 2" from the muzzle. Reloaded with a bit more powder, reseated the ball. Stuck the ball about 2" from the muzzle. Repeated this about five more times. Finally the ball escaped from the barrel! I must have a tight spot there, though you cannot feel it.

 

[RedFeather]

As one fellow said, it is not true that possums are born dead on the side of the road.

A good while back, I read where using a centered small drill bit to rout out the ball or Minnie to help start the screw also prevents the puller from spreading the lead. Guess you could fit up something like that with a bore sized brass collar guide.

 

[Billnpatti]

That's like removing tonsils through the anus.....it's the long way around to solve a problem. Just work some power behind the ball and shoot it out. It takes very little powder to get the ball to come out and practically no struggle more strenuous than working the powder behind the ball. It is the simple and easy way to solve a common and frustrating little problem. :thumbsup:

Now, I can envision one situation where a ball puller is almost the only way to solve your dry ball situation. If you happen to be shooting a flintlock and you dry ball it and the ball is far enough back that it obstructs the touch hole then, bless your heart, you are in deep poo poo. :cursing: Go ahead and reach for that ball puller. If you start to get the ball out and the puller pulls out of the ball as so often happens, just hope that you have moved the ball just a tad. If you have gotten the ball to move, your touch hole will no longer be obstructed and you can put away the ball puller and start working powder behind the ball. As you can tell, I don't reach for my ball puller unless it is the last hope. :shake:

Of course, there is the CO2 discharger....I don't have one but I hear that they are great when you need one.

 

[Billnpatti]

As for armadillos and 'possoms, they aren't just for running over in the road. Both of them make pretty darned good table fare. But, I will say this, someone else has to dress out and cook a 'possum before I will eat it. Once cooked they are good eating but they have a smell when you are gutting them that actually makes me gag. They are like rattlesnakes in that way. Both are good on the table but I cant' stand their smell when they are being dressed out. Armadillos are a different thing. They don't stink any more than any other animal. They present a little trouble in getting them out of the shell but once you know how to do that, you have some good meat. but, whatever you do, don't rupture the gall bladder. If you do, the only thing you can do is throw the armadillo away 'cuz the meat is ruined if any of the gall bladder contents get on it. That's why it is best to head shoot them. I like 'possum when it is cooked with sweet potatoes ('possum and 'taters) and my preferred way to cook armadillo is to roast him with the same vegetables as you use when making a pot roast. Just stuff them inside him and around him and roast him. Rattlesnake is good, I have eaten it fried and grilled. I like fried best.

Hey....wait a minute....what the hell does this have to do with stuck rifle balls? I don't know either. :idunno:

 

[Zonie]

Some armadillos (not all) carry the bacterium that causes leprosy (Hansen's disease).

Probably a good idea to just leave them alone and worry about how to get the stuck roundball out of your muzzleloader.

Even if you can't get it out with a puller, it won't give you a really bad disease.

By the way, I've use the "shoot it out" with a little powder dribbled under the ball on several occasions.

I've also used a ball screw on a metal ramrod to get stuck balls out.
The shoot it out method is far easier and the blue color of the air when your finished is just powder smoke instead of the results of a lot of extreme profanity.

 

[Adui]

:thumbsup:

Years ago, when I first got into ML, I hunted with mine in the rain. The rain only one who's lived in the pacific Northwest (NW Oregon all the way up to Seattle) can understand, and it was a wet year...

After a long a fruitless day out as the sun was going down I went to empty the rifle so I could clean and dry it well.
Cap go pop... Recap..
Cap go pop...
Recap.. Cap go pop.. Several curse words are spoken. Dig in hunting pouch for nipple wrench, unscrew nipple with cold, tired , wet fingers. Drop nipple in gravel.. Its now too dark to see..

Buddy turns car so we can put the headlights on as I am scrambling on my hands and knees. Find nipple ; (my guardian angel with a Murphy style sense of humor had pity on me)

StufF as much fresh powder in the nipple hole as I can get to go in while trying not to let the light drizzle get into the hole. Replace nipple...

Cap nipple.. Point at tree about ten paces from me.
Say a quick prayer to whater power might be listening and fire.

POP!! ffffffffffShwooot.. Crack!

The sound of the ball hitting the tree was long enough after the discharge that a flint shooter would have started to think he had a misfire before it went off...

Took the rifle home cleaned it, refinished the stock (it swelled so much from not being sealed I had to fix it.. I weren't very learned about Traditions ML guns back then....)

Hunted with it two weeks later...

 

[Rifleman1776]

I dry balled once

Once? :shocked2:
Come on now. Really,how many times, truthfully, have you dry balled?
Like the other big male lie. Only 1% admit it. The other 99% are liars. :wink:

 

[mooman76]

I've only dry balled twice I think, but maybe 3 times. It would probably be more but I usually shoot by myself so there are less distractions. I get distracted easily especially now adays that I am getting older. Now what were we talking about?

 

[azmntman]

Seems I can dry ball every 4-5 trips to the range....and I shoot alone almost all the time

 

[Cowboy]

I get distracted easily especially now adays that I am getting older. Now what were we talking about?

I don't know? I forgot?
:rotf: :rotf:

 

[Eterry]

Billnpatti, I gotta go with Jim on the Armadillo's. A good friend's first assignment at deer camp was to hunt down one, zap it with his woodsman, then dress it while I build the fire and put on beans. He loved the "diller" while I wouldn't touch it. Now a young coon was a different matter...I loved them. Later he found a research paper from a TX university stating there was a fair chance he could get leprosy and that did it...now we make chili. :grin:

I've dryballed a few times, but my most memorable screwup was sticking my ramrod full length with a jag and tight cleaning patch. We tried EVERYTHING to pull it out. I pulled the nipple and put in a few grains of powder, pointed it downrange at the 50 yard berm, and pulled! It sounded like a cap gun but the ramrod flew halfway to the berm then nosedived, bouncing a few times before it went OVER the berm. Thankfully it was a synthetic rod; it wasn't even scratched. How's that for being ff !!