Misfire

[Cattywompuss]

So, after I spent an hour on 10 shots in my .50 cal, I decided to take a Parthian(Parting) Shot with my .40 "Stower's Thumper" squirrel rifle. I wanted to shoot more, but evening church was an hour away and needed to wash off the stench of BP before that. So I loaded 40gr of Goex, and since my solid lube was already in the car I cut a patch and sucked on it for a minute to make it a spit patch. Loaded a .390 ball, cut patch, started it, rammed home. Primed from the horn since my 4f was already in the car. "Whoosh!" Nothing.

Reprimed, twigged the flash hole, whoosh, nothing. Seven more attempts, nada.

Took the gun home, nervously praying it didn't hang fire and shoot a hole in the roof of my good lady wife's BMW, and went to church. Came home, tried the ol screw tip ball puller to no avail. Then I started packing the touchhole with powder and after about 15 to 20 grains went in, I went out in the yard pointed at the ground and Whoomph-pah! It cleared. Sounded like a Roman candle.

I have three theories: 1. The touchhole is quite open, and the 3f literally drained from the hole while loading leaving a "seated" ball with no powder behind it.
2. The spit patch was too wet and soaked the charge in the 30 seconds between seating and priming. 3. The charge was so small that the load was behind the touchhole.

When I stuck the vent pick in the vent it went straight through to the other side of the barrel. The load was definitely seated all the way down, but was it too far? I was able to add quite a lot of powder very carefully and slowly through the vent. Yes, I added whole grains of 3f a couple at a time.

I'm not new to this, but this is a new to me rifle(had it since May, but never fired). What gives?

 

[smo]

Close the frizzen and load it too see if the powder is blowing out the touch hole…

40 grns should get you above the touch hole on a .40 I would think..

The Roman candle sound going off doesn’t sound right, it should have just sounded like a shot fired..

 

[excess650]

IMO, you never put powder in the bore before seating the ball in your .40. While it does sound like your vent is large, there is no way that the entire powder charge was blown out while seating the ball. Likewise, a "spit patch" wouldn't have dampened the entire powder charge in 30 seconds, AND if it had, you wouldn't have been able to put "quite a lot of powder" under the ball via the vent.

 

[Cattywompuss]

IMO, you never put powder in the bore before seating the ball in your .40. While it does sound like your vent is large, there is no way that the entire powder charge was blown out while seating the ball. Likewise, a "spit patch" wouldn't have dampened the entire powder charge in 30 seconds, AND if it had, you wouldn't have been able to put "quite a lot of powder" under the ball via the vent.

Sadly you are wrong. I used a new antler powder measure for the first time to do it. Measure was checked prior to use for volume when I completed it a week ago. Using my own creation to charge the gun left a nice memory in the ol noggin.

 

[Cattywompuss]

IMO, you never put powder in the bore before seating the ball in your .40. While it does sound like your vent is large, there is no way that the entire powder charge was blown out while seating the ball. Likewise, a "spit patch" wouldn't have dampened the entire powder charge in 30 seconds, AND if it had, you wouldn't have been able to put "quite a lot of powder" under the ball via the vent.

I would love for it to have been a ball with no powder. That would make the explanation simple. The fact that I know it wasn't is far more concerning. I do think it is possible for too wet a spit patch to do it if the pressure of loading squeezed a lot of moisture out as it was seated. But the space behind the ball definitely leaves open the possibility of the powder blowing out the vent.

 

[Cattywompuss]

Close the frizzen and load it too see if the powder is blowing out the touch hole…

40 grns should get you above the touch hole on a .40 I would think..

The Roman candle sound going off doesn’t sound right, it should have just sounded like a shot fired..

The angle at which I held the gun to the ground, muzzle a few inches off the ground may have muffled it. Not to mention longrifles being virtually hearing safe compared to modern guns. The sound of the shot was weird, but it wasn't your typical range shooting situation as I was just hoping for a cleared bore and no bulged barrel kaboom.

 

[Billy Boy]

Close the frizzen and load it too see if the powder is blowing out the touch hole…

40 grns should get you above the touch hole on a .40 I would think..

The Roman candle sound going off doesn’t sound right, it should have just sounded like a shot fired..

Could the Roman candle sound be the priming and ‘trickle’ charges going off without the main charge? It was enough to get the ball out.

 

[Cattywompuss]

Could the Roman candle sound be the priming and ‘trickle’ charges going off without the main charge? It was enough to get the ball out.

It very well could have been. Virtually no muzzle in the dark to speak of.

 

[Grenadier1758]

As @smo has suggested, load your 40 caliber rifle with the frizzen closed. If the touch hole is too large, you will fill the pan with powder from the loaded charge. Now you can either load with the frizzen closed and add 5 grains of powder to the load or plug the touch hole when loading.

Also one minute of soaking the patch material with spit will result in a patch that is too wet unless you have an unusually dry mouth.

 

[Cattywompuss]

As @smo has suggested, load your 40 caliber rifle with the frizzen closed. If the touch hole is too large, you will fill the pan with powder from the loaded charge. Now you can either load with the frizzen closed and add 5 grains of powder to the load or plug the touch hole when loading.

Also one minute of soaking the patch material with spit will result in a patch that is too wet unless you have an unusually dry mouth.

Thanks Grenadier, I will do as SMO suggested when next I take that rifle out. Let's put it this way regarding the patch- I had to ring it out to use it at all, so no dry mouth. I'm leaning toward a wet charge now.

 

[Grenadier1758]

Even then, if you load a very wet patch on powder and immediately shoot it, the dry powder at the breech should still fire even is the powder just under the ball is wet. Many of the "I never wipe between shots, just use a wet patch to load the ball" advocates get away with using a sloppy wet patch around the ball.

 

[OldSmoky1967]

IMO, you never put powder in the bore before seating the ball in your .40. While it does sound like your vent is large, there is no way that the entire powder charge was blown out while seating the ball. Likewise, a "spit patch" wouldn't have dampened the entire powder charge in 30 seconds, AND if it had, you wouldn't have been able to put "quite a lot of powder" under the ball via the vent.

I Agree. I have been guilty of this, too.

 

[Cattywompuss]

I Agree. I have been guilty of this, too.

Again, there is zero doubt the rifle was charged. I would love for it not to have been, because that's an easy answer. But there is not a shred of doubt it was loaded with 40gr of powder from a newly minted antler charger that I used for the first time to load this gun.

 

[Cattywompuss]

Even then, if you load a very wet patch on powder and immediately shoot it, the dry powder at the breech should still fire even is the powder just under the ball is wet. Many of the "I never wipe between shots, just use a wet patch to load the ball" advocates get away with using a sloppy wet patch around the ball.

The only possibility I see with this is most of the charge was wet and the ball moved only so slightly, but even 20gr of powder(half the original charge)will push a .40 lrb out of the bore. Problem with that potentiality I checked ramrod length against the known load depth AFTER the misfire.. The ball was firmly seated to a ramrod mark left by a previous owner.

 

[Eterry]

I've used spit patch for over 4 decades. I always put the patch between my teeth and lip and suck the moisture from it before loading. It's been working that way a long time. Even left it loaded overnight a time or twice, still went boom. Im thinking the patch was too wet.

 

[bpd303]

The other thing I can think of is if the rifle was stored butt down after the last cleaning and oiling the bore, the lube may have migrated to the breech blocking the flame channel from the pan. What type of lube was it cleaned with and how long since it was shot last? I had that happen once when I used RIG to coat the bore on a rifle that I didn't shoot very often and the RIG solidified at the breech. I failed to use a can of air to clear the flash channel when the next time it was shot.

 

[hanshi]

Something sounds really strange about your whole experience. I plug the touchhole when I load but even when I forget the 3F charge still doesn't blow out the vent. If that is indeed what happened then your vent/vent liner hole is vastly too large and needs a smaller one. Even a spit patch won't inactivate a 40 grain powder charge. And with the "kickstart" you trickled into the breech it would have still fired. But the fact the vent pick detected no powder in the breech explains a lot. The only question is, "why wasn't a powder charge under the ball"? I highly doubt an entire powder charge leaked out of the liner, so we must start from this assumption if we wish to explain the incident. Regardless, I don't think it's worth worrying about unless the vent liner really does need replacing. Good luck.

 

[Cattywompuss]

The other thing I can think of is if the rifle was stored butt down after the last cleaning and oiling the bore, the lube may have migrated to the breech blocking the flame channel from the pan. What type of lube was it cleaned with and how long since it was shot last? I had that happen once when I used RIG to coat the bore on a rifle that I didn't shoot very often and the RIG solidified at the breech. I failed to use a can of air to clear the flash channel when the next time it was shot.

No idea what it was last cleaned with. It was done by the previous owner. I ran a lubed patch down it before first firing. Then a clean dry patch. It's possible, but it would have probably had to have dried out. Also my guns are stored horizontally so it probably wasn't from me.

 

[hanshi]

If the previous owner was the last person to clean the rifle you're can't swear to what kind of job he did. IMO this will remain a puzzling mystery that's not important enough to ponder over.

 

[Cattywompuss]

Something sounds really strange about your whole experience. I plug the touchhole when I load but even when I forget the 3F charge still doesn't blow out the vent. If that is indeed what happened then your vent/vent liner hole is vastly too large and needs a smaller one. Even a spit patch won't inactivate a 40 grain powder charge. And with the "kickstart" you trickled into the breech it would have still fired. But the fact the vent pick detected no powder in the breech explains a lot. The only question is, "why wasn't a powder charge under the ball"? I highly doubt an entire powder charge leaked out of the liner, so we must start from this assumption if we wish to explain the incident. Regardless, I don't think it's worth worrying about unless the vent liner really does need replacing. Good luck.

Thanks. When I bought the gun I reckoned the touch hole was awfully big. Gonna grab a bit set and see what size it is tonight. It looks like a White Lightnin.