Lawyers won’t grow a hand back in any event. AND a good iron barrel was not going to create grenade fragments. In fact the British proof house, at least did a very energetic proof. AND if the barrel bulged and did not burst it could be hammered back to shape and reproved. Some times several times until it passed. Iron is not brittle. I suspect the the issues with still until the late 1860s+- was the reason that the Union‘s Rifle Musket barrels were skelp welded “best iron” was the lack of control of the steel alloys of the time. These BTW were proved with 200 gr of musket powder and a 500 gr Minie spaced 2” off the powder. And if a barrel failed it was examined by a committee to determine why and the workman responsible had to pay for the barrel. I like to point out that years ago my dad shot a Garand with dirt in the barrel. Dunno what ammo he was using probably ball. It put a lump in the barrel about 1.5” behind the front sight. No breaks, no burst, just a short lump. Now tho Garand barrel is pretty thin at this point and the bullet is doing about 2700 by that time, maybe a little more. So buy yourself a 12L14 fowler barrel load it with a standard load with a ball then plug it 3” behind the muzzle. Most cold rolled steel will break. BTW the Garand barrel was 4150 perhaps 41V50. It been in use since the 1930s by the military. It can be shot when red hot and not suffer a failure other than the bore erodes faster. The fact that the TENSILE of 12L14 is 3-4 times the max pressure that can be obtained with BP NONE OF THEM SHOULD EVER FAIL, i.e. burst/break even with a bore obstruction. The fact that some do, proved or not should tell you SOMETHING. Everything I have stated about 12L14 comes from a long time shooter of MLs who happens to be a metallurgist that specialized in failure analysis. BUT getting a metallurgist to comment on a firearms failure/suitable steels is difficult Since they immediately figure its a law suit and don’t wanna be called to court. The other thing… Many years ago, mid-1970s IIRC a certain American company who was mass producing “Hawken” rifles with, at the time 12L14 barrels, was sued several times. But the Handloader defense saved them. Even if the barrel burst at the breech as some did. One in particular “proved” to have been used with smokeless. A friend of mine, who would post on some forums as “Mad Monk” decided to to the chemical analysis on Goex straight form the can. Created the fouling, did the chemical tests and behold he got a “smokeless” result. But the injured party’s lawyer did not bother to have Goex fouling tested. “Mad Monk” used to work for Oxy Chemical and it eventually killed him. Finally. This is ALL info people don’t want to here. Scary. Flintlocks are less prone to failure, perhaps very, than percussion since they have a “softer” pressure rise, but it still worries me. Flintlock shotguns in Britain that were converted were known the fail even though they had passed British proof. We also have to remember that the POWDER was better by about 1800-1830 than it was in 1760-1780 for the most part. There was a change in powder making about 1770 that I am not going go into. The old Buckskin Report would call a spade a spade and it put it under in the end. You cannot print the truth with consequences. It was amazing the number of failure reports that came into John’s office at the time. But they did not appear in Muzzleblasts or other magazines. It can PO the advertisers. So there is a LOT you never see in ANY gun magazine. Have written articles and have a friend who has written literally thousands for various big names I can tell you that you don’t find anything that might injure or insult and advertiser since this is where they make the money. SO even if there was blowup every week you won’t hear of it and the shooter is gonna blame himself and shut up so people won’t know how “stupid” he was since MLS “never blow up” unless the shooter loads them wrong….. Some of the photos I have seen over the years where the barrel “broke” with not stretching are pretty scary. In modern firearms with much higher intensity powder an overload with at worst bulge something. However, an under load of some powders like IMRs etc or some pistol powder will cause brittle fractures even with modern steels and it can be anything from a 357 mag, a 45 Colt to a 50-140 Sharps reproduction (tested to 50K psi in 45-70 with not even a stuck case) to a 300 Win Mag. It WILL break and show little or no distortion. Just break since its possible to convert smokeless powders into a high explosive by loading too light. Like trying to creat BP or cast bullet velocities in a large case and a powder like IMR 4831 or IMR 3031 or Bullseye, or Red Dot. Unique loads published by lyman for DECADES were notorious for ringing rifle chambers. Ruger told my employer, when we got one back) that they had Rugers in 45-70 come in with 150 separate rings in the chamber. This was known and in the 1930s, soon after IMRs were developed and it was documented by Phil Sharpe, if you know who he is and have read his book…. So while you CAN destroy a modern steel barrel 4140/4150 it can’t be done with blackpowder. But everyone is an “expert” but they have not read or seen what I have or had communication over the almost 50 years with the people I have. Here some excerpts from The Buckskin Report.
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