Hi all,
I am having a really strange problem with 2 bullet waits. 230gr and 200gr. Both are jacketed. The problem is that the primer goes off, but there is no ignition. There is enough pressure to push the bullet out of the case and jam it in the barrel maybe ¼” in. When I was shooting the 230gr bullet I had hang fire in a few instances instead. When I carefully extracted the unfired case and examined the powder I noticed that the powder at the top looks normal. But the powder at the bottom feels slightly compressed and also is brown-yellow (dirty yellow) in color. Please see the attached picture. First I thought I might have my cases contaminated with the Lyman spray case lube, but then I tumbled them and started using Lee’s case lube paste, which does not harm gun powder at all. I opened a new can of W296, but the same problem happened today. This past Friday I loaded a 300gr XTP bullet using the powder from the same can and there was no problem. Not even once. So that confirmed my suspicion about the Lyman lube contaminating my powder, but today’s experience totally destroyed that theory. Unfortunately I do not have different primers so I cannot role them out. I use CCI small rifle primers.
Can you please tell me if you have seen this problem before and if you can tell me what the cause of this is?
Thank you so much.
Cheers,
Mad
P.S. The powder fills the case almost to the bottom of the seated bullet, however it is not compressed and if I shake the cartridge it actually makes the powder-shaking noise.