Heat & Ammo Question
I have always been taught that the old wild west movie stuff about a cowboy tossing cartridges into the camp fire and have them go off was bogus. Excessive heat (like a house fire)can ignite the powder but by then the brass has softened to a point where there was no good seal and the bullet just limped out. Am I wrong? Channel 8 in Indy just had a segment about explosions from ammo in a house fire last night.
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IMHO I have done this as a kid and the case will travel faster then the bullet because it is lighter the case can sting you but it needs a closed Chamber and barrel to develop HIGH Pressure. . Now if you had enough ammo and it was in a closed Steel ammo can then it may cause a small explosion.With a very large amount inside a non fireproof safe. ^You may get a somewhat larger BANG , I still think the fire would do more damage then the ammo going off. YMMV
Edit DONT EVER TRY WITH BLACK POWDER YOU ARE CORRECT IT WILL not react the same as smokeless . Black powder is an explosive smokeless has to be confined to do more then burn slowly Smokeless burns faster the more pressure so just an loaded case will spit out the bullet.under less pressure thus slower burn rate then Black.0 -
as a kid i have also done this many more times than i had a right to get away with it. i noticed that the primer was expelled from the case with the most force and could cause the most damage, but the case and bullet seldom went anywhere. 0 -
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I have been hit by a couple of primers doing the campfire thing (not very so schmart, I guess) when I was a kid. Those things can really fly! Never did get hurt by the bullet or brass.0 -
I wonder if the old black powder charges react differently than todays smokeless rounds?
BP is considered a explosive, while smokeless is not.0 -
quote:Originally posted by Tailgunner1954
I wonder if the old black powder charges react differently than todays smokeless rounds?
BP is considered a explosive, while smokeless is not.
Yes they would. But primer is still the weak spot, so it would let loose first0 -
I was one of the kids that dident get away with the campfire thing! my brother and I had to dig a primer out of my scalp! could NOT tell mom or dad that would have ment a massive azz beating! not funny I guess I was lucky though , it could have been my eye! my brother tossed a 38spec into the fire and I was standing on the other side about 5 feet away from the fire ring and pop! (OUCH!#^#*!) THAT FAST! one of the more stupid things that we tried as kids. 0 -
You should all get a copy of "Hatchers Manual" and read up on the subject. The military did many tests on ammo under many different conditions including fire. (very little danger from it) I believe the TV program "MithBusters" also had a segment on the subject. Google it to find out. 0 -
Saw the mythbusters episode. They used several different rounds and tried them in both a fire and an oven. They all went off in both cases but the bullets barely moved if at all. It was the brass that went flying. 0 -
Had a friend whos house caught fire and he had some 30-06 mil. ammo that cooked off in mil.ammo cans. The bullets,cases and primers were all in the cans with some cans bulged a little.The worst were the cans with the Grand clips,in the small cans some bullets went thru the sides but i think it was because of the way they were packed and there was not much room to push out the bullet,brass or primers.All the small cans were badly bulged. 0 -
I remember reading something about this a long time ago. I seem to remember the greatest danger was for a gun stored with a round in the chamber. The close quarters caused the pressure to build and the bullet to travel down the barrel as if it had been shot. 0
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