Are AR15 bolts standard and interchangeable?

[Shuggy]

I take it back. I wouldn't want to be well away from him on the firing line. More like the next county!

[Laurie]

So they were shooting this free ammo until one of them went Kaboom.

 

 

There's a lesson in there folks

 

 

The only time I've seen anything similar, it was also 'free ammo'. This was a .303 BREN pre-Hungerford that two guys would bring to the monthly Vintage Arms Assoc. range day at Purfleet. The first time they came with it, the allegedly permanently converted to semi-auto fire LMG would fire full-auto no matter what they did to selectors, gas ports or whatever. They went home discontented. The next outing one month on started better, the S1 converted LMG was what it said on the tin and on the owner's FAC, until .... !

 

I was next to them on the firing line and an almighty 'bang' had me twist round fast enough to see the mag spinning up in the air about six feet above the gun and smoke and flames still coming out of the ejection port under the gun's body. It turned out they had some mates who were into warplane archeology and who'd dug up a crashed Hurricane or Spitfire from somewhere in deepest Kent. As well as recovering engine parts and similar they'd acquired several thousand rounds of 303 ammo in 'good nick' which they'd passed onto their shooting friends. This was around 1983 or 84 so the ammo was 40 odd years old and you've guessed it a squib round had produced enough pressure to lodge the bullet far enough down the barrel for its successor to chamber and fire. Anyway, being a BREN nothing at all in the action was damaged, it just had a (QD) blocked barrel. A replacement was swapped in before the next meeting and they were off again, well for four or five years anyway until the 1988 Act presumably turned their gun into a display piece.

[Shuggy]

I think that I must have been unluckier than most to be right next to 3 kabooms. The first was someone unwisely shooting factory Samson .357 magum +P+ 'metal piercing' ammo in a Douglas tight barrelled K frame Smith & Wesson until the cylinder gave way.

 

The second was someone who thought that it would be a good idea to load 250 grain .45 Colt semiwadcutters into .45 ACP with a very heavy load in a 1911. This was fine until the case ruptured over the unsupported feed ramp, blowing out the magazine and removing the grips.

 

The final (I hope!) one was a nice old boy who did the the classic no powder followed by a live round in a Winchester lever action. This really got bits of the breech moving quickly!