FOR YOUR ENTERTAINMENT
I've had two squibs in my life time.
The first one was with cheap .22 LR ammo and a nice Browning semi-automatic rifle (super accurate). The squib cycled the action with a less than normal bang. The next round made a bang twice as loud as a normal bang. "Cheap ammo" I thought. The rest of it seemed normal. That night as I was admiring the rifle getting ready to clean it, I was put into shock and disbelief. Halfway down the barrel was a bulge. I realized that the big bang was the second round knocking the previous round (the squib) out of the barrel. I quickly put a cleaning rod and patch through the barrel to check-out the bulge from the inside. Sure enough, any bullet passing through that barrel was free-floating midway down the barrel. I could have cried at that moment. The rifle went to the pawn shop.
Lessons learned:
1. When you hear an abnormal bang, check it out before you continue.
2. Stay away from the really, really cheap .22 LR ammo.
And the second squib:
*** WARNING - DO NOT DO ANY OF THE FOLLOWING - COULD BE DANGEROUS ***
I was reloading for a 444 Marlin using IMR 4198 (I think). It turned out that I had a little bit of powder left over. Not quite enough for a 444 load, but just enough to fill a 44 Mag case. Being a bright young engineering college student, I realized this rifle powder burned to slow to ever reach a dangerous pressure level with the amount that could be crammed into a 44 Mag case. So I set about loading up one very special 44 Mag round, almost full to the rim with IMR 4198. Then my brother and I grabbed my dad's 4" S&W Model 29 and headed out behind the house to shoot the thing (lived up in the TN mountians) and see what would happen. I was correct! There were no excessive pressures. As a matter of fact, the powder burned so slow and the pressure was so low, the bullet never exited the barrel. So there we were, trying to figure how to dislodge that bullet before dad got home. I had received one lecture about my reloading practices and didn't want another. We couldn't find the right size wooden dowel so we tried to tap it out with a screw driver, but I was afraid the screwdriver would drive into the bullet and somehow bulge the barrel (memories from the first squib). I loaded up a 44 Mag blank (little bit of pistol powder capped with cardboard). It took six of those to pop that bullet out of the barrel like the cork from a toy pop gun. With each blank I had increased the charge ever so slightly. My dad didn't appreciate this story when I told it to him 15 years later.
Lessons learned:
1. Stick to the reloading manuals, don't wing it.
2. Parents don't like to hear how you trashed their prized revolver.
