Just when you think you've heard it all....

[Son]

I came across a request for detailed drawings for the bolthead of a No4 MkI*. Ok, perhaps not anything unusual there, some collectors are always chasing tech docs of one sort or another.... But, this gent wants to make his own bolthead, and doesn't like the fact that the three boltheads he owns are different sizes. Now, the reason he gives for this is the fact he had a catastrophic failure of a bolthead which resulted in him getting sprayed with burnt powder residue, the shooter beside him being burnt also, and a passing range officer being struck by a piece of the shattered bolt head. Not wanting to allow the thread to deviate into an investigation of the failure, he has said only that he was shooting cast bullets out of handloaded ammunition at the time.... and could find no reason for the failure....

Anyone else hearing alarm bells here? I suggested he put his trust in the proven track record of the Lee Enfield action and parts, but re-visit what he had done wrong that could have caused the misshap...

I did say I wasn't aware of any such failure that couldn't be attributed to operator error in some way... have I made a wrong statement here?

Things that come to my mind from the scant information available so far...
Was it a DP rifle?
Was the bore fouled/ blocked?
Did his handload cause a serious overpressure by
1) a double charge of a fast burning pistol powder popular for lead pill shooters?
2) Or a half full case and a flashover of the powder.
3) Was the projectile sized correct?
4) Not crimped too tight or even too hard compound?

Another though just to mind, is the bolt missing the lug which prevents the cocking piece falling when the bolt isn't locked... allowing ignition and the unlocked bolt flying rearward from the pressure- effectively an out of breech ignition?

...any discussion welcome here... have I missed something? Or should we all be making our own boltheads so we aren't injured at the range?

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