Colossal AR Failure
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ก.พ. 2025
- Over-gassed? Bad materials? Not sure (my guess is: over-gassed)
Either way, I feel fortunate to avoid injury with what I characterize as a colossal failure (bolt carrier group destroyed).
Intelligent, experienced feedback is greatly appreciated
That's not a gas issue I don't think to send that much pressure back through the system would have blown your gas tube well before it did any damage to the bolt carrier group
that looks to me like an out of battery detonation
Again if it was a super hot round you would have seen problems in other places
That looks like an out of battery to me
I 2nd that!
I totally agree
I agree
@Bob Watters my vote is on a squib or sorts causing a bore obstruction. Out of battery dets usually leave bits of a blown out cassing half out the chamber and are pretty obvious. This looked like the bolt was in battery.
How could an AR, in semi out have an out of battery det. These have safety mechanism to prevent such a thing, correct?
That looks to me like a classic breach failure due to a defective round. A much milder version of what happened to Scott over on Kentucky Ballistics.
Scott was a very lucky man! I'm hoping he heals up without any complications!
@@al01100 same here, Scotts one of my favorite pewtubers
Great thing about AR's is when they fail, they tend to fail in a way that is relatively safe to the shooter. Glad you're safe.
kuhchuk I agree. ARs are designed to blow out the ejection port and down through the mag well. Glad he was not injured or worse.
@kuhchuk, speak on it, we all know your reference....
@kuchuk, you can god damn well tell you’re not left handed! Read my post on here about the pos. Then tell me what you think about loosing your right ear and most of your right cheek from one of the sob’s blowing up on you,IN THE MIDDLE OF A FIREFIGHT, not on a f king rifle range. November, 1967. Guys last name was Carson, Billings Montana. Nickname was “kit”.
@@Pointman-yf6or to be fair those early AR’s where crap
Unlike the RN-50
Have a hard time believing the adjustable gas block was the problem! Looks like you had a possible slam fire before the bolt was in battery, or an over pressure round. There is one other possibility, a failed cam pin. If it broke (very rare) it would have possibly allowed the bolt to go home- BUT NOT ROTATE INTO FULL LOCKUP. This would allow the hammer to reach the firing pin, fire the cartridge with a subsequent rear movement of the carrier assembly and explosion.
Agreed. A standard, non-adjustable gas block is essentially wide open to begin with. Over-gassed rifles do not destroy themselves like that. Out of battery discharges or over pressure rounds do.
Check that firing pin., even my builds have marks on the unfired rounds that have been cycled. It might be out of spec.
@@defiantmopar Or a high primer! The bulging over the ejection port tends to indicate a detonation when the bolt picked up the cartridge- ie high primer.
@@harrisonmccullough1183 that happens with every ar15 that does not have a spring on the firing pin if those even exist. the firing pin is free floating and will always leave a small mark.
I agree, I work as a RO at a range, seeing a lot of blown up guns this year. Poor quality control by ammo and firearms manufacturers?
After looking at the damage images, I agree that this was most likely one of three things.1 a hot round, 2 a blockage, or 3 ,far less likely, a flawed or damaged bolt carrier. It is highly unlikely to be the falt of the gas block.
I'd say 3 is most likely just from the damage to the BCG. Both hot rounds and blockages tend to blow the gas tube in my experience.
@@Dominik189 just no.
@@KoonceTodd based on?
What Bojan said, poorly made bolt carrier. Clearly it split under the pressure, probably had a crack growing for a long time.
@@snek9353 to be fair if you had to have a BCG fail and blow on you, this would probably be the best case scenario. Just kills a mag and not you.
Glad you are ok brother
Me too
That would have nothing to do with the Gas block. That is Out of battery, or barrel obstruction or ammo. Too much gas will not blow the gun apart like that. Have seen the same thing several time at the range. Most had to do with ammo (Reloads) or obstruction, even one with split case necks letting the bullet push back in the case.
Agree with this. The block alone should not be able to send enough to do this.
Yes, that is exactly what I thought. Too much powder. Certainly past proofing, I'd guess around 10% past proof. Much above that and he would probably be in hospital.
The only way it could be overgassed is from a cartridge or obstruction, the adjustable block can't make it higher than a non adjustable block.
@Bob Thompson The size of the port in the barrel determines how much gas is taped for operation of the piston in the bolt. The hole in the gas block is usually larger to allow for slight misalignment. The damage here almost has to be caused by an obstruction or a massively overloaded cartridge.
That happened to me 13 days ago, the exact same event.. My BCG split apart & BOLT catch broke off. Brass case head failure... GOOD VIDEO..
Same thing happened did u find any fix on how to salvage ur upper ?
Ammo related, not a problem with the gas system. If it was over gassed it would just cycle harder and fling the brass farther/at a different angle.
I agree with the other comments. If over gassed the only thing that would happen is excessive BCG speed. If the bolt is locked, you have a head space issue or an over pressure round. If not, then it's an out of battery situation. The two problems that day may just be a coincidence. Anyway, the gun failed where is was designed to.
Agreed.
Excessive BCG speed can cause a catastrophic failure by extracting the case too early, and the residual pressure blowing out the cartridge. One would think that an early unlocking would be a tame failure, but in fact it's enough to banana-peel the receiver and destroy the bolt and carrier.
I don't claim to be an expert but in my limited knowledge I don't think this is possible from too much gas pressure unless there was a barrel obstruction (it has happened before with underpressure loads) but I think you would have noticed it from the previous shot. To me this looks like a headspace issue or a Kentucky Ballistics type accident with a very hot overcharged load. If you have not seen the video of Kentucky Ballistics 50 cal blow-up I would recommend watching it. Basically it was a fatal event had he been alone. You were very fortunate.
This guy was firing rounds without tracking if they went boom. He was expecting the rifle not to cycle properly, so he was primed to manually cycle without thinking about it. It could have easily been a squib that he didn't notice.
Ah, the venerable AR-15 platform. So modular you can assemble one using an inexhaustible number of manufacturer's junk parts, and then act surprised when it bites you.
The ruger 5.56 is a junk rifle. The jp gas block wasn't an issue. It looks ad though the bcg failed. While still under pressure from the round which caused the damage to the upper recoever. This was a bcg failure.
And a catastrophic failure is one that makes the gun completely in operable. Even if you dont get hurt.
looks like youtube sends us to the same videos.
@@AllanPowell yep
If I may, that had nothing to do with the gas block at all. Most gas blocks are drilled out larger than the gas port in the barrel. The gas port size determines the maximum pressure delivered into the mechanism. If the gas port is within spec, the two most likely causes of a carrier rupture would be a barrel obstruction past the gas port (which could have been cleared by the subsequent round), or a badly over charged round. A barrel obstruction before the gas port would have most likely damaged the bolt head (lugs) and pushed the head backwards into the carrier.
I do not think the gas block was the issues. I am thinking an issue in the BCG like failed cam pin, super hot round or the like. The gas system just can not deliver that sort of force. The gas tube would split or the those parts directly getting that gas would fail first. For the actual carrier to fail first that had to be non-gas block related.
You should edit this video, the highest quality part in that entire rifle was the JP gas block and a gas block can't cause such an issue. Really anyone who is turning a wrench on an AR should 100% understand why a gas block didn't cause this. If you have ever had anything in 300 blk, or the original owner of the mag or rifle did, the odds are good somehow one snuck into that magazine - that causes exactly what you are describing. Similarly a barrel obstruction can too, ie 2nd to last round was a squib.
its not a gasblock issue at all. looks like headspace, or a squib blockage in barrel or out of spec casing which caused the headspace issue. what brand ammo were you using? i hate to buy stuff when these companies are under so much pressure to get product out, in the rush errors happen more. thats what will happen if you put a 300blackout round into a 556 barrel, and yes it will fit. you didnt have any 300 blackout rounds around you at anytime when that happen?
Interesting point!
I agree 100% with all that you said. The Ruger 556s that I've had experience with have had tight chambers. So I'm leaning toward an out of battery discharge from a slightly fat round, possibly a reload.
@@rustynut1967 i would send it in.. thats out of spec headspacing
@@rustynut1967 do you have to morder the charging handle to unlodge the casing
@@OperationGetReady I had a round stuck so bad mortaring ripped the lip off the case and had to be removed with a rod.
I’m don’t think that was caused by the adjustable gas block. I don’t see how its possible. Failures like that are from out of battery detonation, bore obstruction or some magical powder. I’ve seen gas tubes blow (pig tail kind), it never ended like that. I don’t think you can add enough gas back into the system to even have a failure like that. Glad you didn’t get injured. Hopefully your buddy can get the upper assembly replaced.
Where's the bolt catch spring? You can't have that thing flopping around like that. 7:40 Never seen that happen before. WTH?!?
It wasn't the gas bolt or anything. You either shot 300 through it by accident. Check the round empty case inside. Or you had a squid load. There isn't enough gas to blow it up that bad. And lastly a really over pressured round which I doubt because its hard to get 223/5.56 overloaded with gun powder(unless you use pistol powder). Also any comments about out of battery if there is any are false, ar-15's cant fire out of battery, mechanically impossible.
Glad you're ok. God bless. Be safe.
Seconding what a bunch of people already said: That is not a gas problem, it's an ammo or obstruction. I would not salvage any part of that upper. Not the barrel, not the receiver, not the BCG. Maybe you're OK with the charging handle...and perhaps a little ironically, the gas block. But I would get a new gas tube as well.
I've seen a bunch of AR15 rifles get destroyed, in EVERY case it was ammo related. Usual suspect's are too long headspace or high primer of the ammunition almost always hand loads or crap factory ammo. I highly doubt it was the gas block. That's what the failure looks like to me.
The barrel is ported to a set size. If you turned the adjustable gas block fully open it wouldn't be able to gas the gun to that extent. You had a ammo or "out of battery" issue. Definitely not the gas blocks fault.
Exactly. If it was functioning properly with a standard gas block, you can't overgas it with an adjustable gas block. All the adjustable gas block can do is reduce the gas from the original amount for using a suppressor which increases pressure or for a lighter BCG or buffer which need less gas to function.
I don't see how that much damage could come from the gas system. Seems the gas tube would have ruptured or blown the gas key off the bolt. That looks like a way over pressure round or a barrel blockage of some sort occurred. Let us know what you find, very curious as I have a Ruger.
@@vitalsigns2679 The adjustable gas system? It's a way to tune the energy that goes into the carrier. Different quality ammunition can create changes in operation (some people complain about not being able to cycle steel cased ammunition - steel case is cheaper and loaded weaker) and installing a suppressor increases the gassing of the weapon. So instead of having inconsistent operation one can choose a "middle of the road" approach that tries to keep the weapon appropriately gassed for the conditions you're planning on using it.
@Bob Thompson rest assured it had nothing to do with the gas system
Possibly a .300 blk made it into a 5.56 chamber
Any chance that last round you mentioned finding and put in the mag separately was a .300 blackout not 5.56?
This was my thought as well, verify you didn't mix in 300 black for that last round. Its unfortunate 300 black can chamber and fire in a 556 barrel, very important to keep 300 black ammo separate from 556 guns. Its very difficult to imagine how an adjustable gas block would lead to this outcome, barrel obstruction is far more likely
@@na-et2gp look at this video th-cam.com/video/RbfIkaNlECo/w-d-xo.html There is no way a gas block did this, even if it was completey open no more gas can get through than the gas port hole in the barrel allows.
If he had cambered a 300AAC wouldn't the bullet still be lodged in the barrel? Even though it chambers there's no way that the .30 caliber projectile is going to clear the 5.56 barrel so he should be able to look down the barrel and see the obstruction.
@@notchagrandpa8875 Maybe the bullet is still in the bore (I would think it would be) but if you read this article the picture shows the 300 bullet in a 5.56 barrel that is at the very end of the barrel almost exiting it! So the .300 bullet could possibly pass through the bore even. www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2018/11/14/pictures-300-blackout-in-a-556-barrel-16/
@@g.barrett8410 I didn't think a 300AAC would chamber but I decided to check into it a little bit and sure enough a 5.56 will fully chamber a 300AAC which that fact alone was surprising to me, I didn't think a 5.56 rifle would come close to fully chambering a 30 caliber projectile, so it's probably possible for the lead projectile to be reformed and forced out of the barrel especially when considering the chamber pressures used to test these rifles, but in order for it to do the damage shown there's no way it could have been solely the fault of the gas block in my humble opinion.
gas system doesn't produce enough pressure to cause that kind of damage. Looks like detonation (undercharged cartridge). Possibly a squib, or the bolt failed to lock?
Did you check headspace after changing the barrel nut.
We need to see the bolt
The barrel nut has nothing to do with head spacing. That is down to the barrel extension to bolt fit. Agree with detonation theory.
@@brettanderson6743 agreed
I suspect squib. He was manually cycling without a care bc was expecting bad cycling.
@@brettanderson6743 in almost all case's I agree. I still check headspace anytime I loosen the barrel nut. Let's call it FOD, or unforseen obstruction.
@@johnaustin6673 You're wasting your time b/c like the man said, headspace has nothing to do with the barrel nut on an AR. Do it if it makes you feel better, just know you're not actually doing anything to cause headspace to change by removing the barrel nut. Its more of an OCD soothing gesture than anything.
Over pressure round! From over load or under load. An under load can cause a massive increase in pressure. The primer flashes over the top of the powder causing it to ignite all at once. Or double load either way Boom!!!
you definitely had a hot round, etc it was the ammo not the gas block or over gassed. glad you're ok.
Absolutely no possible way that was caused by a gas block. 99% probablity the shooter accidentally loaded a 300 Black out round . I have done post mortem on 5 guns that looked exactly the same. If the barrel is plugged as I suspect.....and you'd like to send it to me I can section on milling machine to confirm what happened. If the barrel is clear then you had grossly over charged round, or one that was undercharged and the powder troughed in the case causing detonation. It is simply IMPOSSIBLE to cause that from over gassing. Feel free to call me at the number lsted on maconarmory.com
Looks like we need a follow up video!
For the “hot ammo” theory - I’m a reloader and my 223 are about 80% full of powder. Just not much room to MASSIVELY overcharge the round. I would subscribe to the round before (off camera) was a unrecognized squib or 300BLK partially into 223 chamber.
I can’t wait for a follow up video, Dave. I’ve learned a lot from the posts.
A massively hot round would be entirely possible had they mistakenly used pistol powder.
Powder type is everything. I usually pick a powder I can run compressed, as it generally gives the best consistency. Doesn't mean it's going to end well if I dump unique in the hopper instead of H335.
If you judge how hot your rounds are by how much powder you see in the case, STOP RELOADING. Get a new hobby
You didn't mention the ammo. Factory? Reloads? That's my initial reaction
Kinda looks like an out-of-battery detonation to me.
@@randomgeneratedname1264 That was my thought as well. Looks like the bolt didn't seat properly.
@@randomgeneratedname1264 Like a "hang fire"?
@@fosterdl1 OOB detonation would mean the firing pin struck the primer when the round was not firmly seated in the chamber with the lugs of the bolt locked into the barrel extension
Agreed.
If you say there was no bore obstruction, it was almost certainly hot ammo. Could be overcharged, wrong powder, bullet seated too deep, etc. Something made that round too hot. I would advise taking it to a REAL gunsmith who can solve your riddle.
I agree it blew the barrel extension, that's the only thing that makes sense
It's very hard to believe one single turn on the adjustable gas block would go from one extreme to another, making the rifle so over gassed it blew up the entire upper and magazine. What kind of ammunition were you shooting? I have a gut feeling this was some kind of ammunition or a materials failure. The Ruger 556 is NOT the highest grade AR on the planet, you get what you pay for. Thank God you were not seriously injured.
i have seen that same failure when a 300 black out round go mixed in with 556.
me too!
My guess is that you over torqued the barrel nut for the new hand guard and created micro fractures in the upper that allowed the headspace and timing to be out of spec
We noticed the same thing.
Headspace is set by the barrel adapter, nothing to do with the upper.
I could just as easily say the upper was trying to eject the keymod handguard.
If you over torque the barrel nut you can shear off the indexing pin, or crack the grove that it is supposed to reside in, both of which can disrupt headspace
Lots of questions. Why are the taper pin holes on the barrel in the 12 o-clock position? Shouldn't they be at 6? Also, why is the gas block all the way against the shoulder? Is it designed that way so that the gas hole in the barrel lines up or is it designed so that there should be a gap? How big was the hole in the barrel? A proper sized hole in the barrel should not be able to provide enough gas to the bolt to blow the gun up like that. Most of the KB's I've seen have been ammo related. I've not seen a gun blow up like this from being overgassed. My suspicion would be a ruptured case, but without seeing the bolt and chamber condition, I'd not rule anything out.
Looks like a barrel obstruction. Before the last round was fired did you have to manually charge the handle to clear the brass. I have had a reloaded round not have powder in it that blocked the barrel with the projectile. Luckily I realized that something sounded funny and checked the barrel and sure enough it was blocked by the projectile. If I had chambered the next round I would have had the situation that you ended up with. Were you able to look at the brass of the last round and what did it look like. Also looks like the round could have gone off before it was fully chambered but why would that happen. I know of AK's bump fired that have done that due to timing because a semi auto is not meant to do what a full auto does. Very strange, thank the LORD you were not hurt. ALWAYS wear eye protection I can handle flesh wounds but not eye injuries.
the last round chambered just fine......I didn't have any reason to suspect an obstruction........
@@drdrake63 If you are sure the last round went down range and there was no click instead of bang then probably no obstruction/squib so maybe a bad factory round. Check the case of that last round to see if its damaged or not.
th-cam.com/video/aFlD3sYnq9U/w-d-xo.html
I’ve been working on a friend’s Ruger 556 as well. Since the Ruger has a .625 gas hole, we kept the original gas block, and had it cut down and reprofiled so it may fit under a Troy Battle Rail.
This way we didn’t risk loss of function with a known good gas system.
I believe it was an out of spec headspace issue. I doubt Ruger will replace any parts free of charge since the owner used aftermarket parts and installed it back together.
So this was not related to the gas block at all. Even an over gassed gun would not fail like this. My guess is either bad headspace or significantly overpressure ammo. The failure resulted from the back of the chamber where the bolt locks up with the barrel extension. If you could, I would examine the spent brass from the previous shots and look for signs of bulging in the case head area to see if there are any signs of bad headspacing. Rest assured though, this has nothing to do with your work on the gas block.
Thank you, this was the type of feedback I was hoping to get. I did check the spent casings and none of them have the bulge you discuss.
@@drdrake63 Absolutely, I'm sorry this happened and i'm glad you're ok. I would also be curious to know if this ammo was purchased recently? There have been many reports of bad quality control issues with the increase in production rate.
I also figured I would add some info in about the gas block. So the adjustable gas blocks can only decrease the amount of gas going into the gas tube. A standard non adjustable gas block is actually allowing the maximum amount of gas you can get into the system because there is nothing to restrict flow. The limiting factor being the size of the gas port in the barrel. So from an engineering perspective its not possible to get the kind of gas necessary to cause this failure through that gas port. Additionally, the thin gas tube would blow out long before that thick steel BCG would.
I should have read your response before I posted. I too think it was a headspace issue.
did you have an issue removing the barrel? Early Ruger AR 556's are notorious for using high heat locking compounds on their AR barrel nuts. many had issues removing the barrel nuts when they first introduced the AR line up. if you had to use excessive torque to remove the barrel nut, that might be a contributor.
Either the buffer spring got bound up in an almost fully extended position or something got lodged in between the bold and the walls of the upper that prevented the bolt carrier from moving backwards.
It had nothing to do with the gas system. It was a mere oversight in inspecting all parts or re-assembling incorrectly. The bolt was unable to retract causing the face to strike against the bolt carrier and the pressure alleviated itself at the only point expansion was available.
If it was a gas issue you should have noticed damage on the gas tube as well, and it would have been closer to the where the gas key and the gas tube lose contact I believe.
Edit :
If you look at 8:03
Look for the Carter pin. Must have been warn and dislodged itself.
I build and have used adjustable glass blocks. I use 10-32 set screws similar to what you describe in your video. I start with about 1/2 turn from bottom. When I get some effort to eject and cycle, I adjust in 1/16 inch increments until it acts right.
I agree with most of the crowd that for some reason you had an out of battery discharge. Two dollar question is why.
Over gassing wont do anything, most ARs and all military M4s are over gassed for reliability. The issue here was that the headspace was off, either the barrel or bolt was out of spec or even both.
-Small arms technician USMC
So glad you weren't injured. All my handguns and AR's are bone stock with the exception of a couple of Magpul pieces here and there. Furniture only, no internal changes. But for those who do make upgrades, I'm happy for you. I've just never seen the reason. Love your videos.
"I didn't film this part" in translation. I did something severely muffed up to cause of this and the failure is actually my fault, but because it not of camera I'll blame my gas block....
This 100%. Dude doesn’t really understand what caused the failure and he’s blaming the gas block. It wasn’t the gas block. His understanding of the AR’s operation is way less than what he thinks it is.
If it's KNOWINGLY his fault. Then why show it at all?
It was likely a squib. Dude was manually cycling without a care bc of the gas block adjustment.
Thanks very much for this video. I currently have a Odin works Barrel paired with their Tunable gas block and I too cannot get proper cycling. I think I will order the non tunable gas block.
Measure your gas port size in the barrel. More than likely it was reamed too small, or was drilled and never got reamed to spec.
If an adjustable won't adjust enough to run, a non-adjustable won't run it either.
Gas tube WOULDA blew 1st , what type of ammo was it
After this kind of catastrophic failure I wouldn't trust any part of this system. Start fresh and scrap the rest.
Did you check the fired case! If any left of it? Perhaps the gastube expanded sticking in breech block so preventing full battery of bolt🤷🏻♂️ but definitely over pressure of the brass gas escape
Correlation is not causation.
The maximum gas feedback is determined by the hole in the barrel not the gas block. Adjustable gas blocks can let it all through like a standard or choke it down usually for suppressor's.
3:54 Possibly a 300 blackout round you found? It would cause a failure just like this.
What ammo were you using, reloads? Cheap foreign ammo? Weak brass or high primers.
Need a bore-scope down the barrel to inspect.
Have to agree with prior comments that there is no way the relatively thin gas tube could funnel the kind of pressure needed to cause the damage observed. It would definitely burst well before that. I believe the most likely scenario is a round going off outside of a locked chamber. I think the next step is to confirm that the last round was 5.56 or .223 and that there was no obstruction in either the barrel or chamber. I have personally experienced a case separation with commercial reloads where the front half of the case remained in the chamber while the rear of the case was ejected. A new round was partially chambered and the bolt was unable to lockup. Fortunately the second round did not fire during this jam if it had I believe it would have the damage observed. Was the last round a commercial or reload?
I've only known one person that has blown up an AR15, it was the result of his questionable reloaded ammunition. He blew up a Taurus 1911 before that.
Is this guy still your frend?
What makes you think over gassed would explode the bolt? I have had a very over gassed short barrel .308. No matter how much you take that screw out, the gas port is the same size. It looks like am out of battery, but if they were reloaded ammo I'd say under charged.
Looking at that, I would say it was an out of battery detonation or an over charged round. My thought process is, if over gassed. It would drive the carrier back doing damage to the rear of the carrier, gas key and the upper receiver. What I am seeing looks like something forced the bolt back with enough force to insert it back through the carrier it's self. My first thought is out of battery detonation. Also could have been just a failure of the bolt carrier. With out seeing and hearing the incident, it's hard to tell with the evidence we have.
I just cut down the milspec gas block fsb if it's timed and pinned. This is very unfortunate and I'm glad it didn't take your digits my friend.
A friend of mine was having issues getting his "cheapest parts on the internet" ar to cycle, turns out the hole in the gas block sat about 1/16 of an inch forward of the gas port even though it was up against the barrel shoulder. He did succeed in building the cheapest manually operated ar.
I can't recall ever seeing or hearing of a failure in a AR-15 that cause any serious operator injury. They are very safe firearms. They expel the energy down through the magwell every time.
I'm going to take a guess that the round chambered ok but the bolt didn't lock. When the round fired the pressure drove the bolt backwards into the carrier and gas pressure released down through the magazine. I'm thinking once the barrel is removed, close examination of the locking lugs for damage would tell if this was the case.
As others have mentioned, this was *NOT* an overgassing issue. This was a defective ammunition issue or squib load.
You *CANNOT* get too much gas through the gas system that would destroy the bcg...it's just not possible. An adjustable gas block can't physically allow anymore gas to pass through than a non-adjustable gas block would. The gas port on the AR barrel is the limiting factor in both gas blocks.
An adjustable gas block simply allows 0% to 100% gas to pass through to the bcg.
I'm thinking it's an Ammunition failure. I had two issues with Ammunition 1. Wolf 7.62 x 39. And the other 26 Nosler Ammunition. I believe each round was overcharge at the factory. Damage to my SkS was a firing pin . The damage to my Browning was a stuck bolt I was able to free the bolt. I haven't shot it since.
im going to have to research what a fully open gas port will do to a gun because I have no adjustable gas on my system (port fully open) and I have never had problems with mine at all and certainly no signs that it would. I think your issue was with the load on the cartridge. As a reloader myself, I have seen these kinds of failures in people who push the limits in search of the fastest bullet. It could also be there was not enough powder in the cartridge and that could have caused the exact same thing. Did you check for a squib load? Could have been that last round did not leave the barrel?
You had a ammo problem or a obstructed barrel . NO way the gas system would ever do that .
I wonder if your BCG was too dry , keeping it from cycling until you ramped the pressure up ? I does , most definitely, appear that it fired out of battery. When fully in battery , the lugs on the BCG will keep the pressure in the barrel.
Looks like a slam fire. Looking at the area damaged the round looks Like It detonated above the magazine. Is it possible that the magazine fed the round at an improper angle causing an area of the bolt to strike the primer? Maybe the problem was with the magazine? Could it be one of the bolt lugs struck the primer?
Looks like the result of an OOB discharge. The damage is consistent in an area that would point towards that being the culprit. It’s possible that the over gassing resulted in a broken case in the chamber. Which would lead to the OOB failure
Are we seeing the same BCG damage, cause from my limited experience with OBD, there's a very different patter of damage.
@@Dominik189 yup I see it. But I also saw all of the damage to the upper around the chamber. An over gassed rifle alone won’t cause that. But if the case wasn’t properly seated in the chamber and it was fired. That most certainly would wreck the BCG along with the upper. Which is what leads me to believe that an out of battery discharge is the culprit.
@@TheTgiles turned out to be a 300BLK... Made sense.
You can tell the failure begins at the breech face because that's where the metal expansion and deformation is widest and greatest. Possibly a head spacing issue? Or a squib load, or less than 50% case volume of powder in the detonating round, causing secondary explosion effect
Glad you came out of this okay. I like the suggestions on possible causes that you've received. Convinces me to stick with a factory configuration. Take care.
I would trust reloads over any factory junk.
The gas block had ZERO to do with the issue. If you're using the same barrel/BCG from Ruger, the ammo was the problem. I hope you have the box to provide info to the ammo manufacturer/Ruger so you can get a replacement rifle.
I had one rifle fail like that; it was chambered in 5.45x39 and the issue was barrel/ammo related because the caliber is not SAAMI spec'd.
After reading the other comments I would agree, either a insanely hot round or out of battery detonation (obd) or both.. Glad you are ok.
This isn't a problem with the gas system. Either that round went way over pressure (either do to misloading or barrel obstruction) or it detonated out of battery. Are the lugs intact on the bolt and the barrel? If they aren't, then it was the round going over pressure
The gas tube would blow out before causing that kind of damage to the receiver. The AR was designed this way on purpose
Lot things I didn't see. The video you were showing didn't have the failure in it- did you have that on camera? What were you shooting for ammo? The gas tube is ok, and I would expect it not to be if overgassed hard enough to crack the upper. The fracturing of the upper looks crystalized. Could you get the bolt free? Can we get a look down the barrel? In the barrel, since it failed, is there a point where the rifling looks like it was ground on? I'm hearing reports of duds and squibs with new ammo, all manufacturers. Could you have had a squib that was blown free? Heavy profile barrel might not rupture or even excessively bulge, but the rifling would probably be scarred where it happened. Or an overcharged carttridge. But my money is on bad ammo. If not those two, out of battery detonation and Eugene design for that to funnel out through the mag well.
I’m very thankful that you didn’t get hurt brother. If it’s a recently produced round it, sadly, wouldn’t be a big shocker.
I would like to see the bolt. And breach.
I do not think it has anything to do with the gas. To me it looks like out of battery detonation. Barrel obstruction?
Sir... Can you check the chamber headspace with a 5.56x45mm field and nogo gauge? Were you using commercial ammo or reloads? Also, can you inspect the barrel bore for obstruction?
I noticed the upper receiver was busted up pretty bad so I think you would need to put a new upper with that barrel then check headspace. Everything you mentioned was pretty much what I thought, right down to the obstruction because the AR does not produce enough gas pressure to do that unless the barrel was blocked by something like a sqib.
Given how mangled everything is, I'm going to guess that checking headspace isn't possible, and assuming it was a functioning factory-built gun before changing the handguard and gas block, checking headspace should be irrelevant.
@@KevinJames-yg9eu Thats OK, I just figured it out. CNN said it was Trumps fault the gun blew up. One of their unnamed sources confirmed it.
For sure not over gas since standard gas block has a port as large or typically larger than the gas hole in the barrel. That was either hot ammo, out of battery det, or a squib. Look at last two shots in sequence before the failure does anyone notice any gas exiting end of barrel, squib(s)?
friend of mine had a firing pin stick in the bolt face, turned full auto could have made an out of battery discharge though he was using Tula steel case and those primers are hard and need deep primer strikes.
An adjustable gas block isn't going to send any more gas through the system than the original gas block, which sends the maximum amount of gas that the gas port allows. So it doesn't have anything to do with the gas system. It was likely an out of battery detonation or faulty ammunition/hot load.
I don't recall you mentioning it, but was the rifle purchased new and had it been shot prior to the changes you made? If it was running fine before changes then ammo and/or squib load/bore obstruction seem the most logical. If it hadn't been run before then I would consider issues with parts, the BCG in particular. At least you are OK, there's the upside.
Why would you even put an adj block on a 556?
i agree! not needed!
My guess would be that the primer was not seated properly causing an out of battery detonation.
I'm not sure if the upper receiver was cut for this hand guards anti roll or whatever it is called that keeps the hand guard from rolling over I'm no expert. but my rugar does not have the little indention/cut for the piece of that hand guard that kind of puzzle pieces into the reciver that's why I didnt go free float on mine no shade thrown in any direction just an observation I had
OOBD would have caused obvious case blow out and receiver damage but seems unlikely the BCG would be damaged at all as it would simply have been blown back open into the buffer tube. Upper receiver is obviously damaged but were there any signings of case blow out at the moment that round was fired? From the video I can’t tell if the case blew out and the bolt returned to the forward position from recoil spring pressure or if the the bolt is still locked closed with the case still in there.
Regardless there definitely was some kind of overpressure issue, but from the video looks like you had normal ejection just before the failure so no way it’s gas block issue.
I suspect an over-charged round caused an over-gassed condition where the bolt tried to open while chamber pressure was too high resulting in BC failing. Or the above condition in combo with a defective BC.
Looks like a barrel obstruction. Glad you’re ok.
Glad that you are okay, that is why I don't alter or upgrade any components that are not absolutely necessary mainly because I'm not a gunsmith.
Would like an updated vid to this, I would have a certified gunsmith take a very long look at this. But the one thing I would do, because it was an over pressure situation, is have that lower Magna fluxed, because it could have stress fractures in it that aren't visible to the naked eye, thx.
The Ruger 556 is only a $799 AR to begin with.....They are not anywhere near a Wilson Combat, Daniel Defense or a Geissele for quality and durability. I am not saying the Ruger 556 is a piece of s - - t , but you do you get what you pay for.
An just for clarification, what do's the make of the rifle have to do with my comment, its pretty obvious it was an out of battery detonation, but what was the cause is the question.
@@williammccaslin8527 If you think all rifles (and handguns) have the same quality, build and tolerances, you are incredibly ignorant. The "what do's the make of the rifle have to do" directly refers to the option of a materials failure. If you ever had the opportunity to shoot a $700 vs $3,500 AR rifle, you would know the difference and never even posted that kind of comment in the first place. Materials failure was a possibility mentioned in both the video and by numerous other people in this thread.
@@smithn.wesson7945 an again I ask, what do's the make of the rifle have to do with the comments on the failure of this particular rifle, cost isn't the issue in this circumstance, but the cause an effect of a failure is
are you sure there wasn't an issue with the second to last round? Sheared case neck stuck in the chamber or something that could have caused the lugs to not fully engage? What did the one that blew it up look like? If the lugs weren't engaged and the case head blew off and sent full chamber pressure into the carrier you'd get pretty much the same result you have here
Need to see more details... Further disassembly...
We know that the chamber inside the bolt is much greater diameter than the thinner walled gas tube so the pressure was much less than in the gas tube provided the internal piston was free to move. The pressure would have been the same if it was stuck somehow. By your video we can see there wasn't bulging of the thin walled gas tube so it would be safe to say your bolt body failed on that round upon firing releasing metal fragments and gas down through the mag. Defective bolt. Let me know if you need anymore help with this stuff.
@Bob Thompson The gas tube is a thermal fuse. It blows due to heat before the barrel does in continuous fire. The pressure required to cause an early extraction and consequent case failure would not blow the gas tube, or else there would be almost no AR catastrophic failures. Gas tubes can handle overdriven ammo and pass the buck to the bolt, where the failure occurs.
Barrel/ bolt/ ammo, parts list.. not a gb issue. Let's get to the parts? Was this a factory built upper or your build? Many people don't headspace ar15, you should. A bolt blown apart is made of crap! Hot ammo or wrong cal can damage a good gun. Do tell please and thanks for the video.
It was a bad round, or a squib load that caused a case head separation. I had my ar blow up last summer. Blew out the bottom of the bolt into the mag well, (designed to fail that way so your face doesn't blow up). I was using reloads. My grandpa used an empty powder jar for scrap powder after pulling bullets. We inherited his reloading equipment after he died and didn't know about it. So I loaded 223 with 23 grains of BLC-2 except it wasnt blc2, it was a mix of black, shotgun, pistol, and rifle powders. My gun almost looked the same condition as yours after the failure.
Mine was also a ruger ar556.
Lower was fine.
Barrel nut was fine, handguard was fine, and I have recently rebuilt the gun with the handguard, and lower.
Bolt, upper receiver, and barrel were all toast. The barrel might be OK but I dont want to risk it, plus it cracked my barrel extension and I dont have the ability to replace it and headspace it.
The overpressure from the round was too much for the bolt. Opening up your gas block might have made more gas get through the gas tube, but my guess is that you had a case head separation that blew your bolt open from the overpressured round.
Not an AR failure expert but I think it is possible for over gassing to cause failure issues. Not from the over pressured gas causing the failure all by itself but possibly causing "Bolt Carrier Bounce" which in turn can cause hammer follow and possibly the round firing from an out of battery condition. Like I said I'm not an AR failure expert just throwing it out there as a possibility?
I would suspect a headspace issue. The gas tube would blow out of the block with the kind of pressure needed to blow the bolt apart like that. The pressure came from the chamber and blew the bottom of the carrier off and then expanded the mag.
Unfortunately a lot of people don't invest in headspace gauges and this is a good demonstration of why it must be checked.
I'm glad that you are ok . Is it possible that it was the ammo ? I have adjustable gas blocks on my 6.5 Grendel and 300 HAMR But not on anything 556 or 300 blackout , long or short barrel . I hope to hear what you find out . Thanks for sharing
First of all, when you are adjusting a gun you should not fire multiple rounds without stopping and doing a full examination of each round until you are completely satisfied with the operation of the rifle. Did you examine each case? Was there a nick in the side of any case? Was there any other damage on the case? Was the deflector marred in any way? Second, you NEVER go more than one click at a time on an adjustable gas block. 3/4 of a turn to adjust is too much. Now, that being said, you are correct in that the the gas block is not a big issue in the operation of an AR, so whether the gas block was fully open or fully closed (extreme cases) there should be no way that the pressure from a PROPERLY loaded 556 round should damage a properly assembled rifle. Was this an 80% lower? I've seen some pretty damaged lowers created by heavy chatter from the router bit which could cause this. Are you sure all the parts used for this gun were actually 556? Was the BCG binding in any way? Is the buffer free? Finally, carefully check the case from the failure firing. It will probably tell you where things went wrong. Glad you didn't get hurt and good luck figuring this one out.
I run a JP adjustable gas block on my carbine. Mine was way over gassed before the adjustable gas block. Even all the way out you shouldn't get anymore gas than a standard gas block. It appears to me you had an over pressure round or an out of battery detonation.
As others have said, the rifle came with a certain size gas port. If it functioned with a factory open gas block then the JP block could have been wide open with no adverse effects. I am inclined to think ammo issue. Worth noting, no inspec AR15 will slam fire or out of battery fire either. I have personally gone to great lengths to get one to do so including high primers, pistol primers in 223 or 5.56 casings, cheap bolts, cheap bolt carriers, etc. Could not make it happen.
Not due to your gas block. Ultimately the hole in the barrel is your constant and if you didn’t change it from factory specs your adjustable gas block would not have allowed more gas than the factory block no matter what the setting. This looks like an ammo issue. Was this with hand loads?