Over-pressure situation on my 17HMR, savage responds... and now CCI

Jayne

Just here for the memes
Charter Member
Supporting Member
Multi-Factor Enabled
Joined
Dec 16, 2016
Messages
8,028
Location
Unincorporated Wake County
Rating - 100%
34   0   0
I've got an older Savage 93R17, and at the range I encountered a severe over-pressure situation. Not bothering to do into details, but I'm guessing it was a partially obstructed bore. The case rim separated, and the ass end of the case was smashed against the bolt and blew out down the extractor channel. Results were this:

overpressure_17.jpg

After that, the POI shifted about 1/2 MOA down and the accuracy went to hell, groups 2x larger with the same shooter/ammo. I took it home and cleaned it and emailed Savage to see what I should do. They said STOP FIRING IT (you moron) and said it should be inspected immediately. They offered to do that.

I've been sitting on it for a while though, because I'm not sure what to do. I would like to find someone locally to check it out because shipping it around is going to cost a significant amount of the value of the rifle (it's old and beat up from field use). It's not a warranty thing, it wasn't Savage's fault so if they come back and say it's screwed up, what am I going to do? Just have them keep it vs. putting a new barrel on? That's probably half the cost of a new rifle, and the new rifle would be a significant upgrade, the new Savages are very nice.

I have a LOT of 17HMR ammo, otherwise I might just give up on the caliber since I'm not hunting rabbits in the desert anymore. Selling the ammo at a loss would suck, not really into doing that.

So... local smith who could check it out? Pendergraft I'm guessing.

Mostly I'm just sad I screwed up my rifle. :(
 
That sucks man. Bore obstruction is really bad news. Have you checked for a bulge in the barrel?
 
Last edited:
I shipped one back to Savage.... in 2009 or so and the shipping wasn't expensive.
 
You could hang on to that one but tag it “Do Not Fire”, get a new one to use with all your ammo, and get the original one repaired when it’s more convenient. Sounds like you want it fixed for its intrinsic value, so cross that bridge when you’re more inclined to
 
You could hang on to that one but tag it “Do Not Fire”, get a new one to use with all your ammo, and get the original one repaired when it’s more convenient. Sounds like you want it fixed for its intrinsic value, so cross that bridge when you’re more inclined to

yea, I really like _this_ rifle, it's got a lot of history behind it.

I've got it boxed up, need to write the letter to include (Dear Savage, at the range, I did a bad thing....) and then get it shipped. Slacker keeps that USPS thread pinned, I suppose I should read it.
 
Savage will take care of you. I have dealt with them many times and they are good people.

Got a voice mail from Savage, the rifle is "not repairable". I called them back but the person I need to talk to wasn't available so I'll try again tomorrow. The guy I did talk to said he didn't know the story because the info was not in the system and that the info is likely on a piece of paper on the woman's desk who does the call-backs.

He did speculate that the rifle was too old to repair based on the serial number, but that's just a guess since he didn't have the paperwork.
 
Got to the right person, and my new un-exploded rifle is headed to the LGS for me to pickup. They let me upgrade to the next model for $50 which saves me a lot vs. having the replacement unit threaded like mine was. At the time I bought the original they didn't have a threaded model and I told them that's why I had to thread mine, so I think they were more amenable to the upgrade vs. just a straight SKU replacement. Or I like to think my story mattered.
 
So to make sure I read it right, they were going to replace the rifle at no charge since it was unrepairable and let you pay $50 to get the threaded version instead? Not a bad deal.
 
So to make sure I read it right, they were going to replace the rifle at no charge since it was unrepairable and let you pay $50 to get the threaded version instead? Not a bad deal.

The replacement wasn't free, but it was cheaper than retail. The $50 upgrade was not to the same level of discount as the base replacement (when comparing the MSRP of both versions) but it's cheaper than aftermarket threading.

How's that for not disclosing the base replacement pricing? :)

It's still very nice of them since it's not their fault the rifle blew up in the first place.
 
Even if they sold it below cost they want you have a Savage in your hands then a competitors rifle.
 
Even if they sold it below cost they want you have a Savage in your hands then a competitors rifle.

Lotta fond memories with that rifle. I did keep the stock, didn't ship it out with the action to save on shipping (and I had a box that fit the rest of it perfectly). The new one should drop right into the old stock so it will still sorta look like my old one with it's custom krylon paint job.
 
Got the new one, went to mount it in my old stock and it won't fit. There are changes, it looks like they added a pillar to the back and one in the front (metal screwed into the receiver) and there is an extra rib in the stock itself. So boo that it won't go, but probably a better rifle for it. Seems like they wouldn't add cost/complexity just for grins.

Mounted the optic up and took it to the range, got it zeroed at 25 and then started going for steel at 200. Maybe 20 rounds into the session I had a case stick. Got it out, and the neck was split. Kept going, but then every round started splitting and sticking, like 10 in a row. I stopped firing at that point.

Google seems to say that split necks in 17 is almost common, and it can be a sign of bad ammo more than a bad rifle. The ammo I was using was literally the same box that I was using with the last one when it blew.

Could this be a bad batch, and a bit of neck material separated and it's what caught in the barrel and caused the pressure problem? Doesn't seem unreasonable.

I don't know if it's the whole batch of this ammo (I have almost 2 cases left!) or just a bad box, or if the new rifle isn't right.

I've ordered up some different brands of 17, should be here next week and I can try again and see what happens.

On the positive side, the new bolt is slicking up nicely and it seems accurate. Not as accurate as my old one, but I suspect that's just me not settling in with the new trigger and optic setup yet.

More to come.
 
Could this be a bad batch, and a bit of neck material separated and it's what caught in the barrel and caused the pressure problem? Doesn't seem unreasonable.
I don't know if it's the whole batch of this ammo (I have almost 2 cases left!) or just a bad box, or if the new rifle isn't right.
Have you checked for recalls on that lot of ammo?
 
Have you checked for recalls on that lot of ammo?

OK, so here's the story so far. I broke things into lot numbers and did some test firing. The lot that was in use at the time that the gun blew up was splitting cases 45% of the time. Another random lot was splitting them 0% of the time. That seems like science.

CCI wants me to ship all of it back and they'll "take a look at it". I'm getting clarification if they really want it all back or just a sample from each lot to test.

They've not said there is a recall or anything known bad with that lot, other than it's 9 years old now.
 
CCI responded:

Your ammunition was received in our office and the cause for your issue with this ammunition is from pre fired neck splits. This is caused by the ammunition at some point during its life being exposed to high heat or chemicals and then as the ammunition starts to case harden with age, since this was made in 2009 and 2010, the cases can crack from this exposure. For reasons like this we recommend that your ammunition regularly be rotated out as you buy new.


They're replacing the whole lot, that's good. But 9 year old ammo is old? It's not been exposed to heat or chemicals while I've owned it, so what happened between the time it was delivered to the retailer and I bought it??
 
I'll speculate:

They fired some and it went sideways for them too. Rather than admit in writing that they produced and sold faulty ammo they sent you this nonsense reply and some new ammo.
 
So they are saying brass case hardens with age?
 
CCI are probably beyond statue of limitations with age and know it and do not want to issue a massive recall. Cheaper to just pass you some new ammo and hope you go away silently with there reply.
 
I think that is a bravo sierra answer...
 
Never had a rim separate from a case in my .17 HMR, but almost all of the necks split upon firing. My understanding was that when the case is formed to neck it down it hardens the brass and due to the size of the case they do not re anneal to soften. All the .17 HMR is made by CCI , just branded different for different companies.
 
So they are saying brass case hardens with age?
Isn’t it common knowledge that case necks work harden with age? The neck is under tension, tension is work. Maybe the 17hmr is especially thin and has a lot of neck tension, I don’t know.
 
Isn’t it common knowledge that case necks work harden with age? The neck is under tension, tension is work. Maybe the 17hmr is especially thin and has a lot of neck tension, I don’t know.

Then they should be putting expiration dates on their ammo, right?

I think they were digging for BS.
 
Then they should be putting expiration dates on their ammo, right?

I think they were digging for BS.
I agree that the response seems a stretch, case hardening from neck tension seems to be a decades-long process, 9 years seems very short.

Is anyone putting “best by” dates on lead-free ammo? We know that stuff will be all duds in 15 years.
 
Back
Top Bottom