Big AR-15 KABOOM
This is by far the worst AR-15 kaboom I have ever seen on the internet. The operator somehow mistakingly mixed pistol powder and rifle powder in a few of the cartridges he loaded. The result was catastrophic failure. Just about all the parts were destroyed. Photos from ARFCOM …
Apparently the gold-like coating on the bolt and carrier is from the vaporized brass cartridge. Can any engineers or chemists confirm this?
The shooter was ok, other than getting whacked in the face with the charging handle and having small pieces of the carbon fiber freefloating tube embedded in his forearm.
More photos after the jump … (more…)
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Not brass. Brass wouldn't leave a gold-colored deposit, it would be blue-green. All cuprous metals (including brass) are entirely too fond of oxygen, and copper will bond with the oxygen in the surrounding air the instant it vaporizes, before it has opportunity to collect on the bolt. This is something people who run suppressed weapons -- especially ARs -- deal with all the time. The suppressor limits how much of the material vaporized from the bullet's jacket evacuates the bore, and some of it travels back down the bore and settles on the brass, turning it blue-green and gunking up the chamber. And if it's a DI rifle, some of it also returns through the gas tube to collect on the BCG, turning it the same lovely shade of blue-green. But not gold.
Attention Steve,
The first image is no longer an AR-15 kaboom, it is now a woman wearing a traditional dress while engraving a fine European rifle receiver.