cabage

Its the last weekend of the gun deer season, or any deer season for that matter, here in wisconsin. My good friend Timmy and I were going to drive a chunk of public land not too far from my house. We were on the roadside getting our stuff from the truck. I was carrying my muzzle loader and Timmy had an older remington semi auto .308. I was loaded up, dressed, and waiting beside the passenger door. Timmy goes to load his gun by sliding one shell in the chamber and then closing the action by letting it snap closed (in this way he can then insert the magazine with four in it and have a total capacity of 5). I wasn't paying a whole lot of attention to him, focusing on making sure that my reloads were in order, when the gun went off in the dirt about 4 feet from the both of us. We both look at each other like wtf?? I told him to give me the gun so he hands it over and the safety is still on!!! The gun malfunctioned. I know he didn't bump the trigger because his left hand was on the fore stock and his right hand had just released the bolt and like mentioned before the safety was on the whole time. All I had to say to him was thank you for minding you muzzle direction. Pretty scary. Has anyone had an experience with something of this nature?? I know i'm putting this in the wrong forum but I like you guys and have sort of come to trust you all.

50calty

I've heard alot of stories of remington's doing that kind of thing. I would take it to a gunsmith and have him check it out. Or you could contact remington and have them fix it. Hell I had a buddy that bought one of those new 700 and had the bolt handle break off! Some people say that remington's quality control has went down the drain. Which is kinda weird I've heard nothing bad about thier R-15 or R-25. Just glad no one got shot.

ADVWannabee

I had a Ruger model 77 in 30-06 as my first deer rifle. I had a gunsmith put a Timney trigger on it. That gun wasn't right after that. I could close the bolt and the button wouldn't stay back so it wasn't ****ed. I took the safety off once to shoot at a deer and it fired. I closed the bolt once and it fired. You are asking yourself why I kept using the gun right? Well I had it looked at by the original gunsmith and 3 others with no luck. It kept malfunctioning. I could never trust that gun again so I sold it to a gun store with the original trigger. I told them what it was doing and that several gunsmiths had tried to fix it. I hope to heck they actually got it fixed before they re-sold it.

I now have a Browning BAR in 30-06 and LOVE IT.

Johnmorris

Remington does not repair the old 740 and 742 semi auto's only the newer 7400. If you have one that malfunctions you will havea hard time finding parts. I PUT MY WORKING ONE IN THE AFE AND USE ANOTHER GUN. the ne r 25 in 308 is a very nice weapon.

cayugad

I have a very old Remington Woodsmaster 742 carbine in 30-06 and thank goodness, that thing works as good as the day I purchased it as a used rifle (all I could afford back then) over 40 years ago. The guy that owned it before me sold it because he could not stand the noise that short barrel gives off. Never bothered me. Probably why I am deaf in on ear. I would hate to guess how many deer, coyote, and even a few foxes, have fallen to that short barreled little monster of mine. I actually had a guy tell me that with that short barrel I would not have the range of the bolt gun with the longer barrels. It never let me down on any shot I attempted with it to date.

My understanding from talking to a gun shop owner was, about twenty years ago, Remington started to produce the parts for their semi auto rifles in much cheaper way. Those rifles just seem to not function as well as the old method of making parts for the rifles. They had loading problems, they also had breech lock up problems. Also their assembly manner changed and the old style of each rifle being examined for fit and finish, went to ... test a few here and there.

A person I have known for over 15 years had a Remington 742 in 30-06 but his was the full size model. That rifle gave him so much trouble with cartridges feeding into it, and other things, that he traded it off for a Marlin 336 30-30.

The important thing is your friend, while a terrible thing happened, just proved... handle them rifles in a safe manner. You never know when one of those strange things is going to happen. He never let that barrel point at anyone, even though what he was doing might not have been considered dangerous. Good for him. He is someone to hunt with.

As for a Ruger. I have a Ruger M77 in 7mm mag (purchased new 1984). The first year I owned it, I broke the bolt. We were hunting a huge open field. My friend using his Winchester model 70 in 7mm mag had wounded a deer. and it was running/hobbling across this field. He hollered for me to shoot it, and I fired, slammed the bolt hard to bring up the next round, and something in the bolt broke. It would not fire. So there I was on opening day of deer season with a rifle that would not work. Needless to say, I was a little upset.

I called Ruger and they asked that I mail them the bolt and the rifle (at their expense too) which I did. When it all came back to me a few days later there was a letter from their gunsmith. He really had no reason why the bolt broke he said. But had put a new one in, that he personally tuned and polished to make it smooth. Also he said he tested it personally and it worked flawless. What a beautiful job he did.

Good thing I had my old Remington 30-06 to fall back on that year.

WV Mountaineer

A while back CNBC did a story called remington under fire which focused on this very issue with remington rifles. If I recall correctly a young hunter was killed when one of his parents rifles misfired the same way.

WVCritter

I have a Remington 700 that I purchased new back in 1981 and I've never had the first problem with it. I've hunted every season with it and I might also add that it's never had a trigger job done on it. I think all the guns out there with these type of problems are induced by people who either don't perform the required maintenance on their guns or have the triggers reworked or both.

WV54

I have two Rem.700's. 308 and 270, had them for 30 years.Great guns with no problems.
There have been some terrible accidents over the years.Even if the guns have problems we still need to practice good gun safety.(Muzzle Safety.)

cabage

Yeah it was a big reminder on why we practice the firearm safety that we do.

I think that the semi autos are more problematic due in part to a higher number of moving parts requiring more routine maintenance. I just wonder what happened. Obviously the firing pin struck the primer, but was it because the the sear released the firing pin when the bolt slid forward and closed (even with the safety on) or did the firing pin fail to ever re-**** when Timmy performed his annual preseason sight in?? Keep in mind that i'm no gunsmith, this is just what I could come up with.

Gotbuck

That has happened to my old man with his 30-30 Winchester but those are tricky guns with the safety being the hammer and how you set it, his hand slipped off the hammer and the gun went off in the hunting trailer and blew out the window. Talk about loud, no one could hear for a while. But again thanks to good muzzle control no one hurt.