M&P 2.0 Exploded in My Hands!

Jerzsubbie

Jerzsubbie

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I hit the range today with my best friend and our ladies, we shot a little bit of everything and on my second mag of 9mm, BOOM!! I don’t know which came first, the obvious “something is wrong” sound or the burning and stinging of my hands. I immediately dropped the gun, turned, and walked directly to the truck, hands bleeding.

My friend is LE and has some basic medical training, and thankfully, he gave me a nice IFAK for my birthday which I now keep in my truck. My wife didn’t know exactly what happened so she wasn’t freaking out too badly, she thought it was slide bite lol.

We pretty quickly realized that my injuries were minor, shrapnel sliced my right thumb causing 90% of the bleeding, and a small piece imbedded itself in my trigger finger. It only took compression to stop the bleeding, and then a bandaid.

Thankfully it wasn’t any worse than that and the worst part is that my 2mo M&P9c 2.0 is now ruined. The frame is broken and bulged. Slide and barrel seem perfectly fine. I will contact Smith tomorrow to see what, if anything they can do for me. I fully blame this on ammo and do not fault the gun at all. Worst case, I’ll buy a new one and have an extra slide/barrel to sell, not the end of the world. I still have all of my fingers.

I believe that the bullet got pushed in on the feedramp causing an over pressure situation, blowing out the primer, completely blowing out the mag and other rounds in it, and all of the gasses escaped between the frame and slide into my hands. I found the baseplate about 20ft to my left, guts of the mag were at my feet.

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:eek:
 
Glad you got thru it!
 
Increasing crimp won’t fix it if setback was indeed your problem. That only works on revolver rounds with a crimp groove. Have you found other rounds with inadequate neck tension? Is it maybe more likely that it was an overcharge?
 
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Scary but glad you only have a screwed lower out of it. Could have been much worse. I don't reload but bought reloads before to save a little money. Had two bullets get stuck in my new Glock after only shooting a few hundred rounds. That was the end of my reload buying.
 
Not sure about this but I think I remember reading that Smith normally only sells parts to dealers or smiths. If they say no, ask whether they'll sell a lower to your LGS.
 
Glad you're not injured any worse. Must have been quite the surprise.
As far as S&W is concerned, your gun malfunctioned at the range. I've had excellent experiences with their customer service, so I expect that you'll send it to them and they'll send it back repaired, or send you a new one. Good luck.
 
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Glad you're OK.
 
Lookin at the brass.......did it fire out of full battery? Rapid fire out of battery? Not accusing just trying to learn.....as I am a reloader myself.
 
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BowWow said:
Lookin at the brass.......did it fire out of full battery? Rapid fire out of battery? Not accusing just trying to learn.....as I am a reloader myself.
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I don't think it was OOB, but I did have that though as well. First round of a mag. 3 rounds loaded for a drill.
 
Wow. Glad it wasn't any worse!

And thanks for the reminder about reloading safety and double-checking.
 
Dang man, glad to hear hear it was only minor injuries
 
dave33 said:
I don't think weighing the rounds will help much as there is a lot of variation in the weight of brass. What powder were you using?

Glad you were not hurt worse.
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Titegroup, 3.4gr.
I thought about that and may sort the rounds by brass type.
 
Wow, that is scary, glad you are OK and your injuries were not too bad.
 
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Dang man! Glad you're gonna be able to count to ten still :D

My coworker's FIL had a similar kaboom with a Diamondback DB9 and reloads he made on his 'new' to him Dillon SDB. Pretty sure his was a doublecharge.

FWIW, what powder measure did you use with those reloads? I have heard a few guys having issues with the Lee Autodrum, hence the reason I kept my
pro autodisc setup on my pistol setup.
 
My right thumb is a little sore and swollen, noticed a few more tiny pieces of something in my thumb. Nothing too deep and I don’t even feel them but I can see them. I may dig them out tonight.

Shot a note off to Smith so we’ll see what they say.
 
Ikarus1 said:
Dang man! Glad you're gonna be able to count to ten still :D

My coworker's FIL had a similar kaboom with a Diamondback DB9 and reloads he made on his 'new' to him Dillon SDB. Pretty sure his was a doublecharge.

FWIW, what powder measure did you use with those reloads? I have heard a few guys having issues with the Lee Autodrum, hence the reason I kept my
pro autodisc setup on my pistol setup.
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Ironically mine was on a SDB.

As I learn more I’ll certainly share, including results of sorting and weighing rounds and what Smith says.
 
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FWIW this situation is the reasons I rarely use Titegroup. I prefer a bulkier powder that makes it obvious when the charge is not right. After my first squib at the range I revised my procedure to include a visual check of the powder immediately before seating every bullet. I've caught a few that way even though I thought I did everything right. And with Titegroup that check would be useless because an overcharge looks almost like a regular one.
 
Yeah I’m betting that you touched off 6.8g of titegroup. I love my SBD and have never had a double. One thing I like about the progressive is that so long as you clear the shell plate every time you have a stop you will never have a double.

One time I pulled all the cases but mistakenly didn’t dump the powder from the only charged case without a bullet. Noticed it as I was manually feeding what was supposed to be just primed brass into station 2, would have been 6.8g of titegroup behind a 158g RN fired from a suppressed AR9, would not have been fun. Now I set the cases down primer up, although to be honest I’m got the primer system working well so rarely stop...knock on wood!
 
If that model of Smith has an unsupported chamber the brass appears to have fired out of battery.
With the weight variances of the brass and the bullet, weighing won't get you anywhere. Only pulling every bullet of the remaining batch is going to tell a story. Otherwise you'll flinch on every shot.....
Sorry it happened, but you were in control....
 
It does look like it may have fired out of battery. Just to throw something else out there, are you sure you didn't have a bullet stuck in the barrel from a squib? I've had it happen once from a no-charge and I didn't notice until I pulled the trigger. Thankfully mine was too far out of battery to fire, but it's another possibility you might want to consider. The solution is obviously the same, visually inspect every case for powder level.

Glad you didn't suffer any serious injuries.
 
Wow, glad you're ok; this is why I'm super paranoid when I reload and have to make myself slow down. But, I'm not convinced it was a double charge from the picture. Either way, I'd love to hear once Smith returns your call as to what they'll do for you.
Go to church this sunday, you owe Him one !!
 
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I’m definitely keeping an open mind as to the cause and am curious to determine it. I’m human, and have no issues owning up to my mistakes/failures/short-comings. I wanted to share this experience just because it’s a shocking one and reminds us all to be very careful.

I could have thrown a double, I could’ve missed a crappy piece of brass, who knows. Of course I try to visually check almost every powder charge but that will now be 100%, and I throw out any cases that don’t look or feel right as I clean and sort them.

The fact that the explosion wasn’t worse makes me think it wasn’t a double charge. The pictures I’ve seen of double charges have been much, much worse. Out of battery or bullet setback were the first things to cross my mind.
 
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Yeah, Im thinking a double charge also.
Alot of the handguns nowadays can handle +p+ loads. They can even take 9mm major load a few times without coming apart.

Curious as to what Smith says about this..
 
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BowWow said:
6.8 grains of titegroup would fill most of the case.....correct?
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No where close to filling it. If I remember correctly a 9mm case will hold 3 throws of 3.4gr titegroup without overfilling the case, but it would be very obviously full. Regardless, if you are watching every case a double charge of even titegroup should be pretty obvious. However, a sooty case, maybe not great lighting, it could be missed. Another reason I like wet tumbling, gets the inside of the cases cleaner making powder easier to see.

The updated Dillon powder measure uses a failsafe rod that doesn't reset the powder measure unless the shell plate goes to the bottom, which would rotate the plate, so a double charge should be hard to do. @Jerzsubbie, do you recall any weird distractions during that reload session that could have made it possible to double charge a case?
 
Glad you can still have enough fingers to count to ten.
This is way I use a single stage press.
I do one thing at a time, I drop powder in a loading block full full of primed brass one casing at a time, then I look to make sure they all have the same amount of powder, then I press a projectile into each charged casing.
I have to do it this way.
I don't trust myself with a progressive loader.
But it does look like an out of battery discharge.
 
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