Kabooms

Got some unexpected excitement last night. I'd set up to run a batch of .45 ACP on one of my progressive presses. Had a nice big container of brand new brass on my right, and home-made 230 grain truncated cone cast bullets on my left. Did a quick check of the press to make sure all the dies, etc are snug and aligned. Alright, good to go. On the fifth round, something hangs up. Sometimes there's a misalignment of a piece of brass, maybe a tipped bullet hanging up on trying to enter the seating die. Go back, check every thing again. Ok, pull the lever again and HOLY SHIT!

Ears ringing, heart rate up, little bit of smoke coming up out of the press. After waiting a minute to see if anything else interesting was going to happen, I started tearing down the press to see what happened. Found the decapping pin from the first station lodged in the flash hole of that nice new piece of brass, where it had apparently set off the primer while being seated. And the next seven primers in line behind it. Glad it quit there, as there were about another eighty primers sitting in the tray just up the line. I don't need that much excitement.

Didn't get to do much after that, had to take a quick trip to the hospital to help with someone else's problems, so the press is still waiting to reassembled. I'll give it another try tonight, hopefully with less interesting results.