Pro2AInPA Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 (edited) What have you guys found to be the typical lifespan for major components on open guns, in terms of round count? My gun is an STI frame, full length Caspian slide that's been lightened, a Scheumann barrel w/Gans comp. I'm shooting 9mm major at 170pf with an 8lb Wolff recoil spring. Edited January 14, 2011 by Pro2AInPA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GrumpyOne Posted January 14, 2011 Share Posted January 14, 2011 When it wears out, let us know. As far as life span, do you mean how long the barrel will last? I have a friend who has well over 300K on his open gun with only minor stuff wearing out (barrel, ejector, extractor, safety, etc.). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rye Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 I have a friend that's been shooting his open built in the 90's and only minor changes or maintenance done. As long as the slide, barrel, and frame is fitted right I font think they'll give up. Plus your load is just right... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1911jerry Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 Maybe 80K on the barrel? rebarrel and away you go. Jerry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G-ManBart Posted January 15, 2011 Share Posted January 15, 2011 (edited) I've had comps and slides crack...both were around the 65K mark. Barrels vary greatly, depending on your load, and how hot you get them. If you practice high round count drills without breaks in between, it's going to shorten the life of the barrel. If the slide is getting too hot to touch comfortably, it needs a few minutes to cool. R, Edited January 15, 2011 by G-ManBart Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AZGunut Posted January 17, 2011 Share Posted January 17, 2011 You will mostly wear out barrels and crack slides .the frames seem to last forever. I have seen guns that need to be rebarreled in as few as 8000 rounds some as high as 100,000 rounds, mostly depends on loads and shooting style (high fast roundcounts and the gun getting very hot) Almost anyone who puts a significant amount of rounds through their guns will crack a slide, depending on how much lightning was done to the slide. Have seen them crack mostly between 30,000 to 100,000 rounds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1911Prof Posted January 20, 2011 Share Posted January 20, 2011 Where do cracks in the slides usually develop? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lynn jones Posted January 20, 2011 Share Posted January 20, 2011 Where do cracks in the slides usually develop? i and several of my shooting friends had a crack at the top of the slide at the front part of the opening. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XRe Posted January 20, 2011 Share Posted January 20, 2011 (edited) If built correctly, and you're not running dramatically high pressure loads in them, you should be able to get 45-60K out of them without anything severe happening. Above 35K seems to be the timeframe where some things potentially wear out, but usually they last longer than that. I've seen guns w/ 100K rounds on them that are still shooting 2-3" groups at 50 yards - and all they have left is about an inch of rifling at the end of the barrel! I would risk saying that most well built open guns should get you 80K without needing something major replaced, in the end, but you're going to see groups start to open up a little bit, and the barrel slow down (sometimes a lot) after 60K. Cracks usually develop around stress risers - sharp corners in the part. Lightening cuts that leave such corners can cause them, as can cuts in a comp that aren't properly bevelled, etc. Ejection ports on slides are also a common place. Lightened slides will tend to take a little more beating than full weight slides, as well, due to the extra velocity they tend to carry... ETA - BTW, if you run the numbers, by the time you reach 60K, you've put enough money into ammo to buy another couple of race guns, so... Edited January 20, 2011 by XRe Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueOvalBruin Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 Is it fair to say that the slide is most stressed at the point after ignition where the slide is trying to go one way and the comp is pulling the barrel the other way? Maybe this explains the cracks around the ejection port. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G-ManBart Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 Where do cracks in the slides usually develop? Mine cracked on the left side, almost exactly in line with the breachface. This is a really common place for them to crack. You'll almost always see them crack there, or at the very front...not in between. R, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G-ManBart Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 Is it fair to say that the slide is most stressed at the point after ignition where the slide is trying to go one way and the comp is pulling the barrel the other way? Maybe this explains the cracks around the ejection port. I think it's the other way around. When the slide gets to the end of it's travel, the front half bottoms out on the frame (reverse plug to guide rod seat essentially), and all that energy/vibration/etc goes through the two thin parts of the slide...the sides of the ejection port. You've got the large, heavy rear of the slide...it's much heavier than the front, sort of hanging off the back, vibrating and stressing those two connection points, so that's where they fail. R, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pro2AInPA Posted January 25, 2011 Author Share Posted January 25, 2011 Is it fair to say that the slide is most stressed at the point after ignition where the slide is trying to go one way and the comp is pulling the barrel the other way? Maybe this explains the cracks around the ejection port. I think it's the other way around. When the slide gets to the end of it's travel, the front half bottoms out on the frame (reverse plug to guide rod seat essentially), and all that energy/vibration/etc goes through the two thin parts of the slide...the sides of the ejection port. You've got the large, heavy rear of the slide...it's much heavier than the front, sort of hanging off the back, vibrating and stressing those two connection points, so that's where they fail. R, Best way to prevent this would be? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XRe Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 The breechface and the upper lugs take the bulk of the force in a properly built gun. When you light off the primer, and it kicks the charge, things start moving pretty quickly. The firing pin and primer have forced the mouth of the case up against the front of the chamber. As the powder ignites, the pressure builds rapidly, pushing the bullet into the throat of the barrel - and then it pushes the case backward into the breechface. Even though the brass is softer than the steel the slide is made out of, that hammering action will eventually dent the breechface - the extent and the speed with which that happens depends directly upon the speed of the powder and the peak pressure of the load (and, to some extent, how long the throat is cut in the barrel). The short of it is - higher pressure loads will beat up the breechface more quickly. The eventual result is a crack like the one G-Man describes (some kind of crack in that area... sometimes one in the ejection port, if the ejection port was thinned up a lot). You can actually track wear on a gun by the movement of the upper lugs - they'll actually move over time... As the bullet is trying to travel down the barrel, it tends to pull the barrel forward with it. At the same time, the case is trying to push the slide in the opposite direction. They both get a short running start before they hit the throat or breechface. The result is that the upper lugs of the barrel, and the locking lugs in the slide hit each other with a good amount of force. They get hammered pretty hard, too, and over time, the lugs on both get compressed and/or set back to a small degree. You can see this in front to back play of the barrel vs. the slide when the barrel is in the slide with the lugs engaged. As those lugs move, the amount of travel the lugs have before they strike each other increases - this gives them an even greater running start, so wear accelerates... Eventually, this can cause a crack in the lug area on the slide or barrel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G-ManBart Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 Best way to prevent this would be? Don't shoot the gun Seriously, there's no real way to prevent wear...it's going to happen. All metal has a fatigue life and after X number of cycles, can break...not much we can do about that. R, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G-ManBart Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 The short of it is - higher pressure loads will beat up the breechface more quickly. The eventual result is a crack like the one G-Man describes (some kind of crack in that area... sometimes one in the ejection port, if the ejection port was thinned up a lot). That could be a factor, but having seen ultra-high speed video of a 1911 firing, it was pretty clear that the slide stopping at the end of it's travel causes the majority of the stress on the sides of the ejection port. When the slide stops, you could actually see the metal around the ejection port ripple and flex...it's actually pretty scary when you realize it's doing that a foot in front of your face. They crack at the ejection port because they're getting twisted at that point. There was no corresponding obvious movement/ripple/flex when the round went off...first thing you see is smoke/gas exiting the muzzle and the slide just eases back smoothly....far different from how it stops. That video was at a ridiculously high speed (Ludicrous Speed for all you Spaceballs fans). I can't remember what rate the operator said the video was shot at, but he said he could go to something like 1M frames per second if needed. I've asked them to send me a copy of the videos (several of them) and they keep saying "we're getting around to sending them to everybody"....sigh Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XRe Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 That could be a factor, but having seen ultra-high speed video of a 1911 firing, it was pretty clear that the slide stopping at the end of it's travel causes the majority of the stress on the sides of the ejection port. All but one of them that I've seen crack there have been thinned up a bunch - usually resulting in a stress riser being left in a corner of the port. The one that wasn't that way had a slide that was all beat to hell from running extremely high pressure loads - it was likely taking an extra special hard beating. When the slide stops, you could actually see the metal around the ejection port ripple and flex... I've seen some of that footage, I think... The scarier thing is that most of them never develop a crack there! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gregory_k Posted January 25, 2011 Share Posted January 25, 2011 Where do cracks in the slides usually develop? i and several of my shooting friends had a crack at the top of the slide at the front part of the opening. hard chrome? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G-ManBart Posted January 26, 2011 Share Posted January 26, 2011 That could be a factor, but having seen ultra-high speed video of a 1911 firing, it was pretty clear that the slide stopping at the end of it's travel causes the majority of the stress on the sides of the ejection port. All but one of them that I've seen crack there have been thinned up a bunch - usually resulting in a stress riser being left in a corner of the port. The one that wasn't that way had a slide that was all beat to hell from running extremely high pressure loads - it was likely taking an extra special hard beating. I've seen several crack near the front on the left side...actually, I think Damon's cracked there last year. Mine cracked all the way at the back, almost perfectly even with the breachface, but that isn't always where it happens. The third pic below is a GI slide that cracked quite a bit forward from the breachface, but nowhere near the front...have to figure that one was simply due to metal fatigue after lots of rounds, and not overpressure ammo, since it's a .45 and even pressures well below 9/40/Super will blow cases out before they hurt anything. The first two pics are pretty common, and I can't see how that's anything but pure fatigue from the front and back halves of the slide twisting the thinner parts...and they both appear to have a good amount of meat left to them. http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=63802&view=findpost&p=741318 http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=110624&view=findpost&p=1255818 http://forums.1911forum.com/showpost.php?p=2786986&postcount=1 When the slide stops, you could actually see the metal around the ejection port ripple and flex... I've seen some of that footage, I think... The scarier thing is that most of them never develop a crack there! Unfortunately, the footage I've seen has never been released to the public and was many times faster than anything I've seen posted on the net. I would love to get my hands on it...still waiting! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marcin c Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 I just realized my frame cracked (approx. 50-60 K). Its a standard (limited) gun, sti "tuned" by an european gunshop. Actually had all sorts of problems with the gun from the beginning, had to send it back twice (bad fitting presumably). Anyway, I recon since the crack is at the front, it should be safe to continue shooting for a short while? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rolex Posted February 11, 2011 Share Posted February 11, 2011 I really have no idea! But my slide developed a crack at aprox. 8,500 rds. of .9mm major! A new slide is being fitted as of this post! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CocoBolo Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 (edited) I really have no idea! But my slide developed a crack at aprox. 8,500 rds. of .9mm major! A new slide is being fitted as of this post! That works out to $0.05 per shot for slide expense, cheaper than bullets but more than primers. Edited February 12, 2011 by CocoBolo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G-ManBart Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 I just realized my frame cracked (approx. 50-60 K). Its a standard (limited) gun, sti "tuned" by an european gunshop. Actually had all sorts of problems with the gun from the beginning, had to send it back twice (bad fitting presumably). Anyway, I recon since the crack is at the front, it should be safe to continue shooting for a short while? Is that the frame or the slide that cracked? Can you post a bigger picture that shows exactly where on the gun it is? If it's the slide, I wouldn't shoot it as the reverse plug seat is a high stress area. If it fails there (both sides), the slide leaves the gun in the direction of your face Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Foxbat Posted February 12, 2011 Share Posted February 12, 2011 I just realized my frame cracked (approx. 50-60 K). Its a standard (limited) gun, sti "tuned" by an european gunshop. Actually had all sorts of problems with the gun from the beginning, had to send it back twice (bad fitting presumably). Anyway, I recon since the crack is at the front, it should be safe to continue shooting for a short while? I would most certainly NOT shoot a gun with such a crack. Given how well developed that crack is, I would not be surprised at all to find a similar one on the other side, perhaps not quite as obvious yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marcin c Posted February 13, 2011 Share Posted February 13, 2011 I just realized my frame cracked (approx. 50-60 K). Its a standard (limited) gun, sti "tuned" by an european gunshop. Actually had all sorts of problems with the gun from the beginning, had to send it back twice (bad fitting presumably). Anyway, I recon since the crack is at the front, it should be safe to continue shooting for a short while? Is that the frame or the slide that cracked? Can you post a bigger picture that shows exactly where on the gun it is? If it's the slide, I wouldn't shoot it as the reverse plug seat is a high stress area. If it fails there (both sides), the slide leaves the gun in the direction of your face My mistake - the crack is on the SLIDE (not frame - bad english). After thinking about it I also realised that if it fails there, there is nothing to keep the slide from flying through my mouth.. At the moment I can't see any signs of failure on the other side, but who knows... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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