Chili Posted August 29, 2017 Share Posted August 29, 2017 I've developed a strange feed issue on my Shadow 2 and I'm stumped where to look next to resolve it. At a recent match I had my gun jam up tight on a round that was a struggle to clear even though I case gauge all of my ammo to avoid having ammo related issues. After the stage I recovered the round and sure enough even though it gauged fine and would plunk and spin in the barrel, when feeding from a mag it would fail to go into battery and lock up the gun. Had a few folks more experienced folks look at the round in question and the rim was a bit beat up so we chalked it up to a bad case and just one of those things. Prior to leaving for the MN sectional I decided I didn't want any issues so I hand cycled all of my match ammo through the gun and in 500 rounds I found 12 more that would not go into battery. Again all 12 of these case gauge fine in two different case gauges and will plunk and spin in the barrel. In trying to eliminate causes I can say it is not mag specific as I can load these 12 rounds in one of 20 different mags from 4 different manufacturers and get the same result. I thought even though they plunk and spin that it may be a weird OAL issues so I shortened a few of the rounds that won't go into battery from my normal 1.112 to 1.105 and this had no effect on the issue. I'm using at 147 gn RNFP plated bullet loaded at 1.112, gun has an 11 lb recoil spring in it and the gun has about 8,000 round through it if I had to guess at a number. Also all 12 of the rounds that failed to go into battery will cycle fine through my original Shadow. Any guidance would be greatly appreciated as I'm out of ideas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MHitchcock Posted August 29, 2017 Share Posted August 29, 2017 Have you measured the base of the cases in question compared to the ones that aren't giving you issues? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
muncie21 Posted August 29, 2017 Share Posted August 29, 2017 (edited) When I experienced a failure to feed (round would hang-up part way in the barrel/feed ramp) my OAL was too short for that particular bullet profile. Try increasing your OAL 0.1 to 0.2 and retest. I went from a OAL of 1.11 to 1.13 before I got reliable feeding of the ammo. Edited August 29, 2017 by muncie21 Corrected typo/mistake in OAL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chili Posted August 29, 2017 Author Share Posted August 29, 2017 20 minutes ago, MHitchcock said: Have you measured the base of the cases in question compared to the ones that aren't giving you issues? I have measured pretty much every measurement possible and can find no discernible differences other than small case to case variances that is also present in ammo that cycles fine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chili Posted August 29, 2017 Author Share Posted August 29, 2017 3 minutes ago, muncie21 said: When I experienced a failure to feed (round would hang-up part way in the barrel/feed ramp) my OAL was too short for that particular bullet profile. Try increasing your OAL 0.1 to 0.2 and retest. I went from a OAL of 1.125 to 1.13 before I got reliable feeding of the ammo. If I was to increase the OAL I would start to reduce the gap I've left from the max oal in the plunk test. These particular rounds don't "hang" up on feeding they actually jam the gun and keep it from going into battery. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rowdyb Posted August 29, 2017 Share Posted August 29, 2017 are the rims beat up soooo badly they could not be seating flush against the breach face? brass that's been walked on quite a bit on gravel sometimes gets too beat up for me to use without incident. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chili Posted August 29, 2017 Author Share Posted August 29, 2017 (edited) They do not appear to be noticeably beat up, in fact close inspection really doesn't show any noticeable damage (edit) I gave them another look under a magnifier and there is a few rough spots, nothing major but a spot or two more on the sample pulled from the brass that didn't give issue. Another thing I didn't mention is it's not brand specific as there is several different cases in the mix, the majority are Blazer but that is likely due to the majority of my brass was gained buying blazer ammo before I started reloading. Edited August 30, 2017 by Chili Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thompsoncustom Posted August 30, 2017 Share Posted August 30, 2017 Something you could try is polishing the breechface and/or swapping the extractor. Ive had to do a little work to the extractor claw on a couple cz's to get them to feed thicker rimmed ammo. Are you running the stock extractor spring? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chili Posted August 30, 2017 Author Share Posted August 30, 2017 Gun hasn't been touched or tuned in anyway other than changing the main and recoil spring. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cheby Posted August 30, 2017 Share Posted August 30, 2017 Did you clean the extractor lately? I mean removing it and cleaning it as well as the slide pocket. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IDescribe Posted August 30, 2017 Share Posted August 30, 2017 I would: Check to make sure primers are fully seated on problem cartridges. If they are not, they can restrict extractor movement and cause jams. If primers are fine, remove, clean, and reinstall extractor and channel, then try again. The extractor must be able to move as the bullet is feeding, and if it has lost its full range of motion, that can lead to jams, possibly only with the occasional cartridge where dimensions have stacked up just right to make it happen. If still a problem, I would break down the bullets, reload the brass exactly as they were before, paying extra attention to get a full ram stroke on re-sizing. And test again. If still a problem, I would break down the bullets, adjust my sizing die so that there was but a paper's width between the die and the shellplate/shellholder at full ram-stroke, reload, and try again. If still a problem, seat them a full .020 deeper and try again. If still a problem, I would break them down and reload them with a different bullet entirely. If still a problem, junk those brass. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yigal Posted September 17, 2017 Share Posted September 17, 2017 problems like this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rowdyb Posted September 17, 2017 Share Posted September 17, 2017 (edited) change all of your mag springs. your barrel is the ultimate case gauge. completely clean the extractor by taking it out of the gun. polish the breech face. lightly bevel the leading edge of the cartridge rail. stone the cartridge rail. the rim could have been beat up from your repeated attempts to clear the jam. sometimes, in spite of your best efforts, things won't be perfect. can you describe more precisely what happened? or do you feel you've fixed it an moved on? Edited September 17, 2017 by rowdyb Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chili Posted September 17, 2017 Author Share Posted September 17, 2017 I gave the gun a thorough cleaning including removing the extractor and cleaning the channel and that seemed to do the trick. I only ran one more match with it after that though, as I sold it since I've decided after 3 years in Production I want to give Standard/Limited a run. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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