S2 - spring life?

[Stafford]

How many rounds before changing out the hammer spring and recoil spring on a Shadow 2? Switched out the factory hammer spring and recoil spring for 13# springs from CGW.

[KlausN]

You will get many different answers and some if not many will be based on “feel” not measurements. I have yet to wear out a 13 lb hammer spring.  By wearing out I mean failing to ignite a primer. I measure the DA trigger pull periodically and it gives some indication of spring weakening.  Some change the springs once per year which seems good practice and it is cheap too. For the recoil spring, I built a little spring measurement gauge. It doesn’t give you ‘real’ value but it compares springs and helps fo find differences. I had weakened , worn out, recoil springs after about 15k rounds. 

[SGT_Schultz]

Klaus is right, you'll get a million different answers from everyone.

 

Personally, I strip down, deep clean, inspect, and replace all the springs in any pistol at 10,000 round intervals.

[Stafford]

O.K. Thanks for those replies. I’m estimating that I’ve put around 5,000 rounds on the S2 with the CGW 13# springs.

[SGT_Schultz]

10,000 is not a hard and fast rule.  It's a convenient milestone to remember.

 

If the pistol doesn't have light strikes and the brass still falls where it did at the beginning then the hammer and recoil springs are still good.

 

Suspension springs in cars are never changed............

[Hansb57]

I think relative spring measuring is the most underrated part of gun maintence.

Have you ever measured NEW springs and found them to be of lower pressure (or higher pressure) then the one your replacing it with, although the had the same value on the package ??

I have, several. Recoil and hammer springs.

 

 

 

[KlausN]

7 hours ago, SGT_Schultz said:

10,000 is not a hard and fast rule.  It's a convenient milestone to remember.

 

If the pistol doesn't have light strikes and the brass still falls where it did at the beginning then the hammer and recoil springs are still good.

 

Suspension springs in cars are never changed............

Suspension springs are never changed?  Maybe you have to stop buying new cars when the oil change is due?

Both my 2004 truck and my 1967 car needed new springs, on the truck I even used a hammer to get the springs out.

[SGT_Schultz]

4 hours ago, KlausN said:

Suspension springs are never changed?  Maybe you have to stop buying new cars when the oil change is due?

Both my 2004 truck and my 1967 car needed new springs, on the truck I even used a hammer to get the springs out.

 

I keep my vehicles an average of 14 years and while my wife doesn't drive too much because she works from home, I drive a lot, on average 25K miles a year.

 

Since 1986 I've one Porsche, two Volkswagens, two Chryslers, three Hondas and one Toyota. 

 

I've never replaced the springs on any of them

[SGT_Schultz]

9 hours ago, Hansb57 said:

I think relative spring measuring is the most underrated part of gun maintence.

Have you ever measured NEW springs and found them to be of lower pressure (or higher pressure) then the one your replacing it with, although the had the same value on the package ??

I have, several. Recoil and hammer springs.

 

 

 

 

If the pistol runs like it should, I don't care about minor variations in spring rate that are normal to mass produced springs.

 

Truly, this is a non issue.

[KlausN]

41 minutes ago, SGT_Schultz said:

 

I keep my vehicles an average of 14 years and while my wife doesn't drive too much because she works from home, I drive a lot, on average 25K miles a year.

 

Since 1986 I've one Porsche, two Volkswagens, two Chryslers, three Hondas and one Toyota. 

 

I've never replaced the springs on any of them

I am not sure I understand your argument?  Are you saying because you didn’t have to change springs, springs don’t need to be changed?  A similar argument would be “black swans don’t exist because I have never seen one”.  
just because CZ puts a 18 lb hammer spring in some guns so that they never wear out doesn’t mean everybody uses them.  Just because you and I use 13 lb springs which give a good margin doesn’t mean some don’t use a 8lb spring with little margin and they might change springs earlier and want to avoid the hassle of changing one worn out spring for a bad mass production spring which is out of spec. 
 

[SGT_Schultz]

4 hours ago, KlausN said:

I am not sure I understand your argument?  Are you saying because you didn’t have to change springs, springs don’t need to be changed?  A similar argument would be “black swans don’t exist because I have never seen one”.  
just because CZ puts a 18 lb hammer spring in some guns so that they never wear out doesn’t mean everybody uses them.  Just because you and I use 13 lb springs which give a good margin doesn’t mean some don’t use a 8lb spring with little margin and they might change springs earlier and want to avoid the hassle of changing one worn out spring for a bad mass production spring which is out of spec. 
 

 

Let me explain it more clearly..........spring wear is a very complex engineering subject.  One which is better not discussed with laymen or amateurs in gun forums.

 

I have wasted enough time being told I don't know what I'm talking about regarding metallurgy, machining, heat treatment, and several other manufacturing topics that are part of my professional experience and expertise.  Not about to waste more time debating spring theory and practice.

[George16]

5 hours ago, KlausN said:

I am not sure I understand your argument?  Are you saying because you didn’t have to change springs, springs don’t need to be changed?  A similar argument would be “black swans don’t exist because I have never seen one”.  
just because CZ puts a 18 lb hammer spring in some guns so that they never wear out doesn’t mean everybody uses them.  Just because you and I use 13 lb springs which give a good margin doesn’t mean some don’t use a 8lb spring with little margin and they might change springs earlier and want to avoid the hassle of changing one worn out spring for a bad mass production spring which is out of spec. 
 

KlausN, in theory, springs don’t wear out or lose their springiness due to the fact that they don’t really reach their elastic limit. This is the simplest way I can put it out. Like @SGT_Schultz said, it’s a complex engineering subject. You have to understand Hooke’s law in order to have a better understanding on how a spring works.
 

With regards to replacing springs, you have to know the sag rate of a given spring ( different spring manufacturers will claim the same spring rates but the sag rates are different) in order to truly determine if the amount of sag over a period of time necessitates replacement. Until then, you can keep on using the same spring until it breaks. 

[KlausN]

12 hours ago, George16 said:

KlausN, in theory, springs don’t wear out or lose their springiness due to the fact that they don’t really reach their elastic limit. This is the simplest way I can put it out. Like @SGT_Schultz said, it’s a complex engineering subject. You have to understand Hooke’s law in order to have a better understanding on how a spring works.
 

With regards to replacing springs, you have to know the sag rate of a given spring ( different spring manufacturers will claim the same spring rates but the sag rates are different) in order to truly determine if the amount of sag over a period of time necessitates replacement. Until then, you can keep on using the same spring until it breaks. 

Georg, while I might have used the incorrect terms, possibly due to English being my second language, I do understand Hooke’s law F_s = kx,. Also wear might be the incorrect term but as I understand springs “wear” meaning the sag increases additionally creep or fatigue are possibilities.  Sometimes springs are “stretched “ or compressed beyond their elastic limit especially leave springs in trucks. There is also an endurance limit sometimes called the lifetime.

i am not sure what the correct term is but springs have a finite life. Sag or the force it takes to compress might change and is an indication of the end of life.  
So your statement that in theory springs don’t wear out is correct if properly designed and manufactured, in reality the do “age” <—use the correct term here.  Especially cheap springs.
 

 

 

 

Edited November 25, 2020 by KlausN

[Silver_Surfer]

Not familiar with the S2 but if the trigger return spring is similar to the 75B/TS I'd change them out once a year. I broke more than a few. 

[SGT_Schultz]

On 11/25/2020 at 10:37 AM, Silver_Surfer said:

Not familiar with the S2 but if the trigger return spring is similar to the 75B/TS I'd change them out once a year. I broke more than a few. 

 

It's the same spring.  Cajun Gun Works makes a replacement that will go tens of thousands of cycles.

 

I've heard, but can't confirm that CZ UB has addressed the TRS durability issue.  All my high use guns get a CGW TRS

[Foxj66]

On 11/25/2020 at 9:37 AM, Silver_Surfer said:

Not familiar with the S2 but if the trigger return spring is similar to the 75B/TS I'd change them out once a year. I broke more than a few. 

 

The newer purple/redish shadow 2 springs are far more durable than the older ones. I have only broken them in my dryfire/practice guns and even then typically see 30k or more rounds out of them.

[facelessman]

On SP01 Shadows, regardless if they *needed* to or not, the mag springs, recoil spring, trigger return spring, extractor spring, firing pin spring, and slide stop... all got changed once a year. I'd change them during a practice session or two right before nationals each year. It's all cheap insurance and piece of mind. 

 

I did zero a stage at nationals one year because of a broken firing pin spring. 

[MicahSwan]

not sure about all the vehicle driving per year, or engineering arguments above about who knows more about metallurgy...

All I can tell you is that I have gone through like 3 trigger return springs breaking on me, and 2 firing pin springs no longer getting firing pin out of the slide to make it look like a nipple with daily dry fire and 20k of live fire on just one of my S2's; and still am running the recoil spring and hammer spring Installed 20,000 rounds ago. so make sure you change those much more frequent. (10lb recoil spring and 10lb hammer spring with powderpuff 128PF loads)

experience is not a biblical truth statement. but I do feel confident now recommending to you that if a guy was to go 20,000 (maybe 25k) rounds before recoil and hammer spring replacement you are going to be fine IMO. (IMO fact checkers... IMO haha) 

(remember these may not be the type of things measured by round count. But rather for your recoil spring it's more important to know what you are looking for: your slide cycling as it should (ejection distance from the gun, timing of slide cycle, straight up and down , too much or too little dwell time in the rear of the slide cycle. (this also is what you should be evaluating to decide which one is good for you and your own load)
and for hammer spring the most important to track is pull weight changes, and making sure you can pop all the primers not just your diamond federal specialty Pixy dust primers.)

 

On 11/22/2020 at 10:39 AM, Stafford said:

How many rounds before changing out the hammer spring and recoil spring on a Shadow 2? Switched out the factory hammer spring and recoil spring for 13# springs from CGW.

    

Edited December 9, 2020 by MicahSwan

[Packageman]

Heard replacement fail more often the factory.  If you dry fire need to consider that as well