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excess unburnt powder in the chamber


yekcoh

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I got a new gun built recently. 2011 with 5" KKM with TI comp and 4 holes into the barrel chambered in 9. barrel is pvd black.

 

The usual load that I am used to with my existing open guns is 9.4gr of AA7.

 

This gun for some reason seems to be leaving a lot of unburnt powder in the gun.

 

Sometimes it gets so bad that the chamber gets build ups of unburnt powder causing the next round to jam.

 

Builder said it's his first time hearing such a thing.

 

Funny thing is when I first got the gun, it ran flawlessly for the first 500ish rounds then I started experiencing this problem.

 

So I checked my ammo: 1.172" federal spp mag (cci srp seems to burn better).

 

Ammo appears to be sized and crimped correctly.

 

Any tips or suggestions are appreciated.

Edited by yekcoh
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  • yekcoh changed the title to excess unburnt powder in the chamber
Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, OpenshooterMclass4lyfe said:

What does it chrono at compared to your other guns with the same load? 

It chronos slightly higher. barrel hole position is almost the same but this one is kkm which is known for higher muzzle velocity

Edited by yekcoh
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10 minutes ago, yekcoh said:

It chronos slightly higher. barrel hole position is almost the same but this one is kkm which is known for higher muzzle velocity

I’d play around with the amount of powder some and see if that doesn’t reduce the excess powder being unburnt. 

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I run 9.6 gn of AA7 under a 124gn 9mm bullet. OAL is 1.170 and I use the same primers, no barrel holes.  I have some unburnt powder too but it hasn’t caused a failure. I run 500 to 1000 rounds between light cleaning.  
 

could work up a load with magnum rifle primers.  I’ve used cci450s without any problems. Didn’t look at the amount of unburnt pwdr and compare.  

Edited by jwhittin
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10 hours ago, jwhittin said:

I run 9.6 gn of AA7 under a 124gn 9mm bullet. OAL is 1.170 and I use the same primers, no barrel holes.  I have some unburnt powder too but it hasn’t caused a failure. I run 500 to 1000 rounds between light cleaning.  
 

could work up a load with magnum rifle primers.  I’ve used cci450s without any problems. Didn’t look at the amount of unburnt pwdr and compare.  

If it's a primer issue, it would be an easy fix but even cci srp caused problems albeit less..

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48 minutes ago, Wanna_Go_Fast said:

I would suggest knocking the charge down a few grains and see if you get similar velocities.  Unburnt powder usually means you have more powder than you can burn in the barrel.

 

My load recipe clocks in at 167pf at 9.4gr. Ive been practicing with it because Its feels great despite the jams. Dot tracks great. Its loaded for ipsc nats but Im afraid I wont be able to trust it. 

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Posted (edited)
6 minutes ago, perttime said:

... or that you have too low pressure to burn efficiently.

The gun is a middy length (5” with thread) with 4 barrel holes. If we measure barrel length to the first hole, itd be almost 4” 

 

Does that make this gun a shorty then? 
 

Low pressure and too short of barrel length to burn the powder but the gun tracks wonderful. And it makes either ipsc or uspsa power factor easily. Id do Anything to make this gun work!

Edited by yekcoh
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What PF does IPSC use?  Is it 165?  If so, and unless you know your standard deviation is low single digits, you are at risk of failing a PF check.  If they use 160 PF then you are ok.

Edited by jwhittin
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34 minutes ago, jwhittin said:

What PF does IPSC use?  Is it 165?  If so, and unless you know your standard deviation is low single digits, you are at risk of failing a PF check.  If they use 160 PF then you are ok.

Thats not the topic of discussion. Im not asking about making pf. Im asking about a potential solution to the malfunction I am experiencing with the particular powder I am using

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3 hours ago, 625 said:

Any chance it is your bullet crimp?  🙄

So I did the push test and the bullets are guaged with a hundo
 

it measures 3.780 at the edge(neck) so I dont know what else I could do to test for proper crimp. Any idea?

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Get a 10x loupe or magnifier or phone or whatever and look at the gap between case and bullet with magnification.  If there's an obvious gap (bigger than maybe 1/4 of the brass thickness), you need more crimp.

 

That said, it's very unlikely to be the source of your unburned powder.  Btw, is it actual powder flakes or yellow cornmeal stuff or what?

 

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12 hours ago, shred said:

Get a 10x loupe or magnifier or phone or whatever and look at the gap between case and bullet with magnification.  If there's an obvious gap (bigger than maybe 1/4 of the brass thickness), you need more crimp.

 

That said, it's very unlikely to be the source of your unburned powder.  Btw, is it actual powder flakes or yellow cornmeal stuff or what?

 

I should have uploaded pictures from the get go. 
 

https://imgur.com/a/Rp1Bnet

 

I am using the same load that I used for MPA which works flawlessly.

 

You can see with this gun, the chamber area gets whatever you call (cornmeal or unburnt powder)

resulting the next round to not fully chamber. So Id have to “assist” the slide to close

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I think the yellow "cornmeal" is not unburned powder, it's some sort of combustion residue.  I saw that a long time ago in an Open gun.  Scrape some into a little pile and see if you can ignite it.

 

 

 

 

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Most "cornmeal" described by people is actually unburned powder.  The powder is made and then usually coated with graphite in order to help it from clumping and to make it flow better. in poor combustion situations the graphite is burned off powder granules but there is no ignition so what is left is the unburned powder granule. Some powders do not have the graphite coating and the true color shows through. Why do you think Vit N320 is green. 

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Interim solution for now is switching to 3n38 which seems to be working so far; 200 no issue. Will test several hundred to confirm...

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AA7 is known to be a VERY dirty load due to burned/unburned gun powder getting everywhere. Ive seen charge weight as low as 9.0 for a 124 and as high as 11 for a 115 using AA7. 

 

IMO its not a great powder for 9 major. But I also think WAC is perfect for 9 major. Many people call me crazy. 

Edited by Maximis228
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