Ejection Imperfection...

[Ron Ankeny]

Grrrrrr....this open blaster is really irritating me. I think I cured the intermittent failures to go into battery on my blaster. I got a new .38 Super Aftec and installed it per the instructions. According to the instructions, I have a perfect fit. Today I ran a couple of hundred rounds through the gun and the only failures to go into battery were with one round left in the magazine. Did I mention the gun goes to slide lock with one round in the mag even though the slide stop is deactivated? That's another chapter.

I followed Bob Londrigan's Front Sight article and started with the contact point on the ejector about one third of the way down from the top of the ejector face kind of like this.

About half the brass was hitting the C'More about 1/8 inch in from the right side of the sight. I figured the rounds must be hitting the ejection port so I filed the ejector down about like so.

Filing the ejector made no apparant difference and I figured the spent case must still be hitting the ejection port so I filed the ejector a bit more like this. With the ejector filed as in the third illustration about 20 percent of the spent cases were hitting the scope about 1/16 from the right edge.

So I went for broke and filed the ejector like so. With the ejector beveled from the top clear to the bottom about 20 per cent of the cases just nick the right edge of the scope. FWIW, this is the shape the gunsmith had on the original ejector with an extractor that was apparantly shaped wrong and it had way too much tension. My guess is the original set up was barely clearing the port because the extractor was really hanging on to the spent case.

Now what? I am out of ejector. Buy a new one and bevel from top to bottom leaving it as long as possible? File this one shorter. Flip, fly, spit, cry?

Edited March 19, 2006 by Ron Ankeny

[shred]

Any side-to-side bevel? Don't put a point on it, but you might be able to move the strike point outboard or inboard a little.

FWIW, I've had much better luck tuning ejectors with somebody else shooting the gun-- for some reason it's a lot easier for me to see what's really going on.

[HSMITH]

Put the contact point of the case at the top outside corner of the ejector, about a 7-10* angle from top outside to bottom inside. Should be a really flat ejection pattern, and probably too low. Bring the contact point down by putting the angle on that you started with, in the first black blob in your post to get it going out flat but high enough to clear your finger. A you lower the contact point the ejection should get higher.

The slide lock thing, does it do it with all of your magazines?

You can use the hilljack method of fixing that without diagnosis if you want, just put a dimple on it for the plunger to keep it in place unless you really want it to lock back.......... Not recommended but it does work,

[Ron Ankeny]

I guess I wasn't clear. I followed Bob's article precisely, and my illustrations are only approximations. I actually had the ejector out a dozen times, working the surface down a little at a time. I had two other people shoot the gun in addition to myself. The higher the point on the ejector, the harder the brass hit the scope. If you look at the last illustration, one would think the brass would go straight up, but such is not the case.

FWIW, this is the second ejector and I have tried contact points from the top to the bottom. The best ejection was with the ejector so long that I couldn't eject a loaded round because the bullet hit the chamber mouth.

[Ron Ankeny]

shred:

I did the outboard thing and the ejection was worse. More hits on the brass. So, I tried the opposite, filing inboard and I'll be darned, only 10 percent of the brass hits the scope. I know for a fact the slide is out of spec a bit, but this doesn't make sense.

[Robbie Wheaton Jr]

The last couple of rounds are probably hitting the slide stop and activating it. You need to dremel some material off the slide stop; refer to Bobs article on tuning the slide stop. This should cure the slide lock issue. Ejection problems, been there done that. Sent it to Dan Bedell and he fixed me up. My new open gun runs like a top now.

[benny hill]

Ron, the speed of the slide determines how far, how flat & direction it flies. You said it work's better w/ long ejector, therefore the slide may be slowing to quickly. Try a lighter recoil spring to keep up slide velocity.

[TMC]

I had he same issue with one of my open guns, I found that brass that didn't hold tight in the slide would give inconsistent ejection and cause a jam. I have an Aftec in a Caspian 38 super slide. 9mm brass would not hold in the slide, it would extract ok, but with the slide off, when I would put brass under the extractor it would not hold. Bending the extractor a little so it would hold the brass tight did the trick in my gun.

One thing that helped me tune the ejector was to remove the scope, this way you can really see where the brass goes. That opened my eyes. I had made an adjustement and thought things were better but with the scope off the cases where almost going straight up.

Good luck with it.

[tightloop]

Are you sure, really sure, you want to shoot an Open gun?

[Harmon]

my old gun was doing strange stuff like that.

took the AFTEC out and discovered it only had one of the springs in it and it was not much of a spring anymore.

ordered some springs and put TWO springs in there. shoot without the scope on and itseems to be ejecting brass at 2'oclock.. good for now.

[Ron Ankeny]

I thought my gunsmith was just giving up on me, but he was on a little vacation. He contacted me yesterday and he will stand behind the gun 100 per cent, up to and including building an entirely new blaster. He offered to pay the frieght both ways and do whatever is required to get it running next week, starting with a new slide if necessary. I told him I would try to get it running if he could put up with a dozen phone calls to walk me through the process of tuning the ejector and the extractor. He agreed and he will reimburse me for the cost of the parts even if I screw it up.

As it turns out, there can be a whole lot more to ejection perfection than just ejector angle and applying more tension to the extractor. When the old extractor broke (hardchrome made it brittle I think), every thing went South. My 'smith walked me through the steps in performing a test for checking how much of the extractor is grabbing the case when the gun comes out of battery. As it turns out, when the gun comes out of battery, the ejector is too high on the brass and it is barely holding onto the case. No wonder the ejection is so erratic. After a few tweaks, checks, more tweaks, and more checks, I managed to get the brass to stop hitting the ejection port then bouncing up and glancing off the rearward edge of the scope. Now about 20 percent of the brass flips up too high and the case mouth hits the bottom of the scope almost 3/4 of an inch further forward than before. That represents a huge difference in ejection angle without ever touching the ejector. Kind of amazing isn't it? With any luck, all that remains is to tune the ejector and I am back in business.

I know a bunch of you are thinking all of that shouldn't be necessary and you are right. The slide is a 9mm (and so stamped on the rail) made by STI when they were having quality control issues. Enough said

[XRe]

...but he was on a little vacation. He contacted me yesterday and he will stand behind the gun 100 per cent...

Glad to hear that, Ron!!!

As it turns out, when the gun comes out of battery, the ejector is too high on the brass and it is barely holding onto the case.

Also probably explains why it was tending to go downwards into the ejection port... Yeah, you definitely can't get consistent ejection without consistent extraction.

I know a bunch of you are thinking all of that shouldn't be necessary and you are right. The slide is a 9mm (and so stamped on the rail) made by STI when they were having quality control issues. Enough said

sux....

Edited March 22, 2006 by XRe

[Ron Ankeny]

Dave:

There is a forum policy about vendor and/or gunsmith bashing so let's not go down that road (again). The only reason I even mentioned the slide and the 9 on the disconnector rail is because it's a known issue with pistolsmiths, and that information sheds a lot of light on the problem. FWIW, I spoke with Chris at STI and he offered to replace the slide. He also told me the problems have been dealt with and their products are once again meeting their standards.

Edited March 22, 2006 by Ron Ankeny