Will Aluminum Frames Last?

I don't know yet.

My Model 39 S&W is only 40 years old, so I don't know how long it will last yet?

But it's going to last longer then I will, for sure!

rc

My 9mm Sig P-239 was bought back in the last century, and was first used when I started shooting USPSA. It still shoots to POA at 25yrds and is my edc. TOTAL failures = ZERO, and this isn't some internet exaggeration. It really has never had a part fail or fail to fire with a LOT of rds through it. I did lighten the hammer spring and put in the short reset kit.

I do keep it lubed, and fairly clean.

One of my Sig P6's is from 1980 and with all the scuffs and dings it's been through hell and back. Based on the outer barrel wear marks and the slide rail wear, it's had a TON of rounds through it. No cracks in the alloy frame or steel slide yet. Not to say it can't, but it'll take alot of rounds for it to happen.

If a pistol designed for 9mm is upped to a higher pressure round like .40 I could see it accelerating any potential crack issues.

My S&W 469 went out of production in 1988. Not as old as some alloy framed guns, older than others. No idea of the round count since I got it second hand. Same with my Ruger P89. Never had any issues with the M9 pistols I was issued while in the Air Force, either.

Of the tens of thousands or more of Beretta M9 pistols purchased by the DoD, the percentage of failures among them was quite small. I read somewhere that only a small handful of pistols actually had catastrophic failures, and the majority if them were training weapons that were never combat issued. When thousands of troops train on a few pistols that are constantly being disassembled, reassembled and aggressively cleaned, accelerated parts wear would be expected. But still, a half dozen guns among tens of thousands or more, with above average use... I would still trust a Beretta M9, or any other proven alloy frame gun from a reputable manufacturer.

I have a Manurhin P1 made quite some time ago. Still going strong with no signs, other than finish wear, of any problems with the aluminum frame.

Sounds like a Beretta problem...

My 92FS has been going strong for 18 years and I wouldn't expect anything else.

The military also reportedly disqualified a number of aluminum frame guns, including the popular Sig Saur entry. Other aluminum-frame guns, like the S&W 459, functioned just fine during the military trials. At the time, the Beretta 9mm was considered "overbuilt" by many, but then came the failures, causing the military to rate its service life at a mere 5,000 rounds.

Click to expand...

I think you probably need to reread what actually happened at the XM9 trials in the 80's. Seems your version is based on internet rumors..

http://gao.gov/assets/210/208564.pdf

Our Ruger KP90s have certainly lasted with no more wear than you normally see on steel frames. Not a semi auto, but the AL frame of my early '60s Ruger Blackhawk .357 Magnum has been unaffected by time and shooting.

Nothing lasts forever, but with reasonable care and when used as designed, AL framed guns can easily outlast their owners.

At the time, the Beretta 9mm was considered "overbuilt" by many, but then came the failures, causing the military to rate its service life at a mere 5,000 rounds.

Click to expand...

Source on the 5k number?

I've definitely seen M9s that needed work due to neglect and abuse, but the receivers themselves were Joe-snuffy proof from my own experience and shooting the bull with every armorer I met downrange. If you got a frame to crack from wear, that would be somewhat newsworthy in the shooting world. And I would guess the number of rounds to make it happen would be well into the 6 figures.

I wouldn't worry about it, you mention aluminum but that isn't exactly true, they are made of various modern alloy's that are extremely light and durable and should last a very long time.

It does seem like the OP has grabbed onto a few chunks of misinformation that he has shared with us in a few of his recent posts.

Here is Ben Stoeger talking about his Beretta's and how they've held up https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ue8_uN0OIVs

I think the OP has misunderstood the concept of "mean rounds between failures." Failure, in that context, does not mean frames falling apart or the gun being junk thereafter.

The only aluminum framed gun that I have ever seen fail personally was a Bersa Thunder 380 we had as a rental gun for the range I worked at. It was a very reliable gun and must have had between 10K and 20K rounds through it before the frame cracked. Bersa replaced the gun free of charge.

A frequent cause of frame failures for any gun of any material is inadequate maintenance. You need to change the springs once in awhile or any semi-auto will beat itself to death. Some guns can go 20,000+ plus rounds between changes, others need them swapped much more often than that.

I've had an aluminum framed S&W 622 for about 25 years. No idea of round count through it, but it shows no signs of cracks or any other damage.

I carry a S&W 637 every day. I'm none too worried about it either.

I think the aluminum/alloy frame worries are much ado about nothing.

Steel has a bit more resiliency than aluminum. When bent or beat upon, it returns to it's normal state more easily, without damage. Aluminum tends to break. That's why you don't see aluminum springs.

Most handgun frames aren't meant to do a lot of bending or flexing -- they're supposed to be the handle that makes the gun (barrel and slide/bolt) work. In some respects, polymer frames act more like steel than aluminum does -- and for a gun's frame, may be better than aluminum.

That said, SIG has been using aluminum frames for most of it's models for 40 years, and SIG aren't know for frame failures.

I've seen a couple of aluminum-framed guns crack. One was S&W 669 that I sold to the owner of a local gun range/gun shop. S&W replaced it, and acted embarrassed by the failure. (They replaced it, but didn't replace the very nice trigger job that had been done to the gun before I sold it. The range owner was just happy to get the gun replaced.) I've seen a few steel frames crack, too. Some 1911 show that -- but the cracks are often ugly looking but don't change or hamper the gun's ability to function. I've seen steel slides crack, too -- but that seems to be a design issue, not a "material" issue.

The question isn't really HOW LONG before the aluminum frame cracks or fails -- it's not really a "TIME" issue. It's a work issue: how much work of a particularly difficult nature must be done before the metal begins to fail or show structural damage. I suspect that most guns will do pretty well, and it won't matter whether they're steel, alloy, or polymer.

I agree with what eldon said about spring maintenance. I bet alot of these alloy frame cracks can be attributed to worn out recoil springs allowing the slide to beat the heck out of the frame. Springs are cheap, a new gun is not. Here is an example of spring maintenance schedule for Sigs:

SIG Sauer’s recommended maintenance and parts replacement schedule (as of March 2008):

Barrel: If the pistol exhibits keyholing or unacceptable accuracy.
Decocking lever spring: 10,000
Extractor: 20,000
Extractor spring: 20,000
Firing pin: 20,000
Firing pin spring: 20,000
Magazine spring: When magazine fails to lock the slide open.
Recoil spring: 3,000 - 5,000
Safety lock spring: 20,000
Slide catch lever spring: 10,000
Takedown lever: 20,000
Trigger bar spring: 10,000
Mainspring (hammer spring): 5000 or when misfires due to light hammer strikes occur.

HammsBeer said:

I agree with what eldon said about spring maintenance. I bet alot of these alloy frame cracks can be attributed to worn out recoil springs allowing the slide to beat the heck out of the frame.

Click to expand...

You may be right, but I don't think a weak recoil spring is likely to lead to a damaged alloy frame. A recoil spring weak enough to allow damage the frame is probably so weak it won't be able to store enough energy to strip the next round from the mag and feed it into the chamber. The gun will probably stop running before that happens. I suspect SIG recommends regular spring replacement to assure continued proper function and feeding, not to protect the gun.

The main function of the recoil spring is NOT to protect the frame, but to store enough of the moving slide's energy to be able to strip the next round off the magazine and feed it into the chamber. Frames are generally pretty robust, and the points where slide or barrel interact with the frame are also robust and well designed to manage the forces they encounter. With nearly all of the aluminum-framed guns, where slide and barrel hit the frame, the interface is steel.

1911Tuner a some-time participant here and on other forums, has shown that shooting a 1911 without a recoil spring doesn't destroy the gun; those who have examined the gun he has done this with (many times) say that there's no evidence of damage. Those who shoot that gun (or their own) without the recoil spring installed also tell us that they don't really notice much difference in felt recoil. That would suggest that the recoil spring isn't doing MUCH to reduce slide/frame impact.

The fact that you can typically rack a slide by hand without needing a bumper jack to do it tells you that the recoil spring isn't really strong enough to protect the frame from a lot of slide impact.

It's when all the airplanes start falling out of the air that bothers me.

psyopspec said:

Source on the 5k number?

I've definitely seen M9s that needed work due to neglect and abuse, but the receivers themselves were Joe-snuffy proof from my own experience and shooting the bull with every armorer I met downrange. If you got a frame to crack from wear, that would be somewhat newsworthy in the shooting world. And I would guess the number of rounds to make it happen would be well into the 6 figures.

Click to expand...

Beretta's website states that typically a M9 will fire OVER 35,000 rounds of commercial ammunition before a failure. That's pretty dang robust and fix the failure and shoot a ton more.

http://www.beretta.com/en-us/m9/

When we talk US military standards, we talk hard numbers, not opinions. The M9 has been put through impossibly-rigorous durability and reliability tests that greatly exceed any kind of real-life situation--and it has passed them all with flying colors. For instance, it will keep functioning in temperatures as low as -40 F and as high as +140 F, and it consistently fires over 35,000 rounds of commercial ammunition before a failure. It will keep functioning reliably even after being buried in the sand or snow, or being repeatedly dropped on hard surfaces like asphalt or concrete. Beretta’s engineering experience and the quality of the steels used enable this kind of reliability, on which America’s servicemen and women depend every day.

Click to expand...

It depends on the type of aluminun used. Properly made and treated aluminum can rival steel in it's tensile stregnth according to Cold Steel and I have to agree because in EMS we used to use very light weight aluminum stretchers that would go through absolute hell from getting serverely banged up to rolling 500lb people and those things rarely broke despite their daily life of flexing and impacts.

I also read that aluminum of that quality is not easy to make, is significantly more expensive to make, and requires stricter quality control that raises the price even more.

One thing I don't like is a lot of businesses don't talk about the type of materials they use, are very tight lipped about it when you inquire, and it is quite possible they don't tell because they don't want you to know they use the cheapest stuff that they can and it may be on the border of being able to be durable enough for the use it's put to.

That is my take on the subject.

It's not the years, but the mileage. Most of the data I've seen shows a life expectancy of around 35,000 rounds for aluminum allow framed guns. Most of us will never wear one out. That is 700 boxes of ammo. At $15/box you'll have to spend over $10,000 on ammo to wear one out. If you can afford the ammo, you can afford to buy a new gun.

In comparison most steel framed guns are usually good for at least 100,000 rounds and there are multiple Glocks out there with over 300,000 rounds documented.

Aluminum is the least durable, and offers very few advantages over steel. There is a reason plastic guns are replacing them. But for most of us it is a non-issue.

grter said:

One thing I don't like is a lot of businesses don't talk about the type of materials they use, are very tight lipped about it when you inquire, and it is quite possible they don't tell because they don't want you to know they use the cheapest stuff that they can and it may be on the border of being able to be durable enough for the use it's put to.

That is my take on the subject.

Click to expand...

Your take MAY be correct when applied to some businesses, but I'm not sure it really applies to the firearms industry. If there were a LOT of aluminum-framed guns failing you'd probably be justified in making such a statement in the context of this discussion -- but that doesn't seem to be the case.

While the exact composition of any aluminum alloy used in a gun's frame can probably be determined by a metallurgist, I suspect that most gun makers consider things like their metal frame's "formula" to be a trade secret -- they'll talk in generalities, not specifics.

Beretta, S&W, SIG, and CZ all have made a lot of aluminum framed guns -- and none of them have reputations for selling aluminum-framed guns that fail.