Guns that are "picky" about their ammo...

[goon]

Revolvers - not necessarily accurate with every load but pretty much anything in its caliber will get loud with the appropriate amount of pressure.
I like that.

 

[ravencon]

Every .22 semi I've owned has had ammo "issues". I am a little surprised to hear of problems with the Sig 226. I've owned a couple of these and have never had any reliability issues--even with newbie reloads.

On the other hand, I've never owned a 1911 that was reliable. I no longer own any. Come to think of it, I haven't bought a bottom feeder in quite a while.

 

[orionengnr]

You may find that the more expensive and finely-made a firearm is, the more finicky it may become.

Sorry, my experience does not reflect this. My biggest trouble guns have been:

-one Rossi 38 Spl (and I've only owned one)
-one Charles Daly 45 acp (and I've only owned one)
-FOUR Kel-Tecs (and I've owned four) :banghead:

 

[againstthagrane]

ANY ammunition?

That's simply completely unreasonable.

So you expect it to work as well with crappy Amerc as you do Federal Gold Medal Match?

Sorry, guns aren't computers, nor are they software. They're analog devices. No two are exactly the same, nor can a reasonable person expect them to be.

I don't know ANY serious firearms expert who expects any semi-auto firearm, especially handguns, to work with ANYTHING you put into it.

Now if it won't work with ANY reasonable ammunition of an appropriate type for the application, then you certainly have a problem. On the other hand, if it prefers Winchester White Box to UMC, or Ranger SXTs to Federals, and is 100% with what it likes, that's perfectly acceptable to a reasonable person.

If that's not good enough, you probably need to think about a revolver (and even those aren't accurate with every load) or better a single shot.

i don't think that's too unreasonable a requirement for a pistol to work with ANY OPERATIONAL AMMO of the appropriate caliber. i use high quality ammo in my SD handguns, but who knows what shtf situation may arise that may cause me to use some random ammo. what's the point of having a gun you can't trust with ANY OPERATIONAL AMMO?

i never said that i expected cheap ammo to work the same as match ammo so i don't see why you even brought that up. of course federal match will WORK BETTER than some off-brand junk brand, but the cheap stuff will still WORK.

i have an hk that will shoot anything you put it in. it hasn't failed. i've used every kind of ammo from academy store brand through hornaday TAP through it and it hasn't malfunctioned. and a glock is well...a glock.

i think i'll stick to autos. i like the ergonomics and double tap ability better better

 

[tipoc]

Goon said,

One was a SIG P-226 9mm that wouldn't eject a live round if it was over a certain length, eventhough that ammunition was within SAMMI spec. IIRC, it wouldn't eject unfired Remington Golden Saber or Winchester white box ammo because they were too long. Both seemed to feed from the magazine, fire, and eject spent casings fine but I was concerned that in the event I needed to pull a tap-rack-bang drill, I'd just wind up with a live round stuck somewhere in the action.

If you read what Goon says here in his original, and later in his follow up post, you'll see that he was speaking about handcycling the rounds through. The ammo worked well, extracted and ejected well, with his Sig when he fired it, but when he went to hand cycle the ammo through some brands of ammo that he tried did not easily cycle through.

This was likely an extractor problem. Also few guns are designed or built to hand cycle rounds through. It's not that they can't do it, it's just that it's not what they were built to do.

From manufacturer to manufacturer small dimensional tolerances can exist. Even from one batch of ammo to the next, from a given manufacturer, small differences can exist. So in the case of the ammo that was sticking in the chamber during handcycling it was likely that the brass was simply sticking more in the chamber and the extractor did not have enough of a purchase on the case rim to overcome the tension. It did have enough though when Goon fired the gun normally.

tipoc

 

[VINTAGE-SLOTCARS]

***Guns that are "picky" about their ammo..****.
The worst ever was a S & W 39, with S & W rounds, the gun jammed at least once every mag. I shelved this gun and havent shot it in 25 years. Thought about selling it but I wouldn't want to be the sucker on the other end.

 

[JB Books]

PPKs can be picky about ammo

I never use hollow point ammo in any of my Walther PP or PPK pistols. Both the American and the German models do not do wellwith hollow points.

 

[woad_yurt]

ANY ammunition?

That's simply completely unreasonable.

So you expect it to work as well with crappy Amerc as you do Federal Gold Medal Match?

My Makarov works perfectly with any and all ammo I've ever put in it. My lowly P3AT does, too.

 

[goon]

This was likely an extractor problem. Also few guns are designed or built to hand cycle rounds through. It's not that they can't do it, it's just that it's not what they were built to do.

From manufacturer to manufacturer small dimensional tolerances can exist. Even from one batch of ammo to the next, from a given manufacturer, small differences can exist. So in the case of the ammo that was sticking in the chamber during handcycling it was likely that the brass was simply sticking more in the chamber and the extractor did not have enough of a purchase on the case rim to overcome the tension. It did have enough though when Goon fired the gun normally.

tipoc

Sorry, but no.

The problem was that the SIG's ejection port wasn't long enough to accomodate the ejection of an unfired round. There were always marks on the slide at the front of the ejection port where you could see that ejected live rounds were striking and leaving copper marks. Somewhere between the ejector and the ejection port, there just wasn't enough space to fit that round through there.
The P-226 I just bought also does this a little but with my tests I haven't been able to get it to not eject with anything other than WWB.
Not a huge deal. I'd like for it to be utterly reliable with ANY ammo, but I'll settle for one type of ammo that won't work exactly the way I want. It does irritate me a little because WWB 115 grain FMJ is within SAAMI specs, but since it shoots Remington and CCI just fine and runs OK with the HP's I've tried in it, I'll put up with it.
Technically, it will still feed, fire, and eject fine - spent brass is way shorter.

BTW - it is an issue, at least to me.
In the case of an ammo failure followed by tap-rack-bang, you would instead be met with tap-rack-jam.
Or worse yet, what if the ejector managed to get enough of a smack against the primer with all that strange force going on down in there?
Might just lose some fingers...
I've also found some reports of this online with other guns using other ammo.

 

[tipoc]

Goon,

OK, so this is one of your criteria for the reliability of a gun. I haven't heard of this particular test before but then there are alot of things I haven't heard of. So what you are doing is handcycling a magazine of rounds through the gun as fast as you can to make sure they all fully extract and eject as they should. If some ammo doesn't then the gun don't pass the test.

Hopefully you're titling the gun to the right as you do this. Same as you'd do in an actual drill.

I picked up some of my 9mm ammo laying around and measured the OAL. Various brands measured from 1.165" to 1.045" in length. The longest being some ball ammo. Ball is generally longer than hp. Some spec snap caps I have measure 1.096 in OAL.

I want to suggest a couple of things: Pick up some snap caps. Go to the range with some of the ammo you have questions about. Mix the snap caps randomly with the ammo in a mag. Measure the length of the snap caps and the ammo. Practice clearance drills. This may eliminate any problems potentially caused by your handcycling.

The P226 has a pretty generous ejection port. Take a set of dial verniers (you can get a cheap set at Sears if you don't have one, they will do the job) and measure it. Measure the ejection port of a number of other guns (it's bigger than the 1911 and the BHP for example). Compare them to the length of the 9mm rounds you have.

Try your hand feeding test on some other 9s that are your buddies, or on a rented gun at the range.

In the case of an ammo failure followed by tap-rack-bang, you would instead be met with tap-rack-jam.

In which case you have the rack the slide a couple of times rapidly, while the gun is tipped to the right and downward. You may also have to lock the slide back and drop the mag to clear the jam. It's also best to run and hide somewheres if the jam can't be quickly cleared.

Or worse yet, what if the ejector managed to get enough of a smack against the primer with all that strange force going on down in there?
Might just lose some fingers..

Well I suppose anything can happen with the "strange force" and all but I have not heard of this one. It's not likely, but maybe not impossible I suppose. Likely you would not lose any fingers.

Sigs are very reliable guns, they are known for that. Using your test you've found "problems" with the two you own. They have not given you problems at the range you say, when you are actually shooting them. But their "failure" to pass this criteria you've set up is annoying to you.

I think you're overthinking the problem. I doubt I can convince you of that though and so I made the suggestions I did above, the snap caps and measuring and all, so that either you convince me or you figure out something else out on your own. Look at the open top slides of the Berretta's. I mean no offense by what I say.

tipoc