Unfired .45 ball won't clear ejection port of SA 1911

[Cannonball888]

Whenever I have ball ammo to unload and try to eject the live round it won't clear the ejection port. I then must drop the round through the magazine well. HPs, being a bit shorter clear just fine. It just seems 230gr ball is a bit too long to clear. Anyone else have this problem?

 

[wally]

Unless your .45 ball ammo are reloads which could be out of spec in terms of OAL, send the gun back to Springfield for repair.
As a general rule, if the loaded round fits the magazine it should eject if not fired when the slide is cycled to unload safely.

--wally.

 

[1911 guy]

Yup.

If I had to guess, I'd say you've got a G.I., right?

The problem can usually be overcome by cycling the action fast, not trying to control the round as it leaves the pistol. Sometimes, though, the ammo just won't go.

If this is to be a carry or defensive gun, I'd have the port worked on to ensure reliability should you have to clear a malfunction.

 

[Walkalong]

Nothing unusual. You can have the port "relieved" a bit if it is a big deal to you.

 

[Cannonball888]

I have a 1911 LW Champion Operator. It fires flawlessly.

I guess it is possible in a defensive situation that I might have to clear a live round, but fortunately I won't be carrying ball.

 

[BAT1]

Must have a GI. Lower the ejection port. Throat and polish feed ramp. Put new sights on it. Get trigger job. Or, trade it in on a SS Loaded, then those problems disappear.

 

[Roswell 1847]

I've seen British .455 Auto which is their version of the .45 ACP with a much more rounded nose to the bullet. They look to be a hair shorter as well.
They look like a scaled up .380 ACP.

Could the original 1911 design have been meant for a round with those features?

 

[Geno]

A different take.

I had this same problem with my Kimber Ultra Eclipse. I noted that the extractor seemed to be longer (the claw portion) than other 1911 extractors. There was a gap of at least 1/8" (estimate) between the cartridge and the grabbing portion of the extractor.

I switched it out for the extractor from another one of my 1911s, and problem solved. In effect, somehow this one extractor seemed out of spec. When I would extract a round, there was a considerable gap between the slide and the round. Why? I have no idea. The fact that the round was held closer to the slide during extraction solved that problem and allowed FMJs to clear the ejection port.

But, remember, while I love 1911s, I am no gunsmith!!!

Doc2005

 

[Cannonball888]

I don't think it has to do with the ejection port being too high. It's the length of the port that is a bit too short to eject the longer FMJ. As I said before the shorter HPs eject just fine.

 

[joneb]

It sounds to me that the ejector is to long, it a easy fix and ejectors are replaceable.

 

[10X]

One other suggestion. Do you have a shock buffer in the gun? If so, it limits rearward travel of the slide a bit and could be causing the problem.

 

[Cannonball888]

I'm not sure what a shock buffer looks like, but I'm pretty sure I don't have one. There are no plastic peices inside.

 

[10X]

A shock buffer is a nylon gasket the fits on the recoil spring guide rod.
The idea was to make a bumper for the slide to impact during recoil rather than hitting the metal guide rod. Turned out to be a solution for a non existent problem. The link below would show you a picture.

http://www.wilsoncombat.com/a_shokbuff.asp

Just another possibility.

 

[rcmodel]

Does it have an extended ejector?

Extended ejector:
http://www.midwayusa.com/eproductpage.exe/showproduct?saleitemid=181666

Standard ejector:
http://www.johnmasen.com/Merchant2/...re_Code=J&Product_Code=4513&Category_Code=4RP

That will do it every time because the case hits it before the bullet nose clears the port.


rcmodel

 

[Constantine-p89]

I would say send it to get fixed.

 

[Jim Watson]

Your Champion is not a 1911. It has a shorter barrel, slide, and slide travel. It probably has an extended ejector to make up for the short slide travel, which hits a loaded round too soon to flip it out the ejection port.

My real USGI Colt with standard ejection port and ejector will eject a hardball cartridge cleanly. My match guns with extended ejectors and enlarged ejection ports will not.

 

[rcmodel]

Your Champion is not a 1911.

There you go then!
I missed that part about it being chopped & channeled!

What Jim Watson just said is the nature of the beast!
There is nothing wrong with it, and no way to fix it.


rcmodel

 

[Cannonball888]

Thanks guys. It's a minor annoyance I'll live with.

 

[1man]

Do your have an extended ejector, that could make the round try to eject before it totally clears the barrel or port.

I had the same problem with my Sig p245, I knocked off a couple 1/1000th of an inch off the right corner of the chamber roof. I guess Sig didn't take in account of people needing to clear the barrel of a live round(moving from Condition #1) on the P245!

 

[wally]

If its a game gun, its fine to live with it, but in a defensive situation what if your too long round is a dud and tap-rack-bang becomes impossible because of this issue?

If I encounter comercial ammo that doesn't work with my gun I try to get the gun fixed, its not always possible -- I've several guns that just are not reliable extracting Wolf despite my best efforts, so I shoot other ammo in them, but they'd be the first I'd barter away if things got bad. If/when TSHTF you probably will have to use whatever ammo you can get your hands on, not what your gun necessarily "likes".

My 4" Kimber BP and 4" Charles Daly EMS have no troubles ejecting any unfired ammo that fits the magazine.

I've an extended ejector in my first 1911, a Colt GM. It was an unreliable POS out of the box, but I managed to make it work great eventually, extended ejector was part of the solution as was lowering the port. I trimmed the ejector just enough so unfired max COL rounds would eject.

--wally.

 

[Ken Rainey]

My favorite full size 1911 pistol wouldn't eject all hardball either...it has had the extractor replaced with a spring steel one and it is probably a tad longer than the factory one - probably as Doc2005 referred to - anyway, since I prefer the spring steel extractor, I carefully removed just enough metal from where it was catching the nose of some of the FMJ ammo on the ejection port with my trusty dremel, polished it with 600 grit sand paper, cleaned all the metal dust away, wiped down the bare metal with alcohol, touched it up with cold blue, oiled it down and it looks as though it came that way from the factory! I didn't want to adjust my ejector because it throws the empty brass out at a consistent angle that I prefer. Now, any type of ammo can be cycled thru with ease - just in case "Murphy" shows up and I get a dud primer or whatever the need may be.