(03-14-2022, 08:46 PM)Dino11 Wrote: Try lightening the buffer some more by replacing the steel weights with aluminum ones. I made my own from some 1/2" aluminum bar stock I got at the hardware store. I lightened a rifle buffer and used a 10% reduced power RE spring and had to almost close my gas block off. It is barely open and the the rifle is a very soft shooter that only throws the brass a couple feet away from the bench. My gas port on that rifle is .101, it is rather large but it is a rifle +2" on an 18" barrel, not much real estate between the gas port and the muzzle. And the rifle runs a lot cleaner having almost no gasses going to the BCG and the bolt stays locked longer.
What weight did your rifle buffer end up at? And as you reduce power Spring a wolf one?
Yes it was a Wolff spring and I replaced 4 of the 5 steel weights with aluminum and reduced it from 5.4 down to 3.8 oz. It cost me about $5 and about a 1/2 hour of time to modify it.
....riggeek, as you begin your testing anew, don't throw all of the changes in at once, do them singly so as not to introduce new complications that the combinations could bring.
...the other consideration is once you get the 58gn dialed in, there could be new differences encountered when working with heavier bullets.
03-20-2022, 01:44 AM (This post was last modified: 03-20-2022, 02:13 AM by riggeek.)
While reassembling the gun I noticed something a little interesting with the gas block they provided versus a superlative that I already have. The gas hole on the provided block is bigger and just not sure how much bigger.
...riggeek, I wouldn't be overly concerned about the one gas block having a largerr port hole, if anything it allows for some wiggle room on the alignment of the gas block when installed.
Just got out today to test
The temperature was A very nice 65°
I was running the adjustable gas block, with a mil spec bcg, and 3.7 oz buffer with a wolf reduced power sprng on a A5 buffer tube.
Using factory 108 eld ammo.
Overall there seem to be some improvement and more consistency in the cycling. I ended up with a superlative gas block set to 18 clicks which is fully open.
I did get some jams loading the next round but it was better than before. 1 out of 10 to 15 rounds jammed.
Brass ejection was very inconsistent with 3 bass at 3:00 and 3 brass at 5:30 out of 6 rounds.
I did test this lower out on my 16 inch 556 build. It worked well there I did have to set the gas block on that one to just about to fully vent position so about 44 clicks.
So the options I seem to have now is to lower the buffer wait some more, or look for reduced mass carrier.
If anybody can offer any opinions or advice I’d greatly appreciate it.
Those infrequent jams, might be coming from the cartridge's case lip catching on the forward edge of your mag during insert...
I've had problems like that, I took to lowering all my front mag edges and all of that jamming went away. I posted some info on here on a thread or 2, if you're interested you might look at it.
(03-28-2022, 12:50 AM)grayfox Wrote: Those infrequent jams, might be coming from the cartridge's case lip catching on the forward edge of your mag during insert...
I've had problems like that, I took to lowering all my front mag edges and all of that jamming went away. I posted some info on here on a thread or 2, if you're interested you might look at
Done some searching for the info but did not see any. Was it on a post you had? A photo would be great.
Yes that's it, make total cut about 0.120" down from the flat part of the follower, round the edges and tay above the spot weld. This gives the brass casing room to move fwd without striking that forward edge. I do this for mags that don't have that depth in front, there is I think at least one mfr where the depth is ok and those have always worked for me.
I had a problem once with cycling that I bring up just for general information, not that I think it is happening in your case.
The brass would eject and hit on a scope mount knob and bounce back to the chamber and sometimes jam. I had to cycle dummy rounds for a while to figure out what was going on.
Just to clarify everybody these are the live rounds being pulled from the magazine that are jamming. The brass is ejecting, but it is it landing at around the 5 o’clock area
(04-02-2022, 04:00 AM)StoneHendge Wrote: Could you be cycling too fast? Looks like your bolt may be hitting the next cartridge before it comes up completely.
I have thought about this, but the brass is ejecting in a spot that it suggests it’s under gassed.
One thing to know that this upper doesn’t have a traditional brass deflector like most uppers. This is made by a local company near where I live I’ve had excellent luck with their lowers but this is my only upper from them.
i’ll have to take a look at the weights I have and see if I can weight up some without going out and buying a tungsten weights.
I ordered and install the titanium carrier with the current bolt I was using from the ball carrier
This is still using the reduced power buffer spring and a 3.7 ounce buffer weight.
With this set up the real gun was able to cycle through 40 rounds of factory one08 ELD with no issues and no jams.
When I started back into my handloads I started noticing some issues.
The round would load but it would not fully engage the bolt into the lugs. It was however very close to being there. They were very hard to eject with the charging handle.
Took the rounds back to my house and measured them in the Le Wilson case Gage. Nothing noticeable with this.
So I started measuring the factory rounds versus my reloads and found very minor differences in the tune of 2 to 3 thousand at the base of the case.
I tried to cleaning the chamber with no change.
So I broke down and order myself a set of RCBS short base dies.
After re-sizing some of the brass with the short base die I was able to chamber their rounds
So this is pointing to two possibilities are a mix of the two following items
A tight chamber on the barrel, or an oversized sizing die.
I have not had a chance to test it be on this point.
Thanks for the update. I'm not the expert for this sort of issue, but could it also be a loose (diameter) chamber that reloads have expanded too much at base, whereas factory loads were ok at the base.
Just wondering. And if this is the case then a small base die should improve those fired cases...
I don't see how a case body / chamber could cause the misfeeds you have pictures of above. The cases aren't making it far enough for that to be the issue.
(04-12-2022, 02:10 AM)riggeek Wrote: I thought I’d update where I’m at with this.
I ordered and install the titanium carrier with the current bolt I was using from the ball carrier
The round would load but it would not fully engage the bolt into the lugs. It was however very close to being there. They were very hard to eject with the charging handle.
Took the rounds back to my house and measured them in the Le Wilson case Gage. Nothing noticeable with this.
So I started measuring the factory rounds versus my reloads and found very minor differences in the tune of 2 to 3 thousand at the base of the case.
...not to belittle your choice of gauge, but this is the primary reason why I suggest folks consider the Sheridan Engineering gauges, it allows observance of all parameters of the casing, especially if one is converting brass.
I have the Sheridan gauges for both 6mm ARC & 6.5 Grendel. The 6mm ARC gauge was very helpful in finding the right bullet depth when seating 70gn bullets to touch the lands for fire-forming expanded 220 Russian brass.
The trick is growing up without growing old. -- Casey Stengal
