Light primer strikes!?

First topic message reminder :

Range Officer giving me fits. Good solid primer hits and gun goes bang of course but a lot of light strikes with no boom. Gun hasn't been shot enough for it to be fowling. Wolff 24 pound ILS mainspring in it. Gonna try 26 pounds next. Give me 30 minutes. I shoot at home.

Tim;

Give me a call right now if you want to.
Don't worry, I don't bite.
Talking in person or over the phone trumps internet and texting any day.

602-625-5425

Clarence

I still have some Smith and Wesson Alcan primers in large pistol they were  made somewhere around 1980.. all the S&W primers were pretty hot..

these still work just fine..

think they stopped production in the very early 80s

Ok so the stock Springfield hammer has this weird third notch in it. Should only be two notches I know. It's got three. Yes I'm sure. I just spent the past hour or so taking the gun apart and looking at it. Thanks to C.Perkins - a conversation I had with him on the phone, we were able to find that the trigger stop (as sweet as I had it set) was in fact set too close. 

It was causing the sear to make contact with the first little notch in the hammer on its way forward when firing, thus slowing the hammer and possibly is the reason for my failure to fires. Or one of the reasons. I'm still not fond of those extra power firing pin springs and believe switching back to a factory firing pin spring helped. 

I adjusted the trigger stop, then while holding the grip safety and trigger I pushed the hammer back and let it forward slowly to feel for drag and contact. None now, and the pencil test had stronger outcomes as well. So tomorrow I'll live fire test again and see where we are.

Keep us updated Tim.

As for the pencil test, was sitting around this morning drinking my coffee and decided to do a little scientific analysis of the pencil test
These sample pistols all function properly with factory and home made loads.
Testing used with a new full length #2 lead pencil.

Test subject:
(1) Beretta 92fs = 5" (just cleared the barrel)
(2) S&W M14-4 = 7" (just cleared the barrel)
(3) Ruger New Model Super Blackhawk = 3"
(4) Sig P226 9mm = 3"
(5) S&W M52-1 = 4 feet
(6) Clark 1911 longslide = 4 feet

Conclusion:
Test your good to go pistol and if you change something, it may tell you that something else has changed.

Okay, back to my coffee.

Clarence

I'd be willing to bet some of you are sick of hearing about the crazy misfires I've been having. 80 rounds today with no problems and the primers show good solid dents unlike what I've have up till now. 

So my guess is that the trigger stop was in fact set to far back, allowing the sear to come away from the fully cocked notch and clear the half cocked notch but come into slight contact with this third notch or "shelf" as I've read it referred to as. That contact - I feel - could have been slowing the hammer down enough to get intermittent failure to fires. 

I've read up on this hammer that Springfield uses. I'm unsure as to why it's got a third notch other than a safety. But it turns out I'm not the only one to have found that the sear rubs on the hammer. It was not causing failure to fires for them. I think maybe it did for me because I'm using a reduced power mainspring - so the hammer is slowed down some already. Rubbing on the sear slowed it even more. I think the others had full power mainsprings. 

The trigger stop however was not the cause for the rubbing. On one persons gun it was the grip safety not allowing the trigger to come back far enough. This was proven by removing the trigger stop screw, finding the problem still exists and removing the grip safety to see the problem go away. Fitting (refitting or finish fitting) the grip safety and reassembly solved the issue. 

For me I did not like this hammer or the problems it "could" cause. I replaced the sear, disconnect, and hammer with ones that were from a Springfield custom shop pistol that had only been fired minimally before having a KC roll trigger kit installed. 

The new hammer only has two notches. Half and fully cocked. Fitting the thumb safety was needed to work with new, slightly larger sear. So now I've got a good trigger, passing function tests, passing live fire tests, and no failure to fires. End of story? I certainly hope so! Only more trigger time on the practice line will prove this but I'm feeling confidant.