Aguila Super Extra SV Solid Point Problem :(

I bought a case of this ammo because of its low price.  I had shot Aguila Super Extra in the past with no problem in my S&W41 but I had problems with the very first round with this ammo: failure to extract or stovepipes with almost every round.  I have no problems with the CMP Eley ammo which is now my favorite ammo for the 41.  Anyone with similar problems?

I get about 1 round in 20 that seems not to have priming compound where the firing pin hits the rim.  If I rotate the cartridge 180 degrees, they go off the second time they are hit.

Yeah,I was having some problems with it in my Benelli last week and I'm pretty sure it was working last year.CCI SV was running fine.I tried the Aguila in an older 41 and it wasn't working in that either.It could be that there's to much dust in the guns though.-Mike

Clean your chamber and breach face. It’s your gun not the ammo

I shoot the Aguila in my Model 41, and I have to put a drop of oil on the top round in each magazine toward the front of the brass. If I do that, they work every time. If I do not, then usually I will get the 1st or 2nd round failing to eject.

When I do that, it shoots as well as anything else I can feed it.

fpk wrote:I shoot the Aguila in my Model 41, and I have to put a drop of oil on the top round in each magazine toward the from of the brass. If I do that, they work every time. If I do not, then usually I will get the 1st or 2nd round failing to eject.

When I do that, it shoots as well as anything else I can feed it.

Get your gun fixed

Chris Miceli wrote:

fpk wrote:I shoot the Aguila in my Model 41, and I have to put a drop of oil on the top round in each magazine toward the from of the brass. If I do that, they work every time. If I do not, then usually I will get the 1st or 2nd round failing to eject.

When I do that, it shoots as well as anything else I can feed it.

Get your gun fixed

It might be the case that some polishing of the chamber could make this go away, but I figure I'm in some good company doing it this way and don't mind.

The rim of the Aguila is 2thou smaller than CCI SV and 4thou small than the CMP Eley.

Maybe I need an replacement extractor in my 41?

Chris Miceli wrote:

fpk wrote:I shoot the Aguila in my Model 41, and I have to put a drop of oil on the top round in each magazine toward the from of the brass. If I do that, they work every time. If I do not, then usually I will get the 1st or 2nd round failing to eject.

When I do that, it shoots as well as anything else I can feed it.

Get your gun fixed

steve_podleski wrote:The rim of the Aguila is 2thou smaller than CCI SV and 4thou small than the CMP Eley.

Maybe I need an replacement extractor in my 41?

Try the oil first. If that fixes it, then you have one of the 1/2 of Model 41s that are really tight chambered and finicky.

Here is Jess Clark explaining this trick.
 

If it does not fix the problem, then send it to KC and he will heal it.

Here's what I found when I pulled out the lead bullet of a dud.  Note a good hammer strike on the first picture.  On the second picture, note the inside of the case where there was a round area of missing primer directly on the opposite side of the hammer strike.  You can see the primer flakes next to the case.

So, the chicken or the egg story, which is it?  Was the missing primer there first causing the dud?  Or, did the hammer strike cause the primer to flake off?  I did the chamber cleaning and the drop of oil prior.

Yes we have all heard for years that putting a drop of oil on the top round in the magazine solves every problem a 22 could ever have.  What is does in reality is jacks your chamber pressure up and creates a hydraulic cylinder in your chamber.

Best of luck with it.  As has been stated by several other people, get your pistol fixed.

I too recently purchased a case of this ammo and have experienced multiple failures to fire.  As others have noted rotating the cartridge 180 degrees will often work.  Attempted to use it for slow fire in an indoor match last night and gave up after the 3rd dud.  Finished the rest of the match with CCI standard with no issues at all.

On a related note (bargain ammo hunting) Dicks sporting goods in my area appears to be clearing out  all of their Eley target for $3.58 a box.  Managed to get 15 boxes yesterday.  It's not advertised and I don't know if it's the same in all stores.

I have no idea why or what lubes are used by various companies.

kc.crawford.7 wrote:Yes we have all heard for years that putting a drop of oil on the top round in the magazine solves every problem a 22 could ever have.  What is does in reality is jacks your chamber pressure up and creates a hydraulic cylinder in your chamber.

Best of luck with it.  As has been stated by several other people, get your pistol fixed.

It never comes across in a forum, but really want to stress that the following is meant solely in the spirit of furthering understanding and exchange of information.

I have never understood this analysis. The basic problem in my case (and most others) is that the slide does not travel backward with enough force to eject the brass and feed the next round.  The oil allows this to happen, and the question on the table is how it does this. What I don't understand it how this would spike peak pressure, so let me walk through the way I think the dynamics work, and hopefully someone can point out some element that I am missing or have wrong.

During fire, the brass is supposed to seal the chamber and exert sufficient frictional force to hold the brass in place until the bullet fully enters the barrel. Initially all the expanding gas pressure goes forward pushing the bullet for most of its travel through the barrel, and at some point the frictional force of the brass "lets go" of the chamber and the gas press begins driving it rearward against the slide. This point where the brass expansion reverses and the frictional force releases is after the peak pressure of the system by definition, since that is why the brass expansion reverses.  During this process of firing, you want that gas to blow back around the brass as little as possible.  When the pressure drops sufficiently from gas escaping forward, the brass stops sealing the chamber via friction, and remaining force is exerted on the the slide via the backward travel of the brass. That travel is what gets the slide far & fast enough back to both eject the brass and feed the next round from the magazine.

Now how does the oil effect this system.  It effects the friction between the brass and the chamber and creates the hydraulic effect mentioned.  I believe that this allows the slide to travel back with slightly less resistance (friction) and more captured force (hydraulic action) which is why the "trick" works to allow the cases to eject and the next to feed properly from the magazine. For the hydraulic action to cause increased pressure, the bullet would still need to be in the barrel, and after the frictional force of the pressure of the expanded brass against the chamber would have already let go (with or without the oil). It seems like this is already well past the peak pressure of the system, and would only have an effect of slowing the pressure drop at then end of the firing sequence -- so not peak pressure, but the tail of the pressure curve. I think it is this tail pressure that allow the "trick" to work, transferring more force to the slide and allowing proper ejection and feeding.

All that said, this is a dynamic system, and there are lots of ways to effect it.  As certainly as I can say the oil makes the ejection and feed problems go away, I can also say that other have had KC fix their guns so as to not need the oil trick.

Re the price on Eley at Dick's...Field and Stream is a subsidiary of Dick's.  I picked up a whole bunch of Eley Club there 2 days ago for $3.78/box.  It was 40% of their normal price and unadvertised.

I've noticed that all other .22 ammo that I've checked have a "clean" case exterior and the Aguilla SE .22 have a slight gummy feel, probably from excess lube during the manufacturing process. The cardboard box of the entire case of ammo appeared intact so it may not have been from rough handling of the shipper, but this still could be a possibility for these duds.

I keep my chamber clean at all times and never use the drop of oil, until I started to have problems, but the oil didn't seem to work.  I drop the round into the chamber and it easily falls in.  I have noticed under warmer temperatures during the summer the stove piping and the duds went away.

My pistol works fine with all other ammo. My conclusion is that the slight gummy film on the Aguilla cases may have been the culprit, although I could be wrong.  It is possible that when the slide rails lack lubrication and the affects of buildup in the chamber, the gummy cases do not eject well, especially in colder weather.

I bought a case of this stuff too and it runs 100% in my M41. HOWEVER, my M41 was tuned up by KC. There may be a connection there.... The Aguila runs in my M107 100% as well. Hammerli 280 also. I'm very happy with the ammo. I don't do the oil on the first round. Just load and shoot. Zero issues with the Aguilla, CCI SV, and Eley Club in any of the 3 guns mentioned.

Paul, the hydraulic effect occurs because the oil seals the chamber when the case is fired.  It's called a blow back for a reason.  Introducing a liquid, oil, allows the chamber to be "sealed" for a short period of time.  During that sealing the chamber pressure is spiked far above what it should be.  I hope this explains the situation and answers your question.

kc.crawford.7 wrote:Paul, the hydraulic effect occurs because the oil seals the chamber when the case is fired.  It's called a blow back for a reason.  Introducing a liquid, oil, allows the chamber to be "sealed" for a short period of time.  During that sealing the chamber pressure is spiked far above what it should be.  I hope this explains the situation and answers your question.

Doesn't the pressure expanding the brass also seal the chamber?

xmastershooter wrote:I've noticed that all other .22 ammo that I've checked have a "clean" case exterior and the Aguilla SE .22 have a slight gummy feel, probably from excess lube during the manufacturing process. The cardboard box of the entire case of ammo appeared intact so it may not have been from rough handling of the shipper, but this still could be a possibility for these duds.

I just checked some of the rounds in a case I have of the Aguilla SE SV and they do have the slightest hint of something thicker than an oil, which wipes off easily enough with my fingers.  I had never noticed this before and am going to try wiping down two boxes and see if that effects the results. Thanks for pointing this out!

BTW, I do not have any duds, just the failure to eject. I hope that I don't start seeing that when I buy another case in a month or two.

Oil is non-compressible. The oil in the barrel can act like a speed bump (extra seal) when the bullet is trying to get past it in the bore. Something has to give. Does the bullet act like a wipe and just push it out the barrel? Does the bullet deform slightly from trying to share the same space as the oil? Or does the barrel slightly bulge? It would be interesting to see chronograph results from oiled cartridge vs. no oil on cartridge. I've personally never owned a pistol that required oil to run 100%. As an engineer I would never do it.
Jon

I recently bought a case of Super Extra SV. It's the new version that's not Ely primed. I'm four bricks into it with no failures of any kind. I'm using it for practice ammo in my Marvel conversion. This pistol is in no way "ammo fussy". 

Several years back I bought a case of the Ely Primed stuff that had a high rate of failure. However this was in my old FAS 602 which was extremely fussy about ammo. I suspect in that case it was a gun problem.

Jim

Jon Eulette wrote:It would be interesting to see chronograph results from oiled cartridge vs. no oil on cartridge.

I don't believe we have a completely enclosed system (oil can move rearward, since the chamber is open at the back.) That said, I completely agree with your statement. Muzzle velocity should be effected by the change to the system we are discussing. Right now we have two, likely incomplete, hypothesis of how this dynamic system behaves, and need some experimental data to understand which is closer to what is happening.

I have a chronograph on the list of things to get in order to study exactly this type of thing, but just have too many other projects in flight to justify starting this one as well. If someone else that has a Model 41 that misbehaves this way would run a handful of 10 shot strings with and without oil, and report back, it would be great for you to share the results.

I have a Labradar and a M41.  I will try to run the test this next week.  Do you just want a drop of oil on the top round of the 5 in the mag?  I will run it with CCI SV as I don't have the ammo you are using.  Don