Piston VS DI - firing cheap/crap rounds?

M

MAC1990

Inactive
I currently have a Benelli M4, it has a piston system and I sometimes find that it cannot cycle cheap/crap rounds properly..


so my questions is this:

I want to buy the H&K MR556, it has a piston system....will it fire crap/cheap rounds flawlessly like my colt AR that is DI does?

Thanks
 
I'm not sure it has anything to do with piston or DI. I had a piston system on an AR15 for a while and it shoots the crap ammo just fine with or without the piston system. I think it may have more to do with chamber dimensions.
 
Agreed

I think the best piston out there is the Robinson Arms XCR.

From the ground up design, works well and has multiple settings if you even needed it.

Folding stock. Fantastic ergonomics. Won't hold a 5 shot group as well as a DI, but good for 1 inch to 1.5 MOA which is pretty good.
 
@ slappy, thanks good to know, I didnt even think about the chamber dimension

what type of piston AR do you have?

@RC...had to google robinson arms never heard of it :P
 
Crap ammo tends to be under powered and may malfunction in any AR, piston or DI.

XM193 is cheap when bought in bulk, you only save a few pennies a round with crap ammo.

What's the point of having a $1K rifle designed for 5.56 NATO and then feed it crap. It does not compute.:rolleyes:
 
I currently have a Benelli M4, it has a piston system and I sometimes find that it cannot cycle cheap/crap rounds properly..


so my questions is this:

I want to buy the H&K MR556, it has a piston system....will it fire crap/cheap rounds flawlessly like my colt AR that is DI does?

Thanks
Click to expand...

one thing that never seems to be brought up in the never ending DI VS piston arguments is that pistons require a certain amount of pressure to operate. this is not a problem for military because everyone shoots the same round and it's very consistent however in the civilian world there are dozens of different options when it comes to ammo and each one is going to have different pressure levels. if you have a non adjustable piston system(I've never checked on the MR556 so I dont know) then you have to find a round that it likes(which will probably be SS109 or the closest you can come to it) and never fire a different round or if it is adjustable you will have to keep a log book of all the different ammo types you've fired and what setting operated the best with it. now if you are shooting junk ammo that has very inconsistent loads then there's no way around it, it's not going to work.
 
I think RC20 must have stock in Robinson Arms, he seems to mention the XCR in every post me makes:p

Get the rifle that meets your needs/wants. Then find the ammo that works the best.
However, I think the Corvette analogy, and the "why buy an expensive rifle and shoot cheap ammo" arguements are a bit flawed. Personally, if I spend that much on a rifle, it better damn well eat anything I feed it.
 
Mac1990, I have a Bushmaster Carbine and had an Osprey Defense piston conversion on it for a while. When I bought the rifle I bought 1000 rounds of Wolf Ammo with it. It is the first thing this gun ever saw. I converted it to gas piston configuration and then later converted it back and never once has this gun failed to feed, fire or eject with Wolf ammo in either configuration. I tend to ignore people who say you shouldn't buy an expensive gun and then buy cheap ammo. I buy anything I can get cheap. The more I have on hand the better. There is nothing under powered about it, it doesn't shoot any dirtier that I can tell and it puts holes in paper (or anything else) just as good as the expensive stuff. There seems to be a lot of folks who believe anything they read on the internet is gospel, so someone says "steel cased ammo is crap" and they believes it, and spread it around, whether they know anything about it or not.
 
slappy,
for the record, even though I recommend ATK brands over cheap steel cased, I've fired 3 types of ammo out of my AR since I accurized it, PMC, 15 year old heavily tarnished XM193 and wolf, so far the wolf has been the most accurate, I have noticed that it is a lot dirtier than most brass but no more than remington...now THAT stuff is junk ammo:rolleyes:
 
I ordered a chronograph last night to help work up my hand loads. I think I will test some Wolf and Silver Bear (got a stash of that too) against the other stuff I have on hand and see what kind of velocities it gets. I could be dead wrong about it being under powered but, like I said, I have never had a problem with it.
 
Even at age 77 I believe that life is too short to mess with cheap crap anything. Ammo, cars, people, whatever. I don't drink Lite beer, either. :D When you're booked on the Titanic, why go steerage?
 
Semi-auto military rifles are built to use ammo that meets specific numbers in terms of pressure, case material, etc. If you don't use that same type of ammo in them, you may experience less reliable functioning.

If that is a serious concern for you, there are a number of adjustable gas systems for both DI and piston. The military generally doesn't use adjustable gas systems because they have standardized on a single type of ammo and given the numbers involved and the training level, the probability that an adjustable gas system will be adjusted wrong is usually higher than the probability of trouble from the standard gas system.
 
Even at age 77 I believe that life is too short to mess with cheap crap anything. Ammo, cars, people, whatever.
Click to expand...
Remember the old addage; One man's trash is another man's treasure.
It would be nice if everyone could afford the best of everything. Then we would have no need for politicians. Unfortunately that isn't the case.
 
The point is - using underpowered ammo means not getting full pressure out of the powder charge. There simply isn't as much.

Combat rifles are tuned to the one or two issue rounds, and when changes are made, they make sure the ammo is up to full power. They don't change the rifle.

Civilians do it backwards, and that's what causes problems. They want to shoot whatever load there is, and blame the gun when the ammo they use is out of specification. It really is a case of putting kerosene in their Corvette.

Defensive pistol users know it, shotgun users know it. In fact, most gun testers know it because they deliberately shoot the WRONG stuff in it to see how it works. Shotgun testers deliberately load hi power goose rounds and light bird loads alternately to find out how the compensating valves in the gas piston operate.

That's the key right there - the shotgun designers live with whiny complaints their ten gauge goose guns won't cycle light bird loads because the shooter cant afford the right gun for the job. They put in compensating valves to use the light loads to cycle, and bypass the excess gas from the magnum loads they don't need.

Piston rifles don't have those self compensating valves. You can get an adjustable one and fit it yourself, but saying a $2500 combat carbine "should" be able to do it is ignorant at best. It wasn't ever meant to use anything but the one or two full power issue rounds that a soldier is restricted to use.

Insisting otherwise is like saying Chevy screwed up because their Corvette won't run on kerosene. WT...? Goes right along with " I was breaking in my $1,000 rifle on $4.50 a box ammo and it won't cycle, these guys are building crap."

And, we rank about 15th worldwide in our educational expertise now, too. You guys need to get up to speed. :rolleyes:
 
I started out church-mouse poor. .22 shorts was all I could afford. Time passed, as time does, and life got better. I got into centerfire and reloading and minor gunsmithing. But my centerfire shooting was to test loads, sight in rifles, and get familiar and reflexive with these hunting rifles. Not much shooting for entertainment.

So today I have a fairly fat billfold. Regardless, my entertainment shooting is still with the rimfire. Keeps me tuned up for serious rifle shooting; trigger control, sight picture, all that good stuff. And obviates any need for cheap crap ammo.
 
tirod said:
Piston rifles don't have those self compensating valves. You can get an adjustable one and fit it yourself, but saying a $2500 combat carbine "should" be able to do it is ignorant at best. It wasn't ever meant to use anything but the one or two full power issue rounds that a soldier is restricted to use.
Click to expand...

Ignorant at best??
My $600 DR200 has been eating everything I've fed it for more than 15 years, without ever needing to adjust the tuneable gas port. I'm not bragging up the Daewoo, all I'm saying is that if I spend almost 5 times as much on a rifle, it should be able to do the same.
 
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