striker fired malfunctions

Well to be fair you should only count click no bang failures caused by the striker mechanism.

I had a Ruger SR45 that was bad for light strikes using any ammo. Clean the striker channel and reassemble, it may go 200 rounds or 2 rounds before the next light strike.

It went down the road, replaced by a bullet proof P220.
 
ritepath said:
Well to be fair you should only count click no bang failures caused by the striker mechanism.

I had a Ruger SR45 that was bad for light strikes using any ammo. Clean the striker channel and reassemble, it may go 200 rounds or 2 rounds before the next light strike.

It went down the road, replaced by a bullet proof P220.
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thats an interesting point but my thoughts were about all of the new very reliable usually polymer wonderguns these days. Any issues really light strikes aren't the only thing, also FTF and FTE are valid too.
 
"Springs don't just lose tension. The only way for a spring to lose its temper is with extreme heat."
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Not true. While the steel in a spring might not lose tension unless its exposed to extreme heat, other things can cause a SPRING (made of that same steel) to lose its ability to do work. And most of us call that inability to do work "losing tension."

That "loss of tension" is often caused by micro-fractures in the steel; when that happens the fractured area in the steel can't return to its pre-flex position -- it can't do the same work it did before the fracture. When that happens the spring is BREAKING very slowly, and losing it's ability to do work. Depending on the spring's design and how it's used, micro-fractures can come from excessive cycling or from being compressed/stretched for long period, if at the extreme limit, the spring material is at or near that spring's design limit, (That design limit is also called it's "elastic limit.") When the fractures begin, they often slowly begin to cascade, because the remaining steel must do the same work as before the fractures, but using less resilient steel. The damaged SPRING will continue to degrade and eventually soften and no longer work as it should. Most of us will say the damaged spring has lost its tension even though the steel itself is still tempered.

Most springs are not pushed to or beyond their design limits, so unless the springs are poorly made, or INTENTIONALLY pushed that far by the gun designers -- as might be the case with some hi-cap mags and small recoil springs, the springs are likely to have a long service life.
 
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FITASC said:
Springs fail because of "work", plain and simple - compression and decompression
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Is that why valve springs in car and truck engines may cycle many, many millions of times over an engine's life and almost NEVER fail?
 
Have had striker fire pistols from Springfield (XD-M, XD-S), Walther (P99x2,PPS) and CZ(100). None have yet broken an internal part. Admittedly, I don't throw 5k rounds / year on those.

I could say the same about my hammer-fired Sig, Makarov and Tokarev with the same caveat that I don't shoot enough to wear out most guns.

Modern technology is truly impressive.
 
I've had light hits with my sr9 and a friend has had the same w sr9c. I've also had no primer hit and the trigger reset. Ruger has destroyed the pistol and sent me a new one. galloway precision has a heavy duty spring for light primer hits, sounds like a chronic problem w sr9s.
 
I would say, clean out the channel periodically. I have had light strikes and found out after taking the pistol down that that a lot of crude will produce light strikes. Just bought a sonic cleaner to see if this helps with dirty channels with out tearing the gun down. And I will not use anything but Ballistol, which does not cause gum problems. I learned the hard way, not to jump on every new gimmick cleaner. Some can junk up a gun fast and harden.
 
Is that why valve springs in car and truck engines may cycle many, many millions of times over an engine's life and almost NEVER fail?
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Increase your valve lift and rpm a bit and then come back with that....:rolleyes:

They do fail, but not usually in stock motors.
 
Walt Sherrill said:
Is that why valve springs in car and truck engines may cycle many, many millions of times over an engine's life and almost NEVER fail?
Nathan said:
Increase your valve lift and rpm a bit and then come back with that....
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It's likely that changing the operating range of the valve spring, as might be happening in the case you describe, pushes the valve spring to or beyond it's design/elastic limit. That leads to the micro-fractures previouisly described -- and another name for that is metal fatigue. Metal is a surprisingly resilient material, but like any material, you can't push (or pull) or bend it too far.

If you used springs designed to handle higher engine RPMs and to function with a different amount of valve travel -- rather than forcing stock springs to do something they likely weren't supposed to do -- the replacement springs might cycle many, many millions of times over the engine's life, too.

.
 
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