AK will work just fine.
AK will work just fine.
This was fun until you wanted us to take you seriously. Now it's awkward.
That's a good point, I can't remember a time I ever lubed the buffer spring since I put it together. I bet it's pretty dirty in there too...
Will make no difference at all. Any lube in this area should by very light and only serves to protect the metal from corrosion.
Ok, I've decided to get a BCM bolt upgrade kit (new springs/rings/ejector/etc), since my bolt is a no-name bolt anyway, and a stronger CS ejector spring from Brownell's.
I did stumble across this though, which kind of confirms my suspicions:
My brass ejects at about 1:30-2:00, which according to this means it's overgassed (I suspect due to the carbine gas system on 16" barrel). Hoping to make the mods and give it another test run this month
I did stumble across this though, which kind of confirms my suspicions:
My brass ejects at about 1:30-2:00, which according to this means it's overgassed (I suspect due to the carbine gas system on 16" barrel). Hoping to make the mods and give it another test run this month
Ok, I've decided to get a BCM bolt upgrade kit (new springs/rings/ejector/etc), since my bolt is a no-name bolt anyway, and a stronger CS ejector spring from Brownell's.
I did stumble across this though, which kind of confirms my suspicions:
My brass ejects at about 1:30-2:00, which according to this means it's overgassed (I suspect due to the carbine gas system on 16" barrel). Hoping to make the mods and give it another test run this month
Ah... the chart. That chart has caused so many people grief, pain and money out the wallet.
One thing that will instantly throw you off is that you have a 16" barrel with a carbine gas system, so your rifle will inherently have a more forcefull ejection and will tend to throw shells more at the 2:00-3:00 ranges and even 1:00 range if you're too overgassed. If you're using a carbine weight buffer and not an H weight or H2 weight, then your cyclic rate may be even faster. Too fast and you can have problems like shells ejecting forward back into the chamber and at the same time the bolt closing and feeding so fast that the ejected shell is still bouncing around in the chamber.
You may try a spare bolt if you have one to atleast eliminate problems there. Gas rings and extractor springs and worn extractor could be culprits, however in your case I think it's elsewhere.
I could be dead wrong, but my observation is that your 16" carbine gas with standard buffer spring and carbine weighted buffer was already on the edge in terms of reliability and is the classic case of issues that plagued a lot of the early AR15's sold with similar setups. After 3000 rounds, various parts have worn to the point that some of the flaws are starting to show that maybe a 16" midlength gas, 20" rifle length gas, or even a 14.5" with carbine length gas with an H or H2 weight buffer may not have this early.
If your shells are being thrown in front of you like you said, then it reinforces that your rifle is overgassed, but there may not be anything actually wrong with your gas block (barring an incorrect sized gas port hole in your barrel.) The carbine length gas was meant for a 14.5" barrel, not 16". The extra bit of barrel increases gas pressures considerably and if the rest of the rifle isn't tuned to handle the extra gas pressure, you can run into problems. Most new rifles with this setup may not experience problems until springs start to wear down and then the flaws of the system start to show. The midlength gas system was created specifically to correct gas pressures for 16" rifles. Some manufacturers combat this with using extra power buffer springs or heavier buffers. I believe Colt uses H2 buffer weights for their 16" carbine gas rifles.
After 3000 rounds, the buffer spring has probably worn to the point that your bolt is cycling way too fast. Since you're using a carbine weighted buffer, it's not really helping your buffer spring in slowing the bolt down enough now that the spring is worn a bit. I would almost be willing to bet that if you replaced your buffer spring with a new one or even slightly more powerful one would help, if not eliminate the immediate problem. If you have a carbine weight buffer, I would replace it with an H or H2 to slow the cycling down a bit to add a bit more reliability and help your buffer spring to slow down your bolt a bit more.
A standard buffer spring with an H2 would be my recommendation, maybe an H3. I typically don't bother with extra power springs because they throw things off for me when I'm tuning a rifle. I usually like to go heavier in buffer weights before resorting to extra power springs.
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Drop by the shop, give me your OSA user name and I will be more than happy to look at it for you for free.
I have never seen an AR with that malfunction being the result of an over gassed situation unless it was coupled with either a weak extractor and/or weak ejector. You "may" have an over gassed gun, but that isn't causing the malfunction you described without help.
Take Mark up on his generous offer.
Take Mark up on his generous offer.
Mark got me all fixed up with a new extractor spring. He showed me the tension a good extractor spring should have, and mine was super light in comparison, so we think that's got it. Thanks again Mark! Hopefully I'll get a range test this weekend or next.
Good work Mark. Glad its all sorted.
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