22 tcm disapointment

[tommag]

I picked up my 5" target tcm yesterday and stripped it, cleaned, etc. The trigger is very nice!
At the range today, i fired 5 rounds before giving up. Failure to extract, had to use a rod to knock the cases out, they were stuck pretty tight. I tried the other extractor, thatwasn't the problem.
Switching bbls, it functioned ok with pmc 9 mm. The 22 tcm cases were scratched up quite a bit. The chamber appears to have a bit of brass left behind in it.
Not sure if I should send it back, or try some flitz on the chamber. I'd prefer to try and fix it myself, as I have to hit the road Monday, but I'm not much of a gunsmith.
All input welcome.

[Mk42gunner]

Less than five rounds through it? I would be sending it back or at least insisting they send me a new barrel.

Robert

[USAFrox]

Tell me about these 5 rounds: were they factory rounds, or home loads? If home loads, what did you use (brass, powder, bullet, etc.)? Did you form the brass yourself? More info, please.

[tommag]

The ammo was factory, I ordered 1,000 rounds, dies, and 3,000 of their 40 gr bullets. I figured I would start with factory ammo to get a feel for the pistol before reloading. Also, it was fairly cheap by today's standards, $370 per thousand.

[wellfedirishman]

Armscor customer service is very good, I have used it in the past. Just call them and explain and they should take care of it.

[Pinsnscrews]

Call Armscor. They stand behind their product. They will make it right.

[oger]

They have a real problem with the case length of their factory ammo. If you measure the case length of the one's that stuck you will find they are as much as .020 longer than the cases that didn't stick.

[tommag]

Thanks, Oger.
I didn't think to measure the case lengths. The two test cases sent with the pistol measured 1.024", and the five I fired were between 1.035-1.039"
Every one of those I fired stuck tight. The test cases showed no scratching and the web area measured .3763 The ones I fired measured .3775. Looks like the ammo might be the problem. They responded to my email quickly, and want me to send it back to them.

[HATCH]

Measure the oal of all the factory loaded rounds and you might be in for a surprise....

[seagiant]

Hi,
They will take care of you! Might help the next guy also!

[tommag]

I pulled five bullets, and here's the results. only one of them was crimped in the groove, the others were crimped a little deeper. the brass measured 1.025-1.027", shorter than the fired ones.
120280

[HATCH]

I have loaded 1500 22 TCM using factory components.
The oal on my loads varied as well. Couldn't explain it.
However I don't have any issues with them. I have only shot factory loads for chrony testing.
I can tell you that oal and your crimp will play a major roll in this round.
Factory loads are towards the max oal that my pistol would allow. They function but if I where to go any larger thy didn't.
I am using a Dillon 550 with hornady dies with a ch seat/crimp die (crimp only)

[meister mash]

I have found that some of the factory rounds have different sized rim dimentions also. So if a case sticks look at that case and I'll bet that the extractor isn't grabbing it. My then new to me tcm suffered a broken hammer after one magazine of factory ammo. They sent me a new hammer and allowed me to buy another magazine which at the time there were no spare standard capacity magazines anywhere. I would sacrifice a case. Drill and tap the head for a threaded rod and flitz or jb bore paste the ca:veryconfurp out of the chamber just to eliminate that suspicion.

[tommag]

They are sending another box of ammo to try, then want the pistol back if problems persist. I intend to pull 50 rounds and trim to 1.02" and load them with 296 to see if case length is the problem. I wish I had a way to measure brass hardness, as it occurred to me that too soft brass might be the problem as well.
Per their request, I'm not going to polish the chamber.
I hope it works, as I really like this pistol.

[meister mash]

I have loaded 1500 22 TCM using factory components.
The oal on my loads varied as well. Couldn't explain it.
However I don't have any issues with them. I have only shot factory loads for chrony testing.
I can tell you that oal and your crimp will play a major roll in this round.
Factory loads are towards the max oal that my pistol would allow. They function but if I where to go any larger thy didn't.
I am using a Dillon 550 with hornady dies with a ch seat/crimp die (crimp only)
Hatch look for small differences in the bullet nose shape. I get seating depth differences in the speer 40 gr hp that I am loading because the o,iwishicouldspellit,gleeve is a bit different on each of them.
Keep us in the loop tommaq. I have a suspicion about the brass hardness myself. A too hard a case could allow chamber crud to accumulate and get sticky. My theory not saying I'm right.

[Love Life]

Overall length varies due to the ogive.

[HATCH]

I had two problems initially.

One is the factory bullets were crushing the case sometimes or required excessive force that the bullets would expand slightly.

The second was that the lead inside the jackets is pure ultra soft lead. Doesn't take much to force to mangle them.

I fixed the first problem by having a custom powder die made.
It is pistol style so it expands the brass a little so the bullet sits easier.

I think the oal problem is that the soft point gets squashed some

[tommag]

I bought a box of ammo with a different lot #. I tried it today with much better results. Velocity was a bit funny, with a low of 1846 (only one), and a high of 2346(again, only one) Most were between 2060-2080. Chronograph was 8' from the muzzle.
Maybe I didn't clean it well enough initially. It functioned fine with the lot I initially bought, two fte out of 100.
I have the brass in the cleaner now, but probably won't be able to trim and reload for a couple weeks.