18.9 FTE- please help!

[e'ville]

I have the 9 mm in the limited edition. It's a beautiful gun after an extensive overhaul from Cylinder and Slide (over $1000 in work to tune, polish, and provide two hi caps in .38 super). I just bought it with a try-out period. There were two FTEs out of 150 rounds. C&S put in a new extractor and tuned and test fired it. Is there something wrong with the whole 18.9 series or should I stick with it and have C&S fix it. I have a few days to decide. Thanks.

[gnsmith]

e'ville,

Stick with it! They are easy to get to run. Is it in 9mm or 38Super? There should be no problem getting going in 9mm. Make them do it, and do it right. There is nothing wrong with the 18.9 pistols. There a lot of fun!
What ammo were you using?
Does the pistol still have a 12lb. recoil spring?
Were the mags part of the problem?

Good Luck,

G

[e'ville]

They are stock springs. It's a 9 mm.

I will keep track of the mags to see if they contribute. The case is about half way out of the chamber and the new round is lodged under the case on the feeding ramp. Therefore I think it's the extractor. Am I wrong?

I'm going to try some PMC ammo tomorrow. Today I used Wolf. I'm reluctant to mention Wolf ammo because many go beserk about that. For a perspective, I've run thousands of these rounds through my S&W 952, Colt Elite IX, and Glocks without a single problem. Yet the Para had two FTEs out of 150 rounds. I will thoroughly clean the chamber and extractor to make sure no laquer is present and shoot a bunch of American factory ammo through it.

Thanks for any help.

[stans]

Wolf ammo? Hmmm... Could be the ammo.

[bountyhunter]

Originally posted by e'ville
Is there something wrong with the whole 18.9 series or should I stick with it and have C&S fix it. I have a few days to decide. Thanks.

Considering the many thousands in LE and MIL service worldwide, I doubt that there is anything wrong with the basic design. Their extractors don't seem to hold tension well, but that's an easy fix.

[bountyhunter]

Originally posted by e'ville
Today I used Wolf. I'm reluctant to mention Wolf ammo because many go beserk about that. ....Yet the Para had two FTEs out of 150 rounds. I will thoroughly clean the chamber and extractor to make sure no laquer is present and shoot a bunch of American factory ammo through it.

Thanks for any help.

You just found the problem. Wolf ammo extracts "tight" for two reasons:

1) The lacquer gets hot and acts like adhesive on the throat walls.

2) The steel case is less elastic than brass, so when it expands from discharge, it retains more pressure on the throat after it contracts (less range of elasticity).

Wolf ammo will shoot in some guns with loose bores. Your Para is obviously not one of them.

[AZ Husker]

There's an old saying...You've got a good gun if Wolff won't feed!

[e'ville]

I shot another 120 rounds of American hardball through it after thoroughly cleaning it. There was one FTE, four failures to eject the last round, some of the brass flew straight to my nose, and the slide locked back with a half full mag once. I'm returning the gun. It was on a three day inspection. I was trading a CQB Spec Ops for it, a gun that has never had a single problem.

[bulm5]

Originally posted by e'ville
They are stock springs. It's a 9 mm.

I will keep track of the mags to see if they contribute. The case is about half way out of the chamber and the new round is lodged under the case on the feeding ramp. Therefore I think it's the extractor. Am I wrong?

I'm going to try some PMC ammo tomorrow. Today I used Wolf. I'm reluctant to mention Wolf ammo because many go beserk about that. For a perspective, I've run thousands of these rounds through my S&W 952, Colt Elite IX, and Glocks without a single problem. Yet the Para had two FTEs out of 150 rounds. I will thoroughly clean the chamber and extractor to make sure no laquer is present and shoot a bunch of American factory ammo through it.

Thanks for any help.

No wonder you are havng problems with FTEs, problem with wolf ammo is, the laquer coating can coat your chamber causing FTEs.

[e'ville]

It has nothing to do with Wolf ammo. It did the same thing before it was sent to C&S because of reliability problems. They replaced and polished almost all the internals. They tuned the original extractor. It was returned to C&S for FTE. They put in a new extractor. Up till then it never had a Wolf round through it. I also scrubbed the chamber and extractor after using Wolf. It was still malfunctioning after 120 rounds of American ammo.

[bountyhunter]

Originally posted by e'ville
It has nothing to do with Wolf ammo. It did the same thing before it was sent to C&S because of reliability problems. They replaced and polished almost all the internals. They tuned the original extractor. It was returned to C&S for FTE. They put in a new extractor. Up till then it never had a Wolf round through it. I also scrubbed the chamber and extractor after using Wolf. It was still malfunctioning after 120 rounds of American ammo.

Hence the reason not to buy returned guns with low mileage: you could be buying the lemon somebody else already found and returned.

[e'ville]

I got my Spec Ops back today and returned the 18.9. The guy I dealt with is a pistolsmith part time and spent a week at C&S building a 1911 about 10 years ago. He believes the chamber is too tight. He said it will be cheaper for him to repair this himself than to ship it to C&S.

He's a fair guy. He showed me the receipts for the work done at C&S on the 18.9 (over $1000) and said he has only put two mags of ammo through it since he got it back. I know he'll get the gun running eventually.

I have two Paras. One I've used extensively. But I got a bad taste from the 18.9.

[spd522]

I had problems with my 18.9 too with extractor problems. The factory extractor wasn't adjusted right from the factory. I replaced it with a Wilson and had lots of problems with it holding tension. I now have an Ed Brown in it and haven't had any problems since.

Are you using 9mm mags or 38 super mags? They are a bit different in the length of the mag feed lips with the 9mm being longer. I can use my 9mm mags in my 38 super Para but not the super mags in the 9mm. I could load the rounds a bit longer to compensate but I have found the longer bullets do not feed reliably in my 9mm Para with the factory barrel.

[e'ville]

I gave the gun back. The trouble occurred with both types of mags. Thanks.

[e'ville]

I just heard that the chamber was too tight and has been carefully reamed out. We will see if that fixes it.

[spd522]

I have wondered about the chambers in the factory barrel. They seem a little tighter and possibly slightly shorter chambered also.

I got some Greek 124 gr ammo that was loaded a bit longer than what I usually load or have seen and it wouldn't feed right in my Para. It gagged a few times in my Glock 17 too. But it ran fine in my Hi-Power, Sig, and Colt AR15.

Mine shoots accurate enough so I can't justify the expense of a different barrel at the moment. But that really hasn't stopped me from spending money on gun stuff in the past.