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MIII Hunter light primer hits. Why?

2K views 15 replies 9 participants last post by  Robhic 
#1 ·
I took my teenage son and his friend shooting today. Friend's first time ever shooting.

Wanted to start him on a .22, so I brought out my Mark III Hunter. I purchased the Hunter used last year and it's been flawless with 400 rounds of mine so far (and I doubt that many from the previous owner).

During his strings, he got almost 1 failure to fire round per mag. I would clear the pistol each time, and it was a round that had a primer strike, so I presume it was a light hit.

I was using 4 mags and two kinds of ammo, and he had light hit failures on both kinds of ammo.

I had none when I shot, nor did my son.

SO.....what the heck? Yes he had a couple stovepipes due to classic limpwristing it. That makes sense. But why did he have light primer hits and none of us did, using different mags and ammo.
 
#4 ·
Weak wrist hold

It will happen with a weak hold. I shoot with a group where we have five youngsters 13 and under two are my grandsons that have been shooting Marks for at least 6 years, they are fine, but the other three kids each had trouble finishing some mags at first. After about 2500 rounds and some instruction they had no problems. I had a couple Mark IIs, 3 Mark III, Mark IV and a Victory out that day and using mostly CCI SV. All have some modification and C-More sights, we use them to shoot steel.
 
#5 ·
hooverjc

It will happen with a weak hold. I shoot with a group where we have five youngsters 13 and under two are my grandsons that have been shooting Marks for at least 6 years, they are fine, but the other three kids each had trouble finishing some mags at first. After about 2500 rounds and some instruction they had no problems. I had a couple Mark IIs, 3 Mark III, Mark IV and a Victory out that day and using mostly CCI SV. All have some modification and C-More sights, we use them to shoot steel.
Hooverjc..... ok that's interesting to hear you've seen that too. But i cannot comprehend, knowing what I know about how the pistol functions, how a limp wrist shooter could induce a light primer strike. FTE/stovepipe I get. This i do not. Any clue why?
 
#6 ·
I took my teenage son and his friend shooting today. Friend's first time ever shooting.

Wanted to start him on a .22, so I brought out my Mark III Hunter. I purchased the Hunter used last year and it's been flawless with 400 rounds of mine so far (and I doubt that many from the previous owner).

During his strings, he got almost 1 failure to fire round per mag. I would clear the pistol each time, and it was a round that had a primer strike, so I presume it was a light hit.

I was using 4 mags and two kinds of ammo, and he had light hit failures on both kinds of ammo.

I had none when I shot, nor did my son.

SO.....what the heck? Yes he had a couple stovepipes due to classic limpwristing it. That makes sense. But why did he have light primer hits and none of us did, using different mags and ammo.
Just curious. How did the primer hits all compare? Do they all appear to be the same depth, one hit only? Did you compare fired hits to light primer strikes for hit depth, visually?
 
#7 ·
They were all one-hit and seemed light. I didn't compare the light ones to the good rounds, which would've made sense but Saturday night packed at the range, only had an hr and with a patriot blasting an AR next to me it just wasn't the condusive environment we'd prefer to problem solve. :)

The firing pin etc all looked fine during cleaning, and I'll shoot it this week again and see what's what.

I generally only shoot SV CCI and Aguila out of my pistols when I'm doing my thing, but when I'm the Ammo Guy for kids and newbies to plink from 5-10 yrds, they get the cheaper bulk stuff to shoot. That said, when two kinds of ammo, cheap bulk or not, do the same misfires it makes me wonder. I'll advise this week once I shoot again.
 
#8 ·
I realize that the Majestic Arms items are good, quality items, but I have seen the speed strip kit, if not indexed properly create light strikes. It has a "flat" on it, which needs to be in the same position as the "flat" would be on the factory mainspring housing pin. I am speaking about the "pin" that the allen key would go into in the speed strip kit.

Of course this doesn't explain why one boy got light strikes and others didn't? Maybe the pin is slightly off position, combined with the boy's weak grip?

If you find a certain answer, please tell us. I am curious.

Rich
 
#12 ·
Hello to all, just joined this forum today wanted to add my two cents. I just purchased a mark 3 and took it out for the first time, shot 200 rounds through it. I had 4 ftf with light strikes.I did compare them to cases that did fire and there was a notable difference. I would be curious to know also what others find on this. I did do a cleaning on the gun prior to taking it out. Thanks to all
 
#13 ·
:Welcome: to RFC and the Ruger Mark III forum. Would you post which brand of .22 rimfire ammunition you're having these issues with. Sounds like you did a fine job with cleaning things up.

If your Ruger Mark III is indeed a NEW pistol, my recommendation, that has proven itself time and time again, is to first run several hundred rounds of high velo ammunition through your new pistol. That will get the springs down to their working set and after that's been reached, your pistol will shoot practically all the .22 rimfire that's available. If there was an actual round count, I haven't found it, so keep shooting the high velo stuff until you get consistent performance with the standard velo ammunition.
 
#14 ·
Thank you for your quick reply and your info.I forgot to mention that this is a target model.I was shooting Eley target ammo. I also shot a mag of CCI stingers which I had no problem with and there was a noticeable difference as well.Your advice seems spot on I will run high velocity ammo though it to break it in. Thanks again for your help
 
#15 ·
Note that "High Velocity" means up to about 1250-1300 feet per second. Stingers are considerably more than that and are considered "Hyper-Velocity". Eley Target would be Standard Velocity aka Subsonic at around 1050-1100 fps. Rated velocities are with rifles. Actual velocity with a pistol will be less. Get some Mini-Mags (despite the name, they are regular hig-velocity ammo) or something similar

Stingers will have more oomph but they're not the best thing to use either for break-in or general use - despite the people who will jump in and say they work fine for them. The cases are longer than .22lr and the accuracy is less. At least it is for nearly everybody.
 
#16 ·
"Stingers will have more oomph but they're not the best thing to use either for break-in or general use - despite the people who will jump in and say they work fine for them. The cases are longer than .22lr and the accuracy is less. At least it is for nearly everybody."

Good information and Stingers, If I remember correctly, are frowned upon by RUGER. I believe you can use 'em but just don't overdo it. They ARE a snappy round! :eek:
 
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