Ash
Member
Reliability is very simple in concept, less so in application.
The number of parts has NOTHING to do with being reliable. Jennings have few parts and from personal experience, they are not reliable. CZ-75's have many parts, and they are reliable. Glocks are reliable with few parts, 1911's are reliable if in original specs and are reliable. Tokarevs have many parts and are reliable, etc, etc, etc.
What does matter is the geometry of the round exiting the magazine and entering the chamber, then the case being removed from the chamber and ejected from the pistol. There is a perfect relationship between the magazine, feed ramp, and chamber that must be attained to have reliable feeding. This relationship can be flawed by bad magazines, or bad angles between the magazine and chamber, or too much gap, or several other factors. Getting it just right techincally should be a matter of getting the formula right in the first place and then replicating it. The slide must be able to move freely, so into the design comes the need to run in dirt/mud/fouling. This is so that the perfect relationship between magazine and chamber can be maintianed and nothing more (the amount of play often ensures this, but other things can as well).
You then must have the right relationship between the ejector and extractor in order to remove the round and eject it. Proper design of both of these will ensure reliability. Design either one poorly, with poor angles or materials or grasping surfaces, or spring strength and you have failures to extract or eject.
Fundamentally, there are perfect angles for each round and each pistol should idealy be designed around each round only. Much of the time, this is more trial and error than exact science. However, should enough study be employed, there can be established the optimum angle, distance, etc. for each caliber of ammo (and of course, this would have to be a generalization based on different types and weights of ammo).
Achieving the symetry mentioned above is technically not that insurmountable. It can come from measuring the angles of successful designs and using that as guides.
Simplicity of parts has nothing to do with reliability save for where parts breakage comes into play, and this can be eliminated with quality parts. But in most cases, a pistol breaking is not the cause or reliability problems. As I mentioned above, there are very comlex pistols that are reliable and very simple pistols that are reliable, there are very complex pistols that are not reliable, just as there are simple pistols that are not reliable. The 1908 Parabellum is not reliable but complex just as the 1999 Jennings is not reliable but simple.
Ash
The number of parts has NOTHING to do with being reliable. Jennings have few parts and from personal experience, they are not reliable. CZ-75's have many parts, and they are reliable. Glocks are reliable with few parts, 1911's are reliable if in original specs and are reliable. Tokarevs have many parts and are reliable, etc, etc, etc.
What does matter is the geometry of the round exiting the magazine and entering the chamber, then the case being removed from the chamber and ejected from the pistol. There is a perfect relationship between the magazine, feed ramp, and chamber that must be attained to have reliable feeding. This relationship can be flawed by bad magazines, or bad angles between the magazine and chamber, or too much gap, or several other factors. Getting it just right techincally should be a matter of getting the formula right in the first place and then replicating it. The slide must be able to move freely, so into the design comes the need to run in dirt/mud/fouling. This is so that the perfect relationship between magazine and chamber can be maintianed and nothing more (the amount of play often ensures this, but other things can as well).
You then must have the right relationship between the ejector and extractor in order to remove the round and eject it. Proper design of both of these will ensure reliability. Design either one poorly, with poor angles or materials or grasping surfaces, or spring strength and you have failures to extract or eject.
Fundamentally, there are perfect angles for each round and each pistol should idealy be designed around each round only. Much of the time, this is more trial and error than exact science. However, should enough study be employed, there can be established the optimum angle, distance, etc. for each caliber of ammo (and of course, this would have to be a generalization based on different types and weights of ammo).
Achieving the symetry mentioned above is technically not that insurmountable. It can come from measuring the angles of successful designs and using that as guides.
Simplicity of parts has nothing to do with reliability save for where parts breakage comes into play, and this can be eliminated with quality parts. But in most cases, a pistol breaking is not the cause or reliability problems. As I mentioned above, there are very comlex pistols that are reliable and very simple pistols that are reliable, there are very complex pistols that are not reliable, just as there are simple pistols that are not reliable. The 1908 Parabellum is not reliable but complex just as the 1999 Jennings is not reliable but simple.
Ash
