1911 failure to eject with one round in magazine

[loopy700]

I'm having a recurring failure to eject problem in my kimber eclipse custom II. I've searched online, but my malfunction seems to be just a little different from the usual FTE in that it always happens when there is one round left in the magazine.

The spent casing will get stuck between the barrel hood and breech face (see picture). The starnge thing is this malfunction ALWAYS happens when there is one round remaining in the magazine...never in any other situation. It looks like the spent case has actually slid up the breech face to a position where the ejector barely contacts it.

- This malfunction just recently started happeneing, now I get it every 15 rounds or so

- Pistol is about 5000 rounds old

- Magazines are Wilson Combat. Springs and followers are new, but it happened with the old springs too. I have 6 magazines and it happens with all of them.

- Recoil spring is a new Wolff 16#; I've also tried it with a wilson combat 17#

- Extractor tension seems to be fine...a loaded round is held firmly in place against the breech face and resists shaking

- I've had this happens with several different types of ammo including winchester factory hardball, but it does seem to be more frequent with my 200 gr SWC reloads (although it never happened with the first 4000 rounds through the pistol) any help would be appreciated

 

[WardenWolf]

Different 1911's like different magazines. Those magazines may not quite seat deeply enough to facilitate ejection. I'd try a Colt magazine:

http://www.cheaperthandirt.com/13482-36.html

What type of ammunition are you using? That can make a BIG difference.

 

[1911Tuner]

Extractor droppung the case before it can hit the ejector. May be due to clocking...rotating. May be simply due to lack of tension.

 

[loopy700]

I think the extractor may be clocking. Should the extractor be able to clock at all, or should it be held rigidly in place?

I've checked this by hand cycling dummy rounds; everytime a dummy round extracts and ejects correctly the extractor is in a straight up and down position, but if this malfunction ocurrs, the extractor has rotated a small amount.

Interestingly enough, I never had problems with extraction and ejection with hand cycling dummy rounds before...now all of a sudden it happens maybe 50% of the time. Something must have changed.

It seems strange this would just suddenly start after several thousand rounds. There doesn't seem to be any wear at all on the extractor and only a slight amount of finish wear on the firing pin stop.

 

[1911Tuner]

Bend it a little to increase the tension and see if that helps. A little goes a long way.

 

[loopy700]

If I try to fit a new firing pin stop/extractor, should they be fit such that the extractor WILL NOT clock at all, or should it be allowed to move some?

 

[Walkalong]

http://egw-guns.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=36

After reading posts about these for years I finally decided to try one. I did it for recoil, but it also holds the extractor still and may help. You might kill two birds with one stone. It makes manually working the slide a bit tougher. (harder to start), but recoil is better. Recoil seems a bit less, and it seems to stay on target a little bit better.

 

[1911Tuner]

Ideally...for the most consistent ejection...the extractor should be dead square and it shouldn't rotate at all. Sometimes, that's a little tedious to achieve, but limiting it as much as you reasonably can without spending hours in fitting a stop will do.