Stoeger Luger magazine => chamber problems
 

Hi - I have two Stoeger Lugers I picked up recently - I've disassembled and cleaned them thoroughly and reassembled them both - after working with Glocks, THAT was an adventure - a trip to the range yesterday brought mixed results - most of the problems I experienced seemed to be either 1) with the rounds (CGI Mini Mag) not going into the chamber completely and the toggle not completing the cycle of bringing the bolt (?) completely forward so it'd be up against the chamber for the firing pin to strike the round, or 2) with the round simply not leaving the magazine or not coming out of the magazine correctly - a feeding issue. In most cases, it looked like the round was mis-aligned with the chamber.

I'm hesitant to try and tweak the magazine feed lips without knowing how the rounds are supposed to look at the top of the magazine just before they are presented to the chamber.

Could someone that has a fairly reliable Stoeger Luger send me a pic of how the rounds look in their magazine?

Or offer any other suggestions about something else I'm possibly overlooking.

Thanks!

the problems you are having are pretty much common to the stoeger lugers, which are lugers in in name only. I think that stoeger just owned the right to use the luger name. I own one and intill a year or so ago had never been fired, that story is on the forum. Mine worked ok ,but like i said was new , but still out of every magazine we fired there was at least one jam. They are finicky to say the least.

Thanks padredan - I know that they have a history of reliability problems - I'd like to see if I can at least get the magazine lips right, as far as presenting the rounds properly before they are pushed into the chamber. Most of the issues I saw yesterday had to do with 1) the round not being stripped out of the magazine at all (not high enough, maybe?), 2) the round getting pushed towards the chamber only partially (half in and half out), or 3) the round getting pushed into the chamber almost all the way but the gun not going into battery all the way - in the last situation (#3), all it usually took was a tap on the top of the toggle for it to complete the cycle.

I think if I can find a driver spring, problem #3 might be solved.

For #1 and #2, I need to see how a magazine that works reliably presents the rounds - if anyone has some pictures (front, side, and looking down into the magazine from the top of the gun with the breech back), I think I can at least give that a try before selling the guns to someone that's a better Stoeger Luger gunsmith than I am.

Pictures anyone ???

Thanks!

Anyone ???

maybe these will help, this is a steel frame stoeger .22, bought in 1983 it has had a total of three magazines fired trough it. So i would say the magazine is pretty much new even for a 29 year old gun, perhaps this will help you. good Luck ,:thumbup: Padre Dan

Stoeger made a pretty good copy with the steel frame pistols, too bad they had so many feeding and jamming issues, they never got them to work without problems.

EXCEPTIONAL !! Thans for taking the time to post the pics.

SInce you're such a nice guy, may I ask for a couple of pics, similar to those you posted, but with rounds in the magazine, so I can see how the rounds are presented to the chamber?

Thanks VERY much !

rather sure i can do that for you. What part of the republic of texas are you from?

this pistol tends to like cci stingers, but it hasn't been fired with anything else. good luck.:thumbup:

There you go Joe

Originally from New York City (right where they make Pace Picante Sauce), but I've been here in gun heaven for 26 years.

Thanks for the help, my friend - when ya have time is fine - I won't be shooting them for a week or two at least . . .

Thanks - interesting pics - those rounds look to be a lot lower in the magazine than mine are - the feed lips on mine must be spread out too much . . .

Your welcome, 26 years , you made the right move, you maybe use to the heat by now/lol. your dang near a texan, but not a texican. Good luck with your stoeger .22 , best thing to do is replace the magazines.

Cost of living here is good, it's a good central location for business travel, and my grandkids are all close - plus, I can have machineguns !!!

One final request on the magazine pics - can ya take the magazine out of the gun, and send me a picture with some rounds in the magazine, from the side, so I can see how the round looks coming up from the mag?

Thanks - sorry to keep bugging ya.

Joe

Joe, Good luck finding a NEW original Stoeger .22 mag. Most all .22s have some feeding problems unless the mags are perfect. Also many have deformed chamber areas, due to dry firing, which can be corrected by a light chamber ream. TH

As mr heller has said and i fully concur ,you need to replace your magazine and the stoeger ones are scarce, but new ones are out there, like anything else you just have to find them and pay a good price for them. Are your stoegers steel framed or alloy?

here are the pictures of the loaded magazine you requested, i would say this magazine is as close to new as any can be, you may like to read this thread on the stoeger luger i took the pictures of.http://forum.lugerforum.com/showthread.php?t=27742 good luck

http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/Vie...Item=284647983 like i said there are some still out there

Thanks, all, for the assistance - the positioning of the rounds in my magazines look very different - so, I think a good first step (LOL, maybe the last step before I just give up and sell the guns) would be to get a new Stoeger Luger magazine and try it in each of the Stoegers I have - if that solves the problem, I'll buy another mag - if not, I'll probably just sell the guns.

I believe that my two Stoegers are alloy frames - the SNs are 4315x and 4417x - for both guns, the barrel measures 5" from the end of the barrel to where the barrel goes into the frame. No markings on either of the mags, but they are definately different - one has a black (smooth) button at the bottom with a white follower and a single place for the pull down button to go into the side of the follower. The other magazine has a silver (aluminum?) button on the bottom, a black follower, and two pisitions where the pull down button can go into the side of the follower.

The presentation of a round is VERY different for each magazine.

SO it looks like a new magazine is the best place to start.

Thanks again - LOL, I am sure that I'll have more questions.

Thanks for the reference to the GB auction - FWIW, my mags look a lot different - I can't even see the spring inside my mags!

not sure if there was any difference between the alloy and the steel frame stoegers, but i do remember that those that owned the alloy framed ones had more problems ,alot more problems, like i said the one in the pictures was really only test fired if your read the story about it.

not sure where you are in texas, i do return home to harris county and the houston/ tomball area from time to time, if you are fairly close we might could meet and i could bring my mag and you could try it, but best you find yourself a new magazine.

I'm near Dallas, and thanks for the offer, but I agree with you that I just need to get a magazine and see how it goes - like I said, if the new magazine does the trick and the gun works at least somewhat reliably, I'll get another magazine and I'm a happy guy - if not, guess who has two Stoeger Lugers for sale? THIS GUY !!!

I would try this ammo. Works like a champ for me. http://www.theraspyrabbit.com/produc..._99277_std.jpg

I'll pick up some of those - thanks for the suggestion.

I bought two magazines for my Stoeger Lugers from Bob's Gun Shop - they fit a lot better and they lock up in the magwell nice and tight - they have different, stronger springs than the two mags that came with the guns, so I think that they should work pretty well. I tried some function tests yesterday with the new mags, and the rounds seem to chamber and eject flawlessly - I'm anxious to see how they work when they're fired - have to wait till next weekend at the shooting lease.

Thanks Rick - I wasn't aware of the potential issue with a divot in the chamber - makes sense, and with these being older guns, I'll have to give the chamber a close look - what you've described is exactly what I was seeing with the old magazines, in addition to other problems - with the new mags the rounds appear to chamber correctly - I'll have to see how it goes with live fire this weekend.

One thing with these new mags - they lock in nice and tight - the older mags fit loose and I had constant problems with them falling out - if I made it a point to hold them in securely while I was firing, the gun cycled noticably better - so, I'm thinking that the new mags should give far superior performance when I get the guns out to the range.

Thanks again for the tip on the divit - I'm gonna check for that, too, before I head out to the range.

here are a few more pictures that you requested. If you tried the new mags and a good cleaning and polished the chamber you have done about all you can, lets face it these are not great guns ,maybe why they stopped selling them. good luck. this is a steel framed one and it started to jam right out of the box,

a few more pics

Think these were made to jam, this one did right out of the box. It now rests deep in the back of one of the gun safes, i doubt it will ever be fired again.

STINGERS?! holy mackerel, these things are 40 gr and over 1600 fps...There is a correlation between firing less than a handful of these in three different Ermas with zinc uppers, and the front toggles that have broken--one on each gun. I'd even refrain from using them in any .22 auto pistol, unless directed by the mfgr., for fear of hammering the action against itself. These things definitely were not around when the Stoegers or Ermas were developed. Feed them what they were born to eat--standard velocity--or maybe less, if the springs are a little wussy. Mine have not snapped a toggle since I've stopped using anything perkier than CCI Minimag, and that is my absolute max. at 1230 fps.

Well guys, thanks for all the advice and the pictrures - much appreciated. After observing how the guns jammed with the original OEM magazines that I got with the guns when I purchased them, it looked like the mags weren't feeding correctly, so I picked up two new OEM mags - the guns performed a bit better with the new mags, but still jammed more than I was happy with, so I figured some feed lip adjustments would solve the problems - I learned pretty quickly that I don't have any capabilities when it comes to adjusting magazine feed lips. So, as of now, one of the mags (one of the new OEMs) works fairly well, and the other one is pretty much ruined and the two other original mags that came with the gun ar at a local gunsmith to see if he can work any magic with them.

I will probably sell the guns, or at least one of them - I just didn't wanna sell them like they were - kinda like staging a house so ya can get a few more bucks for it.

Keep ya'll posted . . .

Update - bottom line is that with the new (OEM) magazines, the guns perform pretty much the same as they used to - not the improvement and greater reliability that I had hoped for. I will probably keep one of the guns only because it's interesting to me - I'm really more interested in shooting than a project-that-never-ends gun.

Any suggestions on what'd be a fair asking price? Thanks for all of the help previously as I was learning about these guns.