Do you polish your feed ramp
 

On both my lugers (DWM and Mauser) the feed ramps are not polished and quite dark looking. The dark is not powder fouling and does not clean off. I was wondering if polishing the feed ramps (I've done this to my other pistols) would maybe help with feeding? I like nice bright feed ramps.
Thanks

If they need it, by all means do it.

Would polishing the feed ramps hurt the collector value in any way?

Only had my 30 Luger for about 4 months and put 1200+ rounds through it, but i can say this:
Cartridges squirt through that pistol like nothing i have ever owned!
If COL is to specs then it is as reliable as i have ever seen (maybe except the H&K G3 i had in the military).

If you want shiny then go for it but i suspect good old George knew what he did and had worked the bugs out of the P08 by the time it hit WWI. But as polishing a 1911 (wich also dont need it to feed ball) DO NOT ALTER ANGLES!!! Just go lightly and less is more.

It you look carefully at how the magazine presents a round to the chamber throat, you will see that the feed ramp is almost an afterthought on the Luger. Polishing it won't necessarily help reliability, but if you like 'em pretty, go ahead.

...And essentially non-existent on the Nambu! :D

Ergo, polish it if you wish! ;)

Would polishing the feed ramps hurt the collector value in any way?

On a shooter or entry-level collector pistol, I'd say no. But on a high-end or rare model, it is best to alter NOTHING.

IMHO.

dju

Reminds me of all those Chuck Norris stories: "When other gun designers make their feed ramps longer, Kijiro Nambu makes it shorter!"

I would never polish a collectible luger's ramp. As for shooters, including any of my "modern" guns in my inventory, i would rarely polish a feed ramp and only if absolutely necessary. Why, you may ask? Well, polishing removes metal and removing metal on the ramp may not be the correct solution to whatever problem. Removing metal tends to be permanent (Unless you have micro welding skills to go along with your Dremel polishing skills.)

I believe the popularity of polishing ramps has to do with its being an easy procedure and because it makes the ramp look much better. Highly polished metal is pretty. However, I have to wonder how much it actually helps. Heck, I know guys that buy a brand new auto loader and the first they do is polish the feed ramp...just because it looks pretty and because of the perceived value when there was no problem to be solved.

Can polishing a ramp resolve a feeding problem? Yes. But, in most cases the problem resides elsewhere.

I am an amateur and this is my opinion.

Much ado about nothing.

Proper polishing removes an un-measurable amount of metal.

Look at the ramps on 10 or 50 different lugers, they are all different- and some would benefit from a little polishing. ;) As always, JMHO.

Maybe so, bot most noobs dont know when to stop and i have seen many a 1911 barrel scrapped because a novise would try to improve what JMB has perfected.

Here is some wisdom i have scrounged somewhere on the interweb:

I thought we were talking about lugers?

If JMB was building all the 1911s, I might agree, but he is not.:evilgrin: The 1911 benefits from polishing if one wants to shoot anything other than ball ammo.

As far as noobs go, someone can screw up anything, and has- sometimes over and over again.:thumbup:

There's a difference between polishing and the ramp adjustment you probably saw on the 1911s. A careful polish removes a minimum of metal (in the 1/1000" range), so it's not detrimental to the function. You can really get in trouble if you change the geometry though, not to mention a ham handed throating of the chamber.

I would never polish a ramp of any collectible, but if you've got a shooter grade to have fun at the range why not?