Robust Luger action? High ejection?
 

Premise. White box Winchester 115 grain ammo. I believe common , powerful enough and safe to use on a Luger.

Shot a few times , very nice , impeccable action, ejection. Could not find all the shells??? WTH!?

I shot again and looked up following the ejected cases...Jesus they flew like 25 or more feet in the air, and apparently some rained down on my roof, stuck in the gutter.

Is it normal Luger operation? Safe for the parts or it indicates too powerful ammo?


I wonder, if I shot my 1911 or Glock ! Or even AR 15 sideways so they would eject upwards, would the shells fly as high??

Nope, not even close, 1911 ejected not more than 2-3 feet in the air.

Physics suggests that the faster the slide or toggle moves backwards, the more aggressively it would kick out shells.

Literature suggests that the rearward slide speed should be not more than 12f/s to be safe for a shooter and a gun.

Literature suggests Luger’s action is very fast( thus needing a stiff magazine spring to keep up)

But how fast is fast... and safe? Do the Luger tail slap marks reflect too aggressive action?

NO, that is not normal... not even close to normal. While the ejection pattern of individual Lugers may vary somewhat, the case should end up 6 or 8 feet away in most instances.

I suspect that your recoil spring is much too light. It's possible that a previous owner clipped coils from it.

Wolff Gunsprings sell Luger recoil springs in several weights from reduced power to extra-power. They even have a pack with multiple weights. They're good people to deal with.

https://www.gunsprings.com/LUGER/cID1/mID38/dID162

Well, it,s a brand new Interamrs Mauser Luger on my avatar. Everything seems new and factory stock, bought from Simpsons.

When one cocks this gun, the spring seems very stiff, and it snaps the bolt shut after each shot( I saw somewhere a mention of not complete closing of the toggle with the weak main spring conflicting with the firing pin spring.)

But I will hold off any shooting, get more info ( hopefully somebody else will chime in ) and might consider a trial of the more poverful springs / kits you have suggested.

Although the removal and installation of the main spring seems like a handful.

TY

all mine always go more then 15' with various factory ammo of various bullet weights - none at all land at 6 or 8' ever - none have weak or trimmed springs -

My 1920 DWM ejects quite similar to yours. It is caliber 30 luger. The brass will land about 20 feet behind and to the right MOST of the time. On occasion when standing outside the covered roof the brass will land up there and fall into the gutters. 30 brass being expensive I have borrowed a ladder to get the gutter brass. I still loose some in the river rock shooting apron tho.

When I shot at the local indoor range, most cases would end up on the little ceiling of the stand.

To my amusement I had several range officers tell me my gun 'did not eject cases'. Lol..

The little extractor spring has a huge influence. I had one P08 with a very weak extractor spring and the cases would land on my head, one even behind my eye glasses. I replaced the spring and after that the pistol would happily deposit the cases on the ceiling.

Most times when I go to the range, my Lugers (a refinished Erfurt LP.08 and a GT worked 1937 Mauser with mismatched toggle train) have their ejected cases hit the ceiling with authority. I do not currently reload so I have not checked their ejection distance when shooting outside.

My 9mm Interarms Luger has a very "robust" ejection cycle. A bit more than a couple of my original Lugers.

Yes, come to think the extractor spring tension was described in other weapons as an important factor as well, but it seems the speed of impact of the carriage hanging on the bolt against the ejector perhaps makes the Luger more vigorous in the ejection.

I,m still planning to see the ejection on my Glock and AR 15 shot sideways... it doubt they would come even close

By placing tape on the rear of the pistol where the toggle motion is stopped by the frame, you can get a rough idea of the impact strength and make an inference as to recoil spring strength.

http://forum.lugerforum.com/showthre...highlight=tape

Nice to know. Gives some comfort .
Somebody mentioned that the ejector “ fin” on the later Lugers is bigger than earlier- perhaps better positioning, almost at ideal 180 degree opposite to extractor thus kicking the shell straight up without any interference or bouncing.
Perhaps that makes feeding also cleaner.
Btw, AR 15 sideways ejected the shells only a couple feet up in the air , when the rifle is held sideways.

I wonder if besides the Luger is there any other gun with such an aggressive ejection?

I'm not sure if it would apply to a post war Mauser Luger, but the FAQ PDF document has a copy of the table of spring weights used in Lugers.

Do check out the rear impact on the frame with tape. If your ejection is happening because of weakened recoil, you could end up battering things.

The Luger is a finely balanced firearm. The geometry of the post war Lugers is slightly adjusted from original WW-I and WW-II era pistols. It's possible that Mauser worked to improve performance with more modern SAAMI / CIIP loads. Gerben or Mauro might have documentation?

I shoot my 1937 Mauser Luger shooter outdoors, so don't really know how high they fly - but it's at least ten to 12 feet straight up. "It's raining brass" is one of the experiences...

IIRC, the unbridled rate of fire for a Luger is around 27 rounds per second. Would this would be important in calculating the action's rate of travel?

27 /sec = 1620/min, correct??? My god.

I was watching a full auto Luger by Werle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iXv_w_XD7Q

He seems to be able to release no less than 3-4 bullets in full auto with one trigger pull. It is a fast rate of fire.

But i think any full auto hand guns I saw on youtube [ GLOCK, 1911, TREJO] seem to have a very similar rate of fire which tells me that the Luger's action can't not much faster than the rest.



I'm deducing that for safe action the weight of slides/ toggle and main springs + distance and speed of their travel for a single round have to be very similar. Pistols must have much higher rate of fire than long guns in full auto.

I believe the max rate of fire i saw on even open bolt guns was in the range of 1800.[mg45]

Mark Serbu made an incomplete[ no trigger] .22 machine gun that shoots 2000/min( simple open bolt, blow back design]

Just thinking out loud.

Vlim,

I have experienced a weak extractor spring causing a Luger to jam from improper case extraction, but never causing one to through cases shorter distances.

Interesting observation Vlim!

Respectfully,


Sieger

Hi,

Interarms Mauser Parabellums should very easily handle Winchester White Box ammo without hurting your pistol. However, jamming and accuracy may be other issues you may experience.

Respectfully,


Sieger

I completely agree with Vlim. And I have had the exact same results with my lugers.

Matt:cool: