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PhilOhio · 07-03-2009, 11:22 AM

W2ec,

You are approaching this trouble shooting in a good, orderly way. My bet is that the lighter Wolff mainspring will solve your problems.

When you have a pistol for which such springs are not available, you can modify or make them from scratch. In the case of your Luger, you could remove the original spring (tricky) and put it away, buy a replacement, clip one coil, and see how that works. If necessary, remove a bit more until it works reliably with a cross section of modern ammo, or your favorite load. That's assuming recoil energy was the issue, and in this case I think it is.

I've been through this a few times, and have just done it once more, finishing yesterday. I have a mint post-war commercial Mauser HSc, an Interarms import. They are excellent and beautifully crafted pistols, but have an Internet reputation as "jam-o-matics". Why? Mauser made a few compromises on totally wrong recoil springs and didn't get the magazine follower design quite right.

I set my gun up to use both the original .380 ACP barrel and also a Mauser .32 ACP barrel.

I made my own stronger replacement magazine springs, heat treated them, and slightly modified the followers.

I then designed, wound, and heat treated three different recoil springs from two different (lighter) sizes of music wire. What Mauser had done was like putting a ten-ton dump truck spring on a VW Beatle.

After testing, I am now confident that the pistol can be trusted as a carry weapon, which was the point of the exercise...total reliability. ...which is not too common for an HSc, but should be.

The point of saying all this is to encourage some of the newer Luger people out there, to believe that most, if not all, of these functional reliability problems can be overcome. I'm only getting back into it after a lapse of many years. But my observation is that, although they have a reliability reputation somewhat like the HSc, most of that is just because they are so well made and closely fitted, and consequently they are very demanding on ammunition that is uniform, of high quality, and tuned to the dynamics of this stiff, high speed action. In my opinion, getting a fine old Luger to really run right, reliably, is worth a serious and methodical effort.

07-03-2009, 11:22 AM	#10
PhilOhio User Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Ohio Posts: 145 Thanks: 5 Thanked 17 Times in 14 Posts	W2ec, You are approaching this trouble shooting in a good, orderly way. My bet is that the lighter Wolff mainspring will solve your problems. When you have a pistol for which such springs are not available, you can modify or make them from scratch. In the case of your Luger, you could remove the original spring (tricky) and put it away, buy a replacement, clip one coil, and see how that works. If necessary, remove a bit more until it works reliably with a cross section of modern ammo, or your favorite load. That's assuming recoil energy was the issue, and in this case I think it is. I've been through this a few times, and have just done it once more, finishing yesterday. I have a mint post-war commercial Mauser HSc, an Interarms import. They are excellent and beautifully crafted pistols, but have an Internet reputation as "jam-o-matics". Why? Mauser made a few compromises on totally wrong recoil springs and didn't get the magazine follower design quite right. I set my gun up to use both the original .380 ACP barrel and also a Mauser .32 ACP barrel. I made my own stronger replacement magazine springs, heat treated them, and slightly modified the followers. I then designed, wound, and heat treated three different recoil springs from two different (lighter) sizes of music wire. What Mauser had done was like putting a ten-ton dump truck spring on a VW Beatle. After testing, I am now confident that the pistol can be trusted as a carry weapon, which was the point of the exercise...total reliability. ...which is not too common for an HSc, but should be. The point of saying all this is to encourage some of the newer Luger people out there, to believe that most, if not all, of these functional reliability problems can be overcome. I'm only getting back into it after a lapse of many years. But my observation is that, although they have a reliability reputation somewhat like the HSc, most of that is just because they are so well made and closely fitted, and consequently they are very demanding on ammunition that is uniform, of high quality, and tuned to the dynamics of this stiff, high speed action. In my opinion, getting a fine old Luger to really run right, reliably, is worth a serious and methodical effort.