Erma La/Ep .22 mags

[ithacaartist]

Gentlemen:

This started out as a PM to GT; you will soon see why. However, since someone else on the forum may have suggestions for me, here it is.

Here's the story for today:

Despite (well, maybe because of) all the warnings about the Erma .22 Luger-wannabes, I bought a couple recently at 2 auctions. About $200 each. To tell the truth, I've had a lot of fun trying to persuade them to function properly...not to mention significant success! I've done plenty of research about what to do to coax these guns to work acceptably. I've found that the Ermas are ammunition sensitive and magazine sensitive. I was getting failure to feed, failure to fire, failure to extract, failure to eject; I even got one to slam fire as it nestled into battery.

First, I cleaned the guns thoroughly and discovered that they worked a little better if the loaded mags were drenched in lube--an interesting discovery, but doing it this way is messy.

Next, I went to work on the ammo. Reasoning that many of the failures were potentially due to lack of energy/momentum in cycling the action, I ran some of what I had on hand to see the results. I tried Federal--I had a partial bulk box of 500 handy; no great luck there. Then a couple varieties of Winchester; again, no particular improvement. Some Eley solids? Nope. Blazer solids? Unh-uh. Research led to conflicting claims about whether solids or hollow points did better, but I uncovered consensus about copper plated rounds' performing better; this info seems to have helped.

Anyway, the CCI copper-plated minimags do the best for me. Figuring that more energy imparted to the recoil might do the trick, I went for higher fps and bullet weight. The Minimags did pretty well, followed closely by their hollow point brothers. I did go higher with fps, in CCI's Velocitor, and finally CCI Stingers. (While shooting a mag of Stingers, a front toggle broke into 3 pieces. Bob's had a replacement for $35, so it's all fixed and working again; but I've backed off from the Velocitors and Stingers.)

Three mags came with the 2 pistols, all three factory 10-round originals. Each of the three displays progressive areas of wear in finish. The newest looking one works the best, with 9-10 out of 10 cycling and firing properly. The most used looking one is the worst, with mis-feeding just about every round, or 2-4 cycling ok. The mid-range wear third one performs better than the worst, not as well as the best.

By examining what was happening during cycling, I was able to check differences in performance of the mags. The best-working one was definitely less used than the others, and I think what makes it function better is a combination of things: 1)mag lips 2)spring strength/range 3)smoothness of function.

I used a needle file to smooth the mag's working edges and the top of the follower. Then I tweeked the lips so that the round is guided more precisely by the front ones--now the front part of the round passes thru them with minimal side play, and the round's flange rides up the front lips, as it appears it should. Undersides of the rear lips smoothed, no issues with round sitting too high or low.

Function of all three improved somewhat, but one still works better than the rest. This, I figured, is my goal--to make the rest behave like the best. So I've obtained several other mags at this point.

One is Erma NOS, its lips are cut and formed just like the first ones; however it is an 8-shot mag.
One is from Bob's, plastic follower, lips cut a little differently, spot welded construction, again 8-shot.
Two are NOS Triple K brand, 8-shot, plastic follower. Lips way different, very front, top edge a bit lower than originals; this allows contact of the bullet nose with the lower edge of the chamber. In this case, the spot welded seam doubles the material in the area I'd like to adjust, making tweeking difficult.

Theoretically the three originals' springs would be the same. All three other configurations' springs are slightly different in weight, strength, and/or range.

I'm trying to achieve at least two mags from this herd that function well in either gun. I think if I can sort out all the differences and define a combo of what works, I may very well be able to make this happen.

I've polished the feed ramps a little, and smoothed the sharp edges of the top and bottom of the rear end of the chamber where the HP's in particular tend to catch and either dig right in or shave a small crescent of lead from the side of the bullet's tip; this helped a little.

I've tweeked the lips of all of them to feed straight and close; this helped a little.

I'm contemplating putting the guts from one of the lesser functioning originals into the newest factory shell. This would combine a spring and follower setup with a set of feed lips that is not already bent out of shape.

In the realm of spring replacement/rehabilitation, is where my question comes. What is the technique for testing a spring's strength and range? What might be a source for replacement .22 mag springs of various specs?


I have not ordered an available spring kit for the action and firing pin, but think that this would not be necessary because that one mag works so well. The deficiencies lie for the most part with the remaining mags.

Thanks!

David Parker