I've had this Prairie Tactical Arms upper for about 18 months ... until about May 2017 ... no issues ... I have about 600rds thru this upper now .. 400rds has been Hornady 123 AMAX 100rds Hornady 123 ELD ... 80 rds has been 123 SST and 20rds Federal Premium 130 Berger. The stove pipes have happened only on the 123 AMAX and ELD (so far. Saturday, I cleaned the chamber and BCG and fired 35rds ... I use e-lander 17rd mags. I had 1 mag with 15rds and two mags with 10rds each. No issues. I did RTB and cleaned chamber and bolt again (also run 1 wet and 5 dry boresnakes thru the bore).
Next day, 1 mag of 15 rds and 1 mag of 10yds ... 10 rd mag first had three stove pipes. This was with 123 AMAX.
Came back cleaned again and tried 10rd mag of ELD ... got stove pipe on 2nd round.
Called Dustin at PTA .. after a 30m discussion his theory is hornady soft brass, wants me to try ammo with different brass. I've had 100rds of Federal 130 berger on back order for a month ... website says "over due" ...
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So in my experience it could be
01 - Dirty chamber
02 - issue with extractor
03 - issue with ejector
04 - ammo
05 - buffer assembly
06 - gas port tuning
So need to rule these out ..
About a month ago I disassembled the bolt .. there was a little build up in the extractor, but no brass flakes. Also removed the ejector and replaced the spring and the roll pin. The roll pin looked a little mangled, but there were no brass flakes or any other foreign material in the ejector port.
My cleaning regime is:
Nylon chamber brush on 2 sections of cleaning rod in drill ... with CLP run it for 20 seconds in the chamber ... the swab out with patches. Then repeat.
field strip BCG and clean with CLP, I also use brushes and dental pics and pipe cleaners ...
pretty much how I was shown to do it in the army except the drill and the nylon brushes ... we didn't have that sort of stuff for cleaning rifles in my day.
Then 1 wet CLP boresnake and 5 dry.
I also clean the lower and the suppressor threads and the exterior ... but not every time ... after each shoot I clean the bore and BCG of stoners ...
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I also tried a different lower when I fired the ELD Sunday.
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Dustin didn't think it could be the gas port tuning. When I bought it, I told him to remove the muzzle break and wrap it in electrical tape as I would be using direct threat suppressors. He did that and said removing the MB would cover the cost of adding an adjustable gas port and he would tune it for suppressor. I reminded him of that when we talked.
I also mentioned the value screw looked pretty far out to me.
He said he leaves them wide open.
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So in the vein of trying to rule out anything and everything, tonight I removed the forearm and then the value screw (1/16 SAE) and sprayed a little brake cleaner in there and blew it out with compressed air. Letting it dry some ... then will put the value screw back in ... and tighten it all the way. That should shut off the gas (I think). Then the gun should fire, but not cycle. Then I will back it off until it cycles. That's what I'm reading other folks do to tune the gas port, so I will try that next.
==
Other thoughts or ideas welcome!
And I notice this sub forum as a few other people having similar issues ... oh my !!! I will say I am not bothered by the issue, I enjoy solving gun issues and reading about stove pipes, I am realizing that for stoners this is one of the "exciting" issues to solve! Three years ago my Sig 762 was having stove pipes ... I took out the ejector and there were brass flakes in there and the forum I was on then said "You found your problem" ... but a few weeks later, I learned that was just the symptom. The real issue was insufficient frequency of cleaning the chamber. That's why I'm crazy about cleaning stoner chambers now. But that doesn't seem to be helping in the current case.
Next day, 1 mag of 15 rds and 1 mag of 10yds ... 10 rd mag first had three stove pipes. This was with 123 AMAX.
Came back cleaned again and tried 10rd mag of ELD ... got stove pipe on 2nd round.
Called Dustin at PTA .. after a 30m discussion his theory is hornady soft brass, wants me to try ammo with different brass. I've had 100rds of Federal 130 berger on back order for a month ... website says "over due" ...
==
So in my experience it could be
01 - Dirty chamber
02 - issue with extractor
03 - issue with ejector
04 - ammo
05 - buffer assembly
06 - gas port tuning
So need to rule these out ..
About a month ago I disassembled the bolt .. there was a little build up in the extractor, but no brass flakes. Also removed the ejector and replaced the spring and the roll pin. The roll pin looked a little mangled, but there were no brass flakes or any other foreign material in the ejector port.
My cleaning regime is:
Nylon chamber brush on 2 sections of cleaning rod in drill ... with CLP run it for 20 seconds in the chamber ... the swab out with patches. Then repeat.
field strip BCG and clean with CLP, I also use brushes and dental pics and pipe cleaners ...
pretty much how I was shown to do it in the army except the drill and the nylon brushes ... we didn't have that sort of stuff for cleaning rifles in my day.
Then 1 wet CLP boresnake and 5 dry.
I also clean the lower and the suppressor threads and the exterior ... but not every time ... after each shoot I clean the bore and BCG of stoners ...
==
I also tried a different lower when I fired the ELD Sunday.
==
Dustin didn't think it could be the gas port tuning. When I bought it, I told him to remove the muzzle break and wrap it in electrical tape as I would be using direct threat suppressors. He did that and said removing the MB would cover the cost of adding an adjustable gas port and he would tune it for suppressor. I reminded him of that when we talked.
I also mentioned the value screw looked pretty far out to me.
He said he leaves them wide open.
==
So in the vein of trying to rule out anything and everything, tonight I removed the forearm and then the value screw (1/16 SAE) and sprayed a little brake cleaner in there and blew it out with compressed air. Letting it dry some ... then will put the value screw back in ... and tighten it all the way. That should shut off the gas (I think). Then the gun should fire, but not cycle. Then I will back it off until it cycles. That's what I'm reading other folks do to tune the gas port, so I will try that next.
==
Other thoughts or ideas welcome!
And I notice this sub forum as a few other people having similar issues ... oh my !!! I will say I am not bothered by the issue, I enjoy solving gun issues and reading about stove pipes, I am realizing that for stoners this is one of the "exciting" issues to solve! Three years ago my Sig 762 was having stove pipes ... I took out the ejector and there were brass flakes in there and the forum I was on then said "You found your problem" ... but a few weeks later, I learned that was just the symptom. The real issue was insufficient frequency of cleaning the chamber. That's why I'm crazy about cleaning stoner chambers now. But that doesn't seem to be helping in the current case.
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