XCR-L out of battery discharge

It seems odd , three things would have had to have happened. Bolt picked up cartridge, moved forward but didn't close all the way, at the same time the firing pin protruded without pulling the trigger. And with a soft primer to boot. :) I'd like to hear wolverines take on all this. ( mil spec ammo/hard primers).
 
beltfed said:
I very much doubt this has anything to do with primer hardness, and quite frankly I use Winchester primers a lot and this is the first I've heard them described as such.
This primer indentation appears to be a full on primer strike - doesn't look indicitive of anything less than full primer pin protrusion.

I would imagine Robarms would do nothing less than circle the wagons and blame everything and anyone but their design - par for the course.
Click to expand...

I'm not arguing one way or the other. The facts are, Wolverine has issued a statement not to use Winchester white box ammo under any circumstances with the XCR-l in 223 because they have soft primers and have caused a high number of OBDs in the XCRs. RobArms comments seem to back this up as well.


See Post#2 in this thread http://www.canadiangunnutz.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-1092036.html
Grumpy Wolverine said:
The Norinco ammo is fine for break in. Under no circumstances use the Winchester white box in these rifles. It seems to have way to soft a primer and there have been disconcerting amount of out of battery detonations using this ammo.

The best way to break these in is to turn your gas setting down as low as you can and still have the rifle cycle properly, then once you have put a few hundred rounds through it, turn it down more if you possibly can while keeping the cycling in mind.
Click to expand...


Robinsion Arms has now said to me that ONLY milspec ammo should be used in these guns because of this reason.

I'm left handed, my left hand was on the charging handle and my right hand was on the mag when I dropped the bolt, nothing in contact with the trigger. The round went off as it was stripped from the mag and everything blew out the ejection port. This was witnessed on the range by others. I have no reason to make anything up. I'm not being compensated and I am just posting the information given to me by the manufacturer who says this is not uncommon.


Brianma65 said:
It seems odd , three things would have had to have happened. Bolt picked up cartridge, moved forward but didn't close all the way, at the same time the firing pin protruded without pulling the trigger. And with a soft primer to boot. :) I'd like to hear wolverines take on all this. ( mil spec ammo/hard primers).
Click to expand...

The bolt was moving forward under the full force of the recoil spring before it picked up the cartridge, something stopped the cartridge from moving forward before the bolt locked up(dirt, feed ramp, neck burr, who knows) the firing pin didn't stop moving forward due to inertia. It protruded enough to strike the primer. It went bang and everything blew back instead of downrange.
 
Last edited:
Canadian_Zuk said:
I'm not arguing one way or the other. The facts are, Wolverine has issued a statement not to use Winchester white box ammo with the XCR-l in 223 for due to the possibility of slam fires and/or OBD.

Robinsion Arms has now said that ONLY milspec ammo should be used in these guns because of this reason.

I'm left handed, my left hand was on the charging handle and my right hand was on the mag when I dropped the bolt, nothing in contact with the trigger. The round went off as it was stripped from the mag and everything blew out the ejection port. This was witnessed on the range by others. I have no reason to make anything up. I'm not being compensated and I am just posting the information given to me by the manufacturer who says this is not uncommon.




The bolt was moving forward under the full force of the recoil spring before it picked up the cartridge, something stopped the cartridge from moving forward before the bolt locked up(dirt, feed ramp, neck burr, who knows) the firing pin didn't stop moving forward due to inertia. It protruded enough to strike the primer. It went bang and everything blew back instead of downrange.
Click to expand...
I got that , but you were not using white box ammo right? And the only reason you were not covered by warranty is because you were using reloads , correct. I don't think it's that common , this is the first one I've seen in a little over a year. ( I think you just had some chitty luck) Here and XCR forum. By the way was that your 1/8 barrel?
 
Brianma65 said:
I got that , but you were not using white box ammo right? And the only reason you were not covered by warranty is because you were using reloads , correct. I don't think it's that common , this is the first one I've seen in a little over a year. ( I think you just had some chitty luck) Here and XCR forum. By the way was that your 1/8 barrel?
Click to expand...


No, I wasn't using factory ammo. I was using very mild hand loads with Winchester brass and Winchester primers. I switched to Winchester brand primers from CCI years ago to accommodate a Savage bolt gun that had light strike issues. After switching to Winchester that gun never had a light strike again. It's common knowledge that different manufacturers use different thickness and hardness primer cups.

I'm not blaming the primer as the sole cause of my malfunction, but I do believe it played a factor. Statements made by both the distributor and the manufacturer have further convinced me of this.

My opinion is I may had a high seated primer that went unnoticed, I have shot several hundred rounds of this load in this gun. 50 or 60 in the hour leading up to this. It was an OBD, I have no doubt of that.
 
Canadian_Zuk said:
Well, you "can" in Ontario but I wouldn't. I will continue to handload for this rifle, but I will be switching back to CCI primers.
Click to expand...
I know you can't use FMJ here ,but wasn't sure if you could get .556 milspec in any thing other than FMJ. Pretty good, buy a NR black gun, that I can only use at the range ,because of ammo ,LOL... Having said that ,I'm going to use my hand loads also, if it breaks ,it'll be the last one I buy. I think Wolverine better get this sorted out, not everywhere in canada ,can you use FMJ,other than the range. Also if there's no warranty ,if using commercial ammo, then your going to be very limited to what ammo you can buy.
 
Canadian_Zuk said:
I finally spoke with Allen at Rob Arms today. He confirmed it is most likely and OBD caused by firing pin inertia and the use of soft primers. Not at all uncommon unfortunately. He is so confident in fact, that RobArms is making a revision to the owners manual to say that ONLY mil spec ammo (hard primer cup) be used in the XCR platform, no commercial ammo should be used. He didn't elaborate if this applied to all calibers or just the 5.56 chambering.
Click to expand...

I did not say this is common. We have never seen an XCR damaged to this extent. The manual specifically says that only new, factory ammo in good condition should be used. The XCR is based on a Kalashnikov design where the firing pin is part of the bolt. The same is true of Galils, Valmets, etc. During the design of the XCR, ammo and primer manufacturers were consulted and the XCR firing pin spring was designed to stop any slam fires. We did extensive testing and made sure that no slam fire could occur with ammo with the specs these manufacturers gave us. We cannot be responsible for reloading or out of spec ammo. That being said, if one is going to reload, he should absolutely use NATO spec primers because they are hard and more likely to be to spec. Fast forward to 2014. Ammo manufacturers have really been producing like crazy. We have seen accuracy and quality of ammo in general has gone to pot.

This information was given to me by the company manager.
 
This may be a freak accident. But it is getting a little late to blame the ammo. Revising a commercial rifle to nato spec ammo when saami is the comercial standard seems disingenuous.

Is this not as simple as replacing the firing pi spring to something harder to prevent the po from moving under bolt inertia and upping the hammer spring to compensate? Equally couldnt we redesign the firing pin to have less mass...or some combination of all three?


Either that or sue winchester for out of spec ammo.
 
Purplenurple said:
I did not say this is common. We have never seen an XCR damaged to this extent. The manual specifically says that only new, factory ammo in good condition should be used. The XCR is based on a Kalashnikov design where the firing pin is part of the bolt. The same is true of Galils, Valmets, etc. During the design of the XCR, ammo and primer manufacturers were consulted and the XCR firing pin spring was designed to stop any slam fires. We did extensive testing and made sure that no slam fire could occur with ammo with the specs these manufacturers gave us. We cannot be responsible for reloading or out of spec ammo. That being said, if one is going to reload, he should absolutely use NATO spec primers because they are hard and more likely to be to spec. Fast forward to 2014. Ammo manufacturers have really been producing like crazy. We have seen accuracy and quality of ammo in general has gone to pot.

This information was given to me by the company manager.
Click to expand...

I did not say that you did. I said I spoke to you and you confirmed it is most likely and OBD caused by firing pin inertia and the use of soft primers, and you absolutely did tell me that.


The "Not at all uncommon unfortunately" are my words. I said that because my own research on many online forums over the last two weeks has lead me to this conclusion based on the number of other XCR-L that have experienced this issue.
 
Last edited:
So, are they going to be sending all existing owners new manuals to let people know that they should be using only mil-spec ammo and not commercial ammo?

You know, because we can just run on down to the local CF base and pick up some 5.56 :rolleyes:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom