Luger denting brass on ejection

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rm_rang

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I picked up a 1939 luger a few months back and when I took it out to the range she worked fine. But when I went to pick up all the brass they were all dented one side flat at the opening. Just wondering if it is my gun thats got something wrong with it or is that just a thing with lugers?
 
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Try using 115gr white box Winchester from Walmart and see what happens then, unless, of course, that's what you are already using.

Remember, too, that the original owners did not handload.

tac, former Luger owner
 
TAC has it, of course.

Look very carefully at your gun and cycle a dummy round through it very slowly. Then cycle a casing through it, slowly.

The EXTRACTOR grips the Rim solidly and pulls the casing backwards, out of the Chamber. As the casing is backed over the EJECTOR, the Ejector contacts the casing near its BASE, forcing the Casing to ROTATE out of the grip of the Extractor. The Casing then flips UPWARD and out of the action, but it still is rotating. As a result, it beats its open mouth against the top of the Breechblock, rebounds from that and flips up and over you, generally landing on the ground a pace or so behind you.

This mystified me after I got my first Luger, many years ago. I now have three of the beasts and they all do the same thing. If you fire your Luger a fair bit without cleaning the top of the Breechblock you will, after a time, notice a faint gold appearance where the brass has been bouncing. This cleans off easily; most people never notice it.

Exactly the same parts in the same alignment are what cause the MG-34 and MG-42 to beat the mouths of their brass so badly although, in their case, the brass is banging off the Triggerguard just ahead of your finger. MP-40, on the other hand, wants to stack the brass just behind your right boot.

The GOOD PART is that, generally, you don't have to hunt all over the range for your brass!
 
So its just the design of the weapons ejection process that cause the damage to the brass? Nothing can be done to lessen this? It makes sense that this wouldn't have been a factor when they designed it as like tac said they weren't planning on reloading anything.
 
Takes care of mine, I know that for sure!

Size first. If the dent insists on going IN, push it out with a bulleted dummy and size again.

Works.
 
Excellent description Smellie,mine (1937 S/42) does the same thing,I always wondered why!

But like you said,one time through the resizing die and the dent is almost unnoticeable
 
It is not normal function and indicates one of two possible causes.

1. weak ejector, or about to break. Maybe already developed crack from inside so it is invisible.
2. weak extractor spring.

P08 ejects empty brass straight up about 2-3 meters and if they land down on concrete they may get dented in process.
 
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Mine doesn't 'dent or mar' the brass that I've seen regularly.
Multi quoting loosely here " While the Luger likes a slow push recoil, the Browning design pistols of today like a hot primer and a sharp recoil. Consequently most of today's ammo is made for their functioning needs, which are the exact opposite of the Luger's...Like the M16, the Luger is sensitive about the ammo used in it...the WW1 German Army Luger load was a 115 grain bullet at 1025 FPS...*

Running ammo out of this spec will cause feeding problems, but that doesn't seem to be your issue. Out of spec ammo will cause FTF.
What are you running for ammo; fps wise?

* Jim Dickson ' The Return of the Kriegerhoff Luger '
 
Me neither but, then again I've not shot much WW1 ammo, lol.
Apparently it's only to slow down cycling; the Luger will handle 1400 fps fodder easily, it just needs a really strong magazine spring. Apparently the lower angle of the magazine is something designed for the 7.65 bottleneck rds; it's not ideal for 9 x 19mm, causes FTF if the gun cycles too fast. Apparently...but I run all sorts through mine ( mostly 800-900 fps though ) and it eats it like a fat kid and Smarties.
A neat article on the Luger though;and some Broomhandle stuff too.
 
It's in the footnotes of my 1st post, actually. It's in an e-book; Gun Digest 2011, ' The Return of the Kriegerhoff Luger ' by Jim Dickson.
Could be total BS, of course. But Gun Digest alone lends some credibility to the author, no?
I load low fps for my Steyr - Hahn anyhow, at the somewhat stern suggestion of the retired 'smith who did the conversion. And originally the converted Steyr's were supposedly marked P-08 on the bbl as well.
It's a two-fer on a slow load IMO. For me of course, do as you see fit.

Edit; there sure are a lot of different opinions on Lugers, their faults & how to fix them aren't there? Google search makes my eye's swim there are so many different theories.
If you download E-books & someone bothers with that article; let me know your thoughts on it. My Luger is WW2 and has a "stronger spring so it can run 124 gr hotter loads" or so Dickson claims it should have in that article. Works good with most everything I've thrown at it anyhow.
Stay Safe
Tokguy
 
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