Norinco M4 malfunction

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tactikewl

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Got a question for all you M4 gurus, I recently purchased a Norinco M4 when I got it I tore it down did a good cleaning and took it to the range, function flawlessly. I purchased the Magpul ASAP single point sling adapter and the Magpul BAD lever I installed them no problem. I took the gun back to the range and it started to malfunction, the bolt catch engages on the bolt carrier instead of the bolt face on the last round only (empty mag). I tore it down at home and did a thorough cleaning and tried using grease instead of my usual MPro 7 LPx gun oil, on a friend’s recommendation, took it back to the range and still had the same malfunction. I spent some time searching the wonderful internet but could not find anything. Any help would be greatly appreciated.


You can see the bolt catch engaging too early. (not my rifle but exactly the same problem.)

p1040912m.jpg
 
My guess would be the Norinco is made to different dimensions than Western made ones resulting in some parts NOT being interchangeable.
 
If the bolt catch engages manually then its either insuffient gas or the carrier itself is not being allowed to move rearward due to poorly manufactured and illfitting Chinese components. I've seen the buffer retainer pin on the lower not allow the passing of the carrier through the groove that located on the carrier's bottom. Mags can be the problem too.
 
The old-open device seems to engage late. Probably due to more mass hanging on your paddle... You should probably disassemble your paddle, clean it and lube it before reassembling it... Maybe lighten the spring tension on your paddle by cutting a bit off the spring?
 
ok well i have BAD on mine and once in a while it does the same thing and sometimes bolt closes on an empty mag
 
jamiejaf said:
If the bolt catch engages manually then its either insuffient gas or the carrier itself is not being allowed to move rearward due to poorly manufactured and illfitting Chinese components. I've seen the buffer retainer pin on the lower not allow the passing of the carrier through the groove that located on the carrier's bottom. Mags can be the problem too.
Click to expand...

Couldn't be an incorrectly tuned BAD, has to be "poorly manufactured....blah, blah" The buffer retainer pin issue is somewhat comical, don't you think, that would take all of 30 seconds to fix, and would surely be discovered before live firing - right? Or was the poorly manufactured and illfitting Chinese component smart enough to duck, until the gun was being fired on the range.
 
Some folks love to make the situation more complex than it is. Let's examine the timeline:

Gun functions flawlessly, parts are added, gun doesn't work. Rather than apply Occam's razor and go for the simplest solution, the OP cleans the gun and relubes it. And it still doesn't work. Yet he never takes the parts off which were installed just before the gun stopped running.

Take the Magpul parts off one at a time and you'll probably find the cause. My money's on the BAD lever.
 
Stevo said:
Some folks love to make the situation more complex than it is. Let's examine the timeline:

Gun functions flawlessly, parts are added, gun doesn't work. Rather than apply Occam's razor and go for the simplest solution, the OP cleans the gun and relubes it. And it still doesn't work. Yet he never takes the parts off which were installed just before the gun stopped running.

Take the Magpul parts off one at a time and you'll probably find the cause. My money's on the BAD lever.
Click to expand...



I’m going to the gun club on Sunday and I am going to bring my tools to take off the two additions one by one to see what’s causing the problem. I just asked the question to see if maybe the same problem had happened to someone else and he could have said for sure that it was either one or the other. Thanx for the help guys I’ll let you know how it went next week.
 
Mine does the exact same thing. I think I've narrowed it down to the spring tension being too high on the bolt catch lever. I found more evidence of this just tonight when I realized the only mag my bolt catch works properly with is one of the Norinco mags where the spring tension pushing up on the follower is noticeably higher...I'm going to see if I can shorten the bolt catch spring tomorrow and see what happens.

edit: I should add that I'm using the stock Norinco lever.
 
magpul bad lever

This lever was never a good idea,wait till you do some active shooting and all the extra leverage breaks the small pin out of the side of your lower(this sucks and your stuck buying a new lower ) I have seen this a few times on peoples rifles in the middle of a competition. Swith to an enlarged bolt release pad. Proper setup on the bad lever is critical or failure like your having will occur. Stevo said it best and I agree fully with him.
 
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