Sig 226 Tacops jamming hard. Any thoughts on what could cause this???

Magoo22

Magoo22

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I have a new 226 9mm tacops pistol and I have had 5 jams now in about 1500 rounds that seize the slide about 1/8" out of battery. The slide is stuck good and you can only move it a mm or so either way. The first 3 I could grab the slide and with considerable effort pull it back. The round did not have any marks or unusual nicks or burrs. In fact I gave the rounds to my buddy and he fired them through his 226 without trouble. The last 2 jams I had to work really hard to get the slide to release and ended up putting a flat blade screw driver in the crack between the barrel and the slide to pry it open. As soon as I get the slide back the round falls out like there was never a problem. It is not a double feed or a failure to eject. It happens in the middle of the mag, the beginning and once near the end of a mag. There is nothing visibly wrong with the gun and I have never seen this type of jam.

I have looked very closely at the barrel and chamber and with the barrel out of the gun rounds drop freely and easily into the chamber and slide right back out. I tried about 100 of them looking for the one that would not work...

Could it be a mag issue? Maybe the extractor? Possible ammo problem?

If anyone has ideas I'm open to suggestions and or thoughts.
 
Could be your Tacops has a tighter barrel? If they are reloads, check the ammo to see if they have a "bulge" near the base of the ammo. They may have been fired from an older Glock (or other pistol) without a supported barrel and the person reloading them did not push 'em through a bulge buster to resize them. Next time, save one of the problematic rounds and use a gauge or if you don't own one, remove your barrel from your Sig and drop the round down the chamber. Check and see if it sits fine or doesn't.
 
Same mag or different mag? You will need to use process of elimination. Did you eject the mag prior to prying the slide back? If so did it make any difference? Number your mags and start taking note if it occurs again.
 
Trinimon said:
Could be your Tacops has a tighter barrel? If they are reloads, check the ammo to see if they have a "bulge" near the base of the ammo. They may have been fired from an older Glock (or other pistol) without a supported barrel and the person reloading them did not push 'em through a bulge buster to resize them. Next time, save one of the problematic rounds and use a gauge or if you don't own one, remove your barrel from your Sig and drop the round down the chamber. Check and see if it sits fine or doesn't.
Click to expand...

That is why I asked if they were reloads. I had a similar issue and miked the base of the problem cases. They were well over SAAMI specs. Interestingly, I tried them in a glock barrel. They fell in and out easily. No surprise. I tried them in an HK barrel- they fell in and out easily as well. I gather the Sigs have tight chambers.
 
Thanks for the ideas,

It has happened with reloads and brand new American eagle 124 grain rounds.

I checked the spring to be sure and I did have it in the right way this time but I did not know that the coloured end should be on the grip end.

I checked a bunch more rounds and did find a couple that have a visible bulge in the case. They are a little tight when I dropped them into the chamber but did seat all the way in. They also came out very easy. I will get a micrometer and check them out. The reloads that we are making seem to fire fine from my X-five, CZ-75 and a Enhanced Elite 226 that my buddy shoots. But maybe the Glock brass have a bigger bulge in them and we picked up a few casings from them along the way. Tough to go to a range and not see someone shooting a Glock... I will have to look at the re-sizing die and see if it is taking the whole case...

What is a bulge buster? Is that an additional die beyond the re-sizing die?

We load on a Dillon 650 and have made over 40,000 rounds to date but are somewhat new to reloading. I have never had a failure on any of the rounds until this pistol and it does it with new ammo as well... Actually 3 of the 5 jams were with new un-fired rounds. Both the jams today were with re-loads and they were the worst ones I've had so it looks like that may be the problem...

Thanks again folks. I'll let you know what I find out...

I'll be back at the range n Saturday and can test the mags as well.
 
From your description it doesn't sound like an ammo problem. It sounds more like a barrel problem. Are there any abnormal marks on the top of the slide, barrel, barrel locking lugs or the locking block in the frame? To have the slide locked up that badly I would suspect that the barrel is jamming the slide somehow. Some pics would be helpful.
 
The Lee Bulge Buster works along with the Lee factory crimper die. The Lee factory crimper has a carbide sizer built in so you basically remove the crimping part of the die and feed your brass, one at a time. Unfortunately they don't work on 9mm so that option is out.

From what I've read, cases with the bulge should be chucked 'cause the brass is already weakened at that point.

p-197.jpg
 
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Magoo22 said:
Thanks for the ideas,

It has happened with reloads and brand new American eagle 124 grain rounds.

I checked the spring to be sure and I did have it in the right way this time but I did not know that the coloured end should be on the grip end.

I checked a bunch more rounds and did find a couple that have a visible bulge in the case. They are a little tight when I dropped them into the chamber but did seat all the way in. They also came out very easy. I will get a micrometer and check them out. The reloads that we are making seem to fire fine from my X-five, CZ-75 and a Enhanced Elite 226 that my buddy shoots. But maybe the Glock brass have a bigger bulge in them and we picked up a few casings from them along the way. Tough to go to a range and not see someone shooting a Glock... I will have to look at the re-sizing die and see if it is taking the whole case...

What is a bulge buster? Is that an additional die beyond the re-sizing die?

We load on a Dillon 650 and have made over 40,000 rounds to date but are somewhat new to reloading. I have never had a failure on any of the rounds until this pistol and it does it with new ammo as well... Actually 3 of the 5 jams were with new un-fired rounds. Both the jams today were with re-loads and they were the worst ones I've had so it looks like that may be the problem...

Thanks again folks. I'll let you know what I find out...

I'll be back at the range n Saturday and can test the mags as well.
Click to expand...

If you look at the recoil spring, there is a narrow tighter end and a looser wider end. The narrow tighter end goes over the guide rod first. I think that should be the orange end in a P226. Just double check that its the narrow end going over the guide rod first, i dont want to give you the wrong info, havnt had a sig in awhile.

Also just something to add here. The slide release is not in the best position on a Sig, so its possible that if your grip is anywhere close to it, that you may be hitting the slide release during live fire, which can cause malfunctions. However, they should be easy to clear not hard as your saying so i dunno. Just some ideas.
 
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As per Sig instructions, recoil spring should be installed with the tightest end toward the locking lug, in most cases, this is the colored end, if not, you probably have a worn recoil spring.
Another thing, grab your spring and bent it slighty (U shape) and look for broken threads, they will pop out.

If recoil spring is ok, I would look inside the slide for markings that the barrel might be creating due to improper fitting, imagine this like a loose/worn 2 stroke engine and loose piston knocking on the walls of the cylinder, the barrel will leave marks when it hits the walls of the slide, look for anything out of ordinary in there.

Also, take a closer look at the recoil spring guide rod, specially at the end that goes in contact with the barrel lug.

I would look last at magazines.
 
From what I have read alot of problems with the Tac-Ops are they mags, supposedly Mec-Gar (not 100%) are the way to go. I also know a fellow who had issues with his and it was the trigger bar and had to be sent to Sig repair depot, took months to get back.
 
Exactly, I totally forgot about the extractor.
If the spring is out of spec or not functioning at all, it will push the barrel to the side instead of the barrel pushing the extractor out, if the extractor is not moving freely or there is gunk stopping it from moving, then you might get a malfunction like this.

I don't think it's the mags since this type of malfunction since to be pretty severe to consider them first...



misanthropist said:
If none of the above advice from Avenida works, another possibility would be the extractor.


I have never seen it on a 226 but if the extractor has a sharp edge or burr where it contacts the rim during feeding, this type of malfunction is possible.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks for the thoughts... The extractor had a little bit of gunk on it but it moves freely. It is a very long extractor on this unit, about 1.75". The pin is about .7" from the business end. Longer than any I have seen on a 226 before. I'll compare it to the tension on some other 226's to see if that seems unusual.

I will join the modern age and set up a photo bucket account and get some pictures up. There is around 1500 rounds through the gun at this point and I can see some of the rub points starting to show.

There is the usual rub on the slide from the top of the barrel and a couple of faint marks on the side of the slide that indicate the barrel is getting pushed to the side opposite to the ejection port.

The spring looks good and I can't see any broken wires when flexing it. My eyes are not the best on the real close up stuff any more so there could be something there that I'm not seeing. The spring feels good and appears to have a decent amount of force.

On the grip issue, I thought about that first. I have about 30,000 rounds through an X-five and learned that the "slide not locking back" trick was all me. On the X-five the mag release is about 3 feet long as well and I learned to correct the grip so I didn't drop the mag on the bench while getting my sight picture lined up... The base on those mags breaks off right away when you drop them close to full...


I'll keep looking and see what helps...

Thanks...
 
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