Weird Experience With a Model 41-Ideas?

[eljaydubya]

This past week I went Bullseye shooting and on the 15th round of CCI Sdt. Velocity the slide did not recycle and "stuck" in the closed position. Dropped the magazine and pulled the slide as hard as I could but it wouldn't budge. Got the big 240 pound range officer and he could not budge it either. He inserted a solid 3/16" brass rod and tapped it with a hammer to the rear as I pulled on the slide. He had to go to a very hard tap as I cringed. It slowly moved to the rear and cleared the spent cartridge. No buldging or particles in the chamber or action. I took it home and stripped it and found a scrape beginning at the very front end of the guide rod that progressively got deeper towards the rear and turned into a gouge. It ended about 3/4 of the way down. Spring was OK but had scrapings inside. Model 41 is an A series of 1980 and fired approximately 1600 rounds. Well maintained and properly oiled just prior to my range visit. Polished up the rod and went back to the range. Ran like a dream again. I have never had any problems with the 41 before this. I thought either the spring got tangled up at the nose of the rod or the rear of the rod came out of it's seat. Any Ideas?? Thanks for your help.

[TOM BECKWITH]

New to me. As you noted, sounds like guide rod got out of place. Did the rod show any damage/bending or did the slide around the guide rod hole show any sign of wear etc. Keep us posted?

[eljaydubya]

Tom:
The rod continues to be nice and straight. I chucked it up in a drill and spun it to check for out of round wobble but it was straight. The damage was minimal as the scrape began at the front of the rod and did wind up with a gouge about an 1/8" wide and 1/32" deep as it progressed to the rear. I sanded and polished most of it out and the 41 worked fine with the polished rod. Have a new one in the mail but I think I'll run this one until I have another incident. The slide has about 1600-1700 rounds through it and other than sharp edges on the spring hole there appears to be no damage. I carefully filed down the edges. I could not see inside to determine the condition of the rod hole. Outside of the rod hole is clean with no damage. Thanks for your input, this really baffles me. Jim

[TOM BECKWITH]

As noted - first time I have heard of this in a 41 - plastic rods in other pistols have failed, but apparently even this is rare. Would guess that the slide might have caught it on closing, but not much room between guide rod and bbl for much movement? If it happens again, please post.