Colt Mark IV Series 80 Government .380 issues

[GT_80]

This may be a lengthy post, but it has some important background story…

Around Christmas I traded in a Sig P238 and a Ruger EC9S in for a Colt Mark IV Series 80 Government .380 in stainless steel. I got a few extra mags, 3 colt branded and one off brand. It is a 1991 YOM.

I cleaned it well (didn’t need much, was very clean already), and took it out to shoot it.

I started out with some Hornady critical defense, and SigV crown hollowpoint and it ran fine.
I switched to shooting some Winchester white box with the flat nose, and I started having some issues loading into the chamber. Like it would load half way in, and the round would get stuck. I tried some Blazer brass round nose, and had the same issue. I tried some Fiocchi round nose as well, and had the same issue loading…

so I cleaned it again, and started doing some reading, figured maybe the springs were weak, so I bought Wolff springs - both the 12lb spring kit, and 13lb spring kit and mag springs too.

I started out with the 12 lb spring, all the same ammo, and at first it seems ok, then started doing the same thing. Rounds get about half way into the chamber after being stripped off the mag, and it would hang up. Pulling the slide back and letting it go would load it fine, and it would run for a couple more rounds then hang up again.

so I cleaned it again, put the 13lb spring in, and tried the same ammo and another brand of ammo (Ammo Inc). Same results, but now I had some failure to eject, from the stronger spring, so I went back to the 12 lb springs.

next I used flitz to polish the feedramp by hand with a mop, then had the idea to take a round and simulate feeding it into the chamber over and over again, and I realized there was a high spot on the top of the barrel throat about half way down. I saw a line of brass where the round was hanging up. So I used a .410 mop and more flitz and polished the throat of the barrel until it looked smoother, and cleaned it all again, took it back to the range.
This time I only brought round nose and flat point FMJ because that’s what it was hanging up on.
I put about 60 rounds through it with no issues, which was way better- used to hang up even on the first magazine. After 60 or so then it started to do the same thing.

the magazines are fine, they all feed fine, lock the slide back, so I don’t think the issues are with mags.

It seems like I got very close to getting it right, but I got to a point where I was super frustrated and I brought it to a shop and put it on consignment. it has been there for over a week, and hasn’t sold so I am starting to think I should go pick it up and keep tinkering with it.

Maybe it just needs a little more polishing in the throat, also I was thinking maybe the recoil spring could be partially binding up because the recoil spring rod is hard rubber and can flex allowing the recoil spring to bend and drag on the frame- there is a company that makes a full length stainless recoil rod, and spring cap (or whatever it’s called) with a hole in it to allow the recoil rod to poke through and I could try that too maybe.


Anyone have any ideas? Suggestions? Should I just let it sell or has anyone had the same issues and fixed it?

some people on the colt forum seemed to think I was crazy for wanting to shoot more than one or two mags through it.

Also, they seemed to indicate, these guns were nt made to be taken to the range and shot a lot.

Why buy a carry gun that you can;t shoot and practice to get proficient?

Maybe it's a Colt thing...

 

[Tu_S]

Had the same problem many years ago when I got my stainless 45 Officers Mk4 Series 80.

What happened was I was shooting LRN through it since the range I was shooting at highly encouraged it's use to help preserve the backstop. This was 25-30 years ago, and the range was actually under the gym of a public middle school that was originally built as a high school in what I would guess was the late 40's or early 50's, using armor plate from a scrapped WW2 era cruiser as a backstop.

One of the old timers knew exactly what the problem was and told me that I would have to spend a little extra time cleaning the chamber, and I never had a problem after.

Thing is none of the other pistols I was shooting LRN through at the time ever had the same problem, including the other 1911's that supposedly had better/more precise barrels, but I don't think I was shooting any other Colts regularly back then.

Not sure if you can get the full history of the pistol, but I would suspect something similar happened.

 

[GT_80]

Had the same problem many years ago when I got my stainless 45 Officers Mk4 Series 80.

What happened was I was shooting LRN through it since the range I was shooting at highly encouraged it's use to help preserve the backstop. This was 25-30 years ago, and the range was actually under the gym of a public middle school that was originally built as a high school in what I would guess was the late 40's or early 50's, using armor plate from a scrapped WW2 era cruiser as a backstop.

One of the old timers knew exactly what the problem was and told me that I would have to spend a little extra time cleaning the chamber, and I never had a problem after.

Thing is none of the other pistols I was shooting LRN through at the time ever had the same problem, including the other 1911's that supposedly had better/more precise barrels, but I don't think I was shooting any other Colts regularly back then.

Not sure if you can get the full history of the pistol, but I would suspect something similar happened.

What do you mean extra time cleaning the chamber? There wasn't a spec of powder or lead in the chamber on mine. I am meticulous when I clean, often spending more than an hour scrubbing with a toothbrush or brass brush to get every spec of dirt out.

Like I said, i also polished it with Flitz to get as much of the factory machine marks out as I could, but if you look in the closeup of the chamber, there are a lof of machine marks...

Some people were saying that Colt was subbing out some of their work back then, and their suppliers had varying quality, and the factory QC missed a lot of issues.


The funny thing is, on the Colt forum, many of the guys over there seemed to have issues with 1911 style guns, and some were telling me the gun isn't meant to shoot a lot, I should be happy if I can get through 2 mags of self defense through without an issue. That's like having a sweet, rare car you can't drive. What the heck is the point?

 

[Tu_S]

It is entirely possible that you have a bad barrel. I just spent some time spinning a brush in the chamber with whatever solvent I happen to be using at the time to clean the lead out.

Thinking about it, and I'm in the middle of neck sizing some rifle brass for the Tikka, I'm wondering if you would detect any differences in fired cases from this and another 380 if you measured the things?, and how they compare to the published SAAMI specs.

 

[CJWinOR]

I have a later production Colt Mustang .380 that will not function very long with new Colt magazines, yet it works perfectly with Metalform magazines. Metalform made the Colt magazines, but there is a difference in how they are shaped at the front top. The Colt magazines have extra metal that is not on the Metalform units.

As strange as it sounds, my Mustang is 100% reliable with Metalform mags, but starts to have feeding issues after about 50 rounds have gone through a new Colt magazine. The extra metal on the Colt magazine is struck by the cartridge as it feeds, after about 50 rounds though the magazine, the top front of the magazine is bent, and it becomes unreliable.

 

[Llance]

Colt 1911 style firearms are meant for the cartridge to strip from the magazine and as it feeds into the chamber the base of the brass is supposed to jump up to the face of the slide where it holds the cartridge in the chamber. This jump means the loaded cartridge will slide forward until it clears the lips then it jumps up to be in line with the chamber and is then pushed into the chamber by the slide closing against the barrel and locking in place. If you are having a feeding problem, it is in your magazine lips, not in the chamber.

You have to be very carefull when doing anything with the chamber because it is really easy to mess up the chamber and end up with extraction problems.

If the feed lips on your magazine are too close together it will cause the cases to hang up at the feed lips area that fraction of a second so that it gets jammed in the chamber. If they are too far apart the cases will jump out of the magazine too soon resulting in none of the cases staying in the mag long enough to feed into the chamber properly. This second issue is less likely to happen than the first. JMB knew what he was about when he designed the guns and sometimes Colt and others really mess things up when they don't adhear to the plans.

 

[CJWinOR]

Colt 380 magazine Issues Photo

I'm unsure if it will work, but I've attempted to upload a photo of the magazine issue I mentioned in my first reply.

Both of these magazines were manufactured by Metalform. The bullet is pointing towards the factory Colt magazine and the extra metal at the top front of the magazine.

When these magazines are new, they come shaped just like the one in the photo, with the little bend in it. As they are used, the bend becomes more pronounced, and feeding sometimes becomes unreliable.

The Metalform magazines does not have this extra material and have performed perfectly for me.

A word of caution about the extractor. Should you decide to adjust it, they are practically non existent as a new replacement part so be very careful when adjusting it.

 

[GT_80]

I'm unsure if it will work, but I've attempted to upload a photo of the magazine issue I mentioned in my first reply.

Both of these magazines were manufactured by Metalform. The bullet is pointing towards the factory Colt magazine and the extra metal at the top front of the magazine.

When these magazines are new, they come shaped just like the one in the photo, with the little bend in it. As they are used, the bend becomes more pronounced, and feeding sometimes becomes unreliable.

The Metalform magazines does not have this extra material and have performed perfectly for me.

A word of caution about the extractor. Should you decide to adjust it, they are practically non existent as a new replacement part so be very careful when adjusting it.

Finding any replacement parts beyond springs are hard to find. You can only get a complete slide assembly and barrel for about $200, and after the time I put into this, and new springs, mags, etc, I am about done messing with it. I have it on consignment at my favorite shop, and hoping it sells quickly. I know some companies that try to "improve" the 1911 design or scale it down often have issues. I think this one coupled with the poor quality in the 1990's from colt is just either work=n out from shooting a lot, or had bad QC. I'm sad I traded in two working guns to get a Colt based on prestige...

 

[GT_80]

Well it sold today, so I’ll be replacing it with a Shield EZ .380 PC maybe as early as tomorrow. I’m glad it sold.

 

[glenwolde]

My gut reaction when reading your post was "...it's hanging up on the extractor..."

Remove the slide and manually slide a cartridge up and under the extractor to check the fit. Maybe it's a bit tight.

 

[GT_80]

My gut reaction when reading your post was "...it's hanging up on the extractor..."

Remove the slide and manually slide a cartridge up and under the extractor to check the fit. Maybe it's a bit tight.

The gun is long gone now, someone bought it- so it's their problem now... I did a lot of upgrades...

Plus, I didn't feel comfortable messing with the extractor- a lot of things I have no problem messing with, but that extractor has no springs or anything, so you would need to grind/polish it for more clearance, and I was not about to do that

 

[gen3guy]

OK. I'll mention the elephant in the room. What was wrong with the Sig and the Ruger? I hope you're not telling us that you traded two perfectly good pistols for one that is unreliable.