This is in response to a question I received. To the person who asked, I offer my sincere apologies for losing your e-mail or name from the PM. I am posting this to answer this persons question and do not wish to get in an argument or debate with the many viewers on here about the pros and cons of the internal extractor.
You asked, if the claw breaking on a 1911 extractor was common?
While I won't say that this is a common occurrence for the internal extractor, I will say that this is not unheard of. Which is what I meant in an earlier post about the inherent flaw in the design of it. Most commonly this happens for numerous reasons. The two most probable being, improper loading of a cartridge for cocked and locked carry. Not chambering a round first from the magazine, placing the thumb safety on, then dropping the magazine and adding an additional round to the mag.
By placing a round in the chamber of the barrel, then letting the slide go forward, you are forcing the claw of the extractor up and over the rim of the case. This can place undue stress on the extractor and overtime can cause improper tension or breakage.
Or two, improper heat treatment of the extractor itself from the manufacturer.
While I am not questioning the durability of the internal extractor, I will also state this fact that I leaned from my Sig Armorer's course. The Sig P6 originally had an internal extractor, out of the many thousands they made, they had 6 break. Now by a statistical standpoint, this is a very small amount, but to Sig this was not satisfactory. So they redesigned the newer models with an external one. I will point out, that this can even happen to an external extractor too.
Without intending an attack, I suggest you visit the Sig forum and read about some of the extractor adventures on recent models.
As I believe was said the last go-around, it isn't the location of the extractor, it is whether it is designed and executed properly to pull out the empties. Many companies now appear to be willing to let the paying customers and the warranty clerks finish designing a gun.
No attack taken. I couldn't agree with you more Jim. The last few years, I have been really disappointed in Sigs quality control. I have had to send more pistols back, especially their newer, redesigned models, than I have had to in the past.
One of the first things I do for a customer who wants to tune their 1911's is pull all the MIM parts out and replace the extractors with a match grade, bullet proof, or hardcore one made by the big name manufacturer's.
I think Wilson Combat, Ed Brown, or Nighthawk make some of the better parts on the market today. Of course you are going to pay for them, but sometimes you get the quality in what you pay for.
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That... right there... is what breaks extractors in an in-spec pistol. If
the slide is out of spec, and lets the nose of the extractor come into firm
contact with the forward angle of the case extractgor groove... they'll break
from that, too.
Magazines that cause push-feeding... most often on the last round, but can occur more than once per magazine... are probably the single most frequent cause of good extractors giving problems.
Wolf's old green cases... haven't seen any of their new ones, so I can't make a call... were short and sharply angled, and also contributed to extractor breakage even in properly spec-ed pistols I have a photograph comparing a proper case beside a Wolf case. It's a little bluury, but the difference is still pretty obvious.
See below.
In 45 years... I've personally had 2 extractors break. One was a very old one, cannabalized from a 1918 "Black Army Colt" and used for several years. The other was MIM that was original in a NRM Colt Government Model.
Two.
I've seen several more that broke due to one or more of the above reasons. Note that this includes internal AND external extractors.
A few years back, a sharp smith named Ned Christiansen devised a machine that simulated the extreme flexion of an extractor climbing a case rim. What wasn't part of the demonstration was the impact that the claw suffers during a push- feed or contact with the groove angle when the case is slammed backward against the breechface... and into the nose of the extractor... under some 20,000 psi on firing.
Wow!
I've only broke one in the last 48 years!
It was a factory Colt extractor in a Commercial Government I bought used in 1960 something. Gun was made in 1953.
No idea how it was treated by the original owner, but it appeared nearly new when I got it.
I must say that during the two years I gunsmithed for 5th. Inf. AMU, I don't recall ever seeing a 1911 extractor break.
Not even once.
And those guys put a lot of rounds down range in two years!
Of all the things that can cause problems in a 1911, the old GI extractor is pretty far down on my list.
Can't speak for the MIM junk being made now, cause I don't have any.
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Can't speak for the MIM junk being made now, cause I don't have any.
Hey! The one I had came with the gun, so I thought...What the hell. I'll just see how long it lasts.
Took about 2,000 rounds for it to break.
The interesting thing is that when the other one broke, the only clue that I had that somethin' was wrong was that the ejection got wild. The gun went through 5 more magazines before it hung up on the last round in the 5th mag... with no hook on the extractor.
Well, that is interesting!
Mine broke while a friend & I were walking a river trail. I saw a positively huge rat on a tree limb right above us and popped him.
Then later that afternoon, when I got ready to clear the gun, I couldn't get the loaded round to come out without shaking it out.
So, I guess that one ejected with the extractor broke too. Or it broke during the feed cycle of the next round? Never did figure it out.
BTW: It just occured to me that I had been shooting up some WWII GI surplus steel-case hardball right about that time!
That right there might be the problem!
I remember Col. Jeff writing about oiling the ammo in the mags during WWII to keep from breaking extractors with the issued steel-case ammo.
There is a lot of Wolf steel-case .45 ACP being shot today, I betcha!
It was probably during the extraction/ejection phase. If you remember... the case probably either went straight over your head, or straight into it... or it ejected to the left.
Back in the early 1950's there was a lot of surplus USGI steel-case hardball that could be had for VERY reasonable prices. Unfortunately it was apparently intended for use in grease guns, and for whatever reason it had a shallow extractor groove simular to the pictured Wolf. Anyway, I broke the hook off of my extractor within 500 rounds, and having learned, shot the rest of what I had - which was a lot - up in a 1917 revolver. There it worked fine.