Had to send in AR9 to get worked on

Ian

Notorious member
It's the cartridges rubbing the bolt there, not gun parts. Perfectly normal for that to be coated with brass. However, if brass is wearing away the coating on the bolt ramp and either exposing machine marks or making chatter marks, explain to me how the bolt has a Mellonite finish. A bolt should skate a file, touch it on one edge there where the brass is rubbing off on the back. If the file cuts it, send it back again and tell them it failed heat treat.
 

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
On the ramp of the bolt it is indented. It looks like chatter marks. It just happens to be leaving the brass from whatever is causing the chatter marks. I checked the bolt completely over before firing it. The ramp was smooth. Something is impacting the bottom causing it.
 
F

freebullet

Guest
Looks like this maybe a different issue than the first. This bolt looks much better than your old one. The first I'd sent back to, this one I would attempt to work with.

It looks like a tolerance stacking issue. Psa has had known issues with bolt stop heights varying to out of spec. Psa has had known issues of upper to lower wiggle on occasion.

Because the lower was fired with another upper I'd want to mark the parts in different colors to find out what's hitting what. You can smooth, polish, & grease that part of the bolt without issue. If it jiggles when it wiggles you can trim a chunk of rubber to fit under the rear takedown pin. They sell little doodads for the purpose. If the sharp edge of the bolt stop is hitting that could be clearance or swapped.

Or you can send it back again & pray not to get one worse than your first.
 

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
This lower has a bolt with a polymer tip to tighten up against the bottom of the rear upper mount. It has NO wiggle. They are impact depressions of some sort. When you hand cycle the action it is silky smooth. It does not feel like anything is dragging on the bolt to leave the marks. The only thing it could possibly be is the hammer. But it shows no wear marks or sharp edges of any kind. I accidentally bump fired it a few times when I was trying to shoot a good group while load testing. that is the only times it has not cycled as it should. It had a hammer follow each time. But not enough to make the gun go off. These will fire with the round not fully into battery.

I actually tested it with just some primed only cases. I can see why some people have blown their guns up with how far back the case can be and it will still fire. It is not like a regular AR15 where the bolt has to be completely closed before the firing pin is un shrouded enough for the hammer to hit the firing pin.

i guess I will see what they come up with. They mentioned replacing the whole gun if needed. I hope at least to get back the barrel. I shot a few bullets with lapping compound on them to move the throat a little as it has no throat. 10 rounds of 600 grit was enough to move it from a seating depth of 1.085" to a 1.115" I did not like how deep I had to seat the 135gr PC bullet from MP moulds. I will say that this melonite is no where near as hard as they are claiming. I did not think it was going to move that much with so little bullets.
 

Ian

Notorious member
I actually tested it with just some primed only cases. I can see why some people have blown their guns up with how far back the case can be and it will still fire. It is not like a regular AR15 where the bolt has to be completely closed before the firing pin is un shrouded enough for the hammer to hit the firing pin.

THAT is nothing less than a case of mental retardation on the part of the engineers. Unforgivable.

And if that is Mellonite, I'm a melon. It might be a light nitride process to blacken the parts for color, but it ain't the true Mellonite process.
 

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
I got a call today that the gun is on its way back. I spoke with the guy that actually worked on it. He said it had the wrong hammer in it. Ok, what is the right hammer? Something about notched????

He said he ran 150 rounds through it and there is no wear at all. So hopefully this is it. And Ian I believe you are right that they are just doing it enough to prevent corrosion and that is it. There is no way that those bullets should have moved the throat that much. What it actually did is put a actual taper to the throat. Instead of no taper at all.
 

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
The saga continues! They sent it back and it already had more chatter marks on the bolt. I took pics of the bolt right out of the box. I then went to the range and shot about 150 rounds. It got worse. Took pics of that too. But my computer took a nose dive and I lost the pics and MUCH more. Not very happy right now.

I had to send the whole gun back to them again. Last I heard was they were replacing everything. They said they have another gun doing the same thing. They said they are replacing it with a different design of a receiver. And they are throwing in their new 3.5lb cassette trigger. They also said they changed something on the ramp of the bolt and they think that was what is causing this. Who knows now???

That was 2 days ago and they said they were shipping it right out. Have not heard back. They are supposed to send tracking as I have to drive about 50 miles to the dealer to pick it up as it is a new serial number.

At least they are trying to make it right. I will give them that. I have been told to f-off (LEE Precision) over stuff very minor. I think his name was Andy.lol
 

Ian

Notorious member
I've been given the cold shoulder by Lyman and Smith & Wesson. My money goes elsewhere. That really sucks, Tomme, seems that they got a bad batch of parts and are sort of throwing the baby out with the bathwater here. I still think the only real problems were the heat treating of the BCG and the design that lets the hammer follow the pin all the way into battery if the disconnector fails.
 

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
Check this out. I stopped at my friends house today. I ordered him one of these about a month after I did. He does not have a computer so I had it sent to our dealer to have him do the paperwork for it. I have been trying to get to his house to check his over to see if it was doing the same thing. Well..........

other ar9

They are sending a call tag to send in that rifle too, but there is a problem. I got off the phone with PSA and I have to call back Monday to find out how to get the UPS tag to send it in. Since the order # is in my name but the gun is in his name they did not know how to handle the return. They canceled the return tag today because of this. Johsia said he will get it handled and will email the tag.

Supposedly they are shipping mine Monday. We will see I guess.