Posted: 5/17/2007 6:34:20 PM EDT
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Not many threads here in the Desert Eagle section, so figured I'd give a range report on my new (to me) .357 Mag w/ 6" barrel. Brought two boxes of ammo, one Winchester white-box 110-gr semi-jacketed HP's, and one Remington Semi-jacketed 125-gr solid tips. Loaded up a magazine w/ WWB rounds, slapped it into the gun, dropped the slide, and the bolt failed to come all the way into battery. Not a great start. Had to pull the slide back slightly to let the round line up in the chamber and then help it forward into battery. Son of a B@#%$. I fired the round, and the gun failed to feed again, this time failing to strip the round out of the magazine. I manually cycle the gun and it picks up the round but fails to go into battery. I help it again, fire the gun and it fails to pick up the next round. This time when I cycle the weapon, the bolt will not pick up the round out of the mag at all, the rim of the case is about 1/32" too low for the bolt to catch it. I pull the mag out, fiddle with the round, put the mag back in, drop the slide, and the weapon fails to go into battery. I'm about to throw the damn thing down range at this point. I fuddled my way through the rest of the mag, having to manually cycle the weapon after every shot, then put the gun down and shoot my 1911 for awhile. Not to be defeated, just before leaving the range I figured I'd try the Remington ammo to see if that would help. So I pull the gun out of its' box, grab one of the three mags that came with it, load up the mag w/ 5 rounds, and shoot. The gun cycles perfectly through all 5 rounds. The recoil/report of the Remington rounds is MUCH louder than the WWB stuff. I load the same mag up again, put it in the gun, and shoot the whole mag with no issues. At that, I called it a day. When I got home, I put a few rounds in the first mag I tried, and sure enough, the fronts of the ears of the mag are bent ever so slightly and are keeping the rear of the cases from coming all the way up. At the range, my initial impression was that this was an ammo issue, so I gave the WWB stuff to a buddy to shoot through his wheel gun. I probably could have kept it, but I've read that these Desert Eagles need good solid recoil to cycle properly, so I'll just stick to the 125 Gr Remy's. My shot group on the rounds I fired was about a 50 cent piece at 21 feet. Not too bad for the first time firing the weapon, considering I was totally focused on whether it would even go bang when I pulled the trigger. I'm looking forward to taking it back to the range this weekend and putting another box or two through it. |
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I kinda thought a .357 DEagle would be nice. .44 and up is heavy recoiling enough that it makes follow up shots more difficult, taking away from the novelty of an autoloader. Never shot a .357 one though. I am not surprised you had problems with the 110gr stuff, good call picking up some 124's. I would guess the gun is "built" for 158gr stuff, but I'm not positive. I would imagine a lighter payload such as that wouldn't give you the necessary impulse to cycle the gun properly. However, that is odd you are having such problems with the mags too. Hope all works out!! DEagles are a lot more fun (and accurate) than people give them credit for. Gundraw |
You are correct about the gun being designed to run on 158 gr. rounds. I actually found that fact in the manual today (which I had to download from their site because I didn't get one from the previous owner). One of the three magazines I got with the gun is a problem, the other two are fine. I believe it's just plain damaged (not sure how, the ears are pretty sturdy on these things, but anything is possible.) It's a fun gun to shoot, not as intimidating as it looks, and seems to be pretty accurate. |
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The DE's tend to be a reloader's guns since it can burn lots of ammo, and you have to load near the top of the pressure curb to get the action to cycle. What you are going to find on plain-jane factory jacketed ammo is that it is loaded well under the top, and may not cycle the DE. If you don't reload, think about starting and/or find someone close to you that can get you started by using their equipment. I have great luck using rainier plated in 44 and 50, and can not see forsee any problems with plated bullet in 357 to keep the price down as well for reloads. As long as you are saving your brass, it not out of the question to keep the loads under $.10 per shot. |
Mine is the MkXIX. I agree, the two-stage trigger is fantastic, just like a compound bow. Heading to the range tomorrow, will post additional reactions here afterwards. BTW, let me ask you something, does your bolt retaining pin (the one that locks the bolt in place when the gun is out of battery) have any play to it? Mine doesn't sit terribly tight against the side of the bolt, and I can actually wiggle it a tad with my fingers. It's not too bad, but I'm afraid that with more wear, the pin could actually slip past the rim/lug on the bolt and be pushed out by its' spring. I may just be paranoid. 
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I've seriously thought about buying the gear to start reloading, just haven't priced it all out yet. .10/round would be great, because you're right, I can see going through some ammo with this thing 
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I know the bolt is retained by the FP, but not the cam pin (at least not in the .357). In any case, it doesn't seem like it's going to be an issue. My last trip to the range was pretty frustrating. The gun is failing to extract....it's leaving the spent cases in the chamber about half the time. Really breaks the rhythm...I'm wondering if the little rubber bumper they use instead of an extractor spring is starting to fatigue? But damn does this thing shoot tight groups! |