I need some help from the collective wisdom of the forum...

I took my M48 to the range this weekend and had the unpleasant experience of nearly every round misfiring. Cycle the bolt to recock and most of the rounds fired on the second go. I tried two different kinds of ammo and the same result. My thought is the firing pin spring is weak and needs to be replaced, so I've been shopping around. Every single sight I've found seems to be sold out, does anyone here know of a place that would have them available or have a suggestion as to other possible problems? I do not hvev a calipre to measure firing pin protrusion, so I'm not sure if it's the spring or the pin itself. This is a fairly recent problem, it has worked well for the last few years.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Regards,

LABlackRifle

What were your weather conditions like?  Cold weather and heavy oil/grease can cause light primer strikes.

If you have never totally disassembled the bolt down to the spring and firing pin, you most likely have cosmoline in there and it is gumming up the works.

I had this very problem even after multiple soakings so I tore everything down now no more problems.

You may also try a heavier firing pin spring from Wolff. What ammo? The Yugo from the '50's has very hard primers and I have the same trouble with some boxes.

This

old cosmoline in the bolt body gumming things up.

Thanks for the replies guys. I have torn the bolt completely down and removed all the cosmoline, but I had a pretty heavy layer of oil on there. Maybe I'll just wipe it down and leave it relatively dry. I will take the advise and wipe down the bolt's guts again and leave her dry, then switch to some of the romanian ammo, maybe that will do it. Thanks for the input

Regards,

LABlackRifle

Just make sure you relubricate the bolt properly so you don't run into the problem I had. :)

http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=6&f=14&t=266465