Erma ESP 85a seems to like a little hotter round than the SV that was recomended. Can this cause damage?

I recently purchased An Erma ESP 85 a and it was recommended that I only run SV such as CCI SV but I get the occasional stovepipe, one or two per 100 rounds. It seems to run more consistently with some Winchester rated at 1140 fps. I have some Federal automatch that is rated at 1200 fps, would running this ammo cause me problems or damage the gun? I keep it clean and sliding points well oiled. I am using it for indoor weekly matches.

NWSteve wrote:I recently purchased An Erma ESP 85 a and it was recommended that I only run SV such as CCI SV but I get the occasional stovepipe, one or two per 100 rounds. It seems to run more consistently with some Winchester rated at 1140 fps. I have some Federal automatch that is rated at 1200 fps, would running this ammo cause me problems or damage the gun? I keep it clean and sliding points well oiled. I am using it for indoor weekly matches.

Hi Steve,
My advice is to only shoot standard velocity in your Erma. Erma's are made of soft steel and crack or peen easily.
I bought some cracked slides off ebay that I need to weld up and machine.
You can make new springs on a lathe if you have one.
Wes

Wes Lorenz wrote:

NWSteve wrote:I recently purchased An Erma ESP 85 a and it was recommended that I only run SV such as CCI SV but I get the occasional stovepipe, one or two per 100 rounds. It seems to run more consistently with some Winchester rated at 1140 fps. I have some Federal automatch that is rated at 1200 fps, would running this ammo cause me problems or damage the gun? I keep it clean and sliding points well oiled. I am using it for indoor weekly matches.

Hi Steve,
My advice is to only shoot standard velocity in your Erma. Erma's are made of soft steel and crack or peen easily.
I bought some cracked slides off ebay that I need to weld up and machine.
You can make new springs on a lathe if you have one.
Wes

Thanks Wes,
 Perhaps I need to find an SV round that my Erma is happier with, the CCI may not be consistent loads also the CCI SV seems to have a fairly heavy waxy coating, I've read a thread here, about removing some of the coating prior to shooting. Just looking for a happy medium between reliability and not destroying the gun.

Is the stovepipe on the feeding of the round? Is the rim of the cartridge still in the magazine when it stovepipes? I found with my Erma ESP 85A is that the magazine is the culprit on the feeding jams. The insert that is inside the Erma magazine is a very tight tolerance on rim diameter. When you load the magazines you can feel that some of the case rims are hanging up. I use and ultrasonic cleaner now to keep the magazines free of debris. 

I have three magazines and all run into the same feeding issues, Winchester SV rims cause tons of feeding issues. This new case of CCI SV is frequent enough that I only shoot during the weekly league night. I had a case of CCI from a few years ago never had any feeding issue. For bigger matches, SK Pistol Match is the slickest ammo I've seen and the ERMA never jams with that.

Rla442 wrote:Is the stovepipe on the feeding of the round? Is the rim of the cartridge still in the magazine when it stovepipes? I found with my Erma ESP 85A is that the magazine is the culprit on the feeding jams. The insert that is inside the Erma magazine is a very tight tolerance on rim diameter. When you load the magazines you can feel that some of the case rims are hanging up. I use and ultrasonic cleaner now to keep the magazines free of debris. 

I have three magazines and all run into the same feeding issues, Winchester SV rims cause tons of feeding issues. This new case of CCI SV is frequent enough that I only shoot during the weekly league night. I had a case of CCI from a few years ago never had any feeding issue. For bigger matches, SK Pistol Match is the slickest ammo I've seen and the ERMA never jams with that.

No, the stovepipe is definitely on ejection, usually the new round is partially chambered and slightly pulling the slide back will clear it and the chambered round gets seated. Occasionally the offending round will get wedged on top of the new round preventing it from being chambered. I feel like this might be either low power loads of CCI SV or the heavy wax coating they have. When I use a slightly higher power round (Winchester 1100 fps) it seems to run more reliably, and the slide does fully rack all of the way back but not slam back as if I were using HV loads (1200 fps) I feel like I need to find a SV load other than CCI.

hello ERMA folks, the only ammo that works in my .22 ERMA is CCI Green Tag. most of the time...
problem i have is the firing pin hits are not striking the rim enough. they catch the lower part and is not enough to ignite. might be the spring I'm still trying to find a replacement spring.