Recoil and springs

To help make the pistol shoot "softer" a heavier mainspring in conjunction with the proper firing pin stop helps greatly.  A 10 pound spring sounds on the light side for that setup.  But without more information it's pretty much impossible to give any kind of accurate advise where to go with your spring set ups.

Tell us more about the pistol and let's go from there.

Well it's a Colt 70. Ultradot .mounted on slide. 10 Wolff recoil spring installed.
I am shooting a zero 185 grain JHP
4.2 gr a Bullseye powder
What other information do you need thanks

Has it been purpose built for bullseye?  What barrel, how is the slide fit, does it unlock properly?  And I'll ask this just because it's been 20 years since you shot.  Any chance your grip or wrist might be letting up just a little bit to cause the occasional stovepipe and or failure of slide to lock to the rear?

This gun was builted for bullseye shooting. I am not sure of type a barrel that's installed. I don't think it's my wrist going limp when shooting. What spring combination would you suggest should be in the bullseye gun with the handload I mentioned.
I can also add I installed a new ejector and adjust the tension
that it would able to hold a loaded round and I can turn the slide around the round will not fall out

I also have a shot buffer for the recoil spring

Ditch the buffer.  They are nothing but alibi generators in a bullseye gun.

Dr.Don wrote:Ditch the buffer.  They are nothing but alibi generators in a bullseye gun.

+1 on getting rid of it.  They do not help one bit.  I tried one in my wad gun and as Dr. Don says, it just caused alibis.

I too agree ditch the buffer, probably why your slide will not lock back since now your using a lighter load. Quite a few years ago the buffer was a rage, everyone was trying them but now I don't know anyone using them. I doubt you can find them for sale on commercial row at Perry.

The buffer is most likely the reason the slide will not lock back. Had the same problem years ago when I was dumb enough to install one on the advice of a jackleg BE shooter.

I do not know who named them recoil buffers but in my opinion they do not buffer the recoil.
Have used a few over the years.
They do keep metal to metal contact battering from happening cause now you have a neoprene sandwich.
A good buffer will be impervious to solvents, oils , grease and take the battering for quite some time.

Do you need a buffer ? ; no.
Can you use one ? ; yes

A buffer is not very thick, check to see if you have no recoil spring stacking and the slide will move rearward past the lock back notch.
Go ahead and get rid of the buffer but am leaning toward that you have another issue but I cannot see your pistol from here.

Never had any issues with my buffers, put a new one in every couple years or so, not that the old one looked bad, never had one break apart, have used one in all my 1911's.
Also used them in my FAL, HK91, M1a, M41, 10/22 with no incidents.

YMMV

Some of my 1911s have them some don't.  Can't really tell much difference shooting the same load.  IMHO it is just something that might need changing that you don't need.  If I was shooting +P loads one might be ok but I am not going to shoot many +P loads.  In fact none so far.  Don

I use them to prevent battering.  The slide is still moving pretty fast when it hits the recoil spring guide.  About half the energy in the recoiling slide gets absorbed by the frame during this impact.  The buffer acts like a soft face hammer.

Pbmoser1954 wrote:I have a  Colt Series  70 45 caliber 1911. It has an ultra dot mounted on the slide.
Years ago I used to shoot HG 460 200 gr JHP bullet with Bullseye powder 4.2. 
After being away for 20 years shooting, I'm back to shooting again. I am trying to load  bit softer loads. So I'm trying to zero bullet 185 grain JHP.

If I may ask a question, why shoot JHP if you're trying to achieve softer loads?  For the Zero JHP, 4.5gr -4.6gr of BE works at 50 and 4.0 gr of BE at 25.
I get very close with 4.0 in a 200gr LSWC at 50 and 3.3 on the short line with much less recoil and lower cost to boot.

I like to achieve softer shooting.  But the main reason I wrote in this forum was because I was having trouble with recoil  using the jacketed hollow point.  Now I have a 10 pound spring in my gun, and  I just removed the shock buffer. That someone suggest and after further research majority of the people say get rid of it. So the next time I'm at the range I'm gonna try it.  If possible I want to try to increase the recoil spring to back to 12 if it works.  One thing to keep in mind to is the lead cast bullets were sized .452 and  jacketed hollow points are sized .451  being less pressure and less recoil. All in all I just want to find the best combination.

IMHO, you can switch to a swaged lead 185 grain bullet and drop the amount of powder to get a softer recoil.

Pbmoser1954 wrote: One thing to keep in mind to is the lead cast bullets were sized .452 and  jacketed hollow points are sized .451  being less pressure and less recoil.

I think that needs some addressing.  It is not a matter of bullet diameter.

JHP generally has HIGHER pressures.  The copper jacket is more dense than lead and creates more friction.  This makes it harder to drive down the barrel.  Therefore it needs more powder to take full advantage of the accuracy they can impart.

LSWC generally has LOWER pressures.  The lead is low density, deforms easily, has some slight natural lubricity, and the bullets are lubed as well.  They need less powder to make it down the barrel.  There is very little accuracy lost that you will notice offhand and LSWC is the preferred load of many high masters because it's soft shooting helps to get back on target quickly.

Diameter in this case is only a function of creating a good seal, not making one shoot "harder" or "softer".

3.8gr of Bullseye behind 185gr LSWC and no shock buffer, maybe 10-12lb spring depending on gun function would be a good starting point and is recommended often on this forum.

As Jayhawknavy posted, he is shooting LSWC at 3.3gr and I have seen even tinier loads in the 2.9gr range.  I have taken mine down to 3.2gr, but just like shooting 3.8gr.  You do need to have a well-tuned gun at these low powder levels, but the recoil is practically puffy.  You can't really do that with a JHP!

I use a 160 gr Dardas cast bullet  http://www.dardascastbullets.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=dardas&Product_Code=45160SWCFB1000&Category_Code=45 with 4.0 gr of bullseye.  It shoots X ring at 25 yards from my LB.  Recoil = points.

I've been running 200gr SWC with 4.5gr WST for a while because it's accurate and it works. I bought a purpose built dedicated wad gun in January and decided to try some light loads in it. A 185gr SWC with 4.0gr WST makes a huge difference! The dot just bounced and came right back on target. Function was a little spotty, playing with the springs, maybe I will remove the buffer too...

Dan 

We run the identical load with a 185 flat base bullet for the short line.. slide mounted dot and an 11 lb spring.

Great load..  ditch the buffer. Just something to break.

The nail in the coffin for shock buffers for me was to perform a simple test. 

 I removed all of the trigger group from my RO so nothing would interfere with the slide and cycled the slide by hand with and without the shock buffer.

The shock buffer caused a slight bind at the far end of slide travel, sucking too much energy from the slide, causing function issues.

Maybe a shock buffer helps handle huge walloping loads, but for a target load my theory is that the slide needs to retain some energy as it cycles to make up for what is lost for the light load and light springs.

If you ever watch a blacksmith work, you will notice they will occasionally let a gentle tap fall directly on the anvil rather than the work.  The reason for this is that the solid anvil will return a large amount of energy and cause the smith's hammer to practically spring itself up, assisting the hammer lift and saving the smith from having to put so much effort into lifting the hammer after a series of blows.  I have done some blacksmithing myself and the anvil bounce technique is an arm saver for sure.

This is what is going on as the slide cycles.  Without a huge load driving it and a strong spring to shove it closed, the slide needs to keep the momentum high to assist cycling.  Shock buffers and limp-wristing cause that needed energy to dissipate from the slide/receiver and suddenly, the gun doesn't function as it should.

Just a theory, as I am not an expert, but it is how I made sense of what was going on with my pistol and was able to take it to 100% function.

I had the exact same problems with a Colt ser 70 (new production) GI model.  The solution was to bend, file, and polish the extractor hook, and lower the port plus install an extended ejector.  Now it functions pretty well with 3.5 b.e. and 200 swc.

I'm running a 10lb recoil spring and stock main spring.

willnewton wrote:The nail in the coffin for shock buffers for me was to perform a simple test. 

 I removed all of the trigger group from my RO so nothing would interfere with the slide and cycled the slide by hand with and without the shock buffer.

The shock buffer caused a slight bind at the far end of slide travel, sucking too much energy from the slide, causing function issues.

Maybe a shock buffer helps handle huge walloping loads, but for a target load my theory is that the slide needs to retain some energy as it cycles to make up for what is lost for the light load and light springs.

If you ever watch a blacksmith work, you will notice they will occasionally let a gentle tap fall directly on the anvil rather than the work.  The reason for this is that the solid anvil will return a large amount of energy and cause the smith's hammer to practically spring itself up, assisting the hammer lift and saving the smith from having to put so much effort into lifting the hammer after a series of blows.  I have done some blacksmithing myself and the anvil bounce technique is an arm saver for sure.

This is what is going on as the slide cycles.  Without a huge load driving it and a strong spring to shove it closed, the slide needs to keep the momentum high to assist cycling.  Shock buffers and limp-wristing cause that needed energy to dissipate from the slide/receiver and suddenly, the gun doesn't function as it should.

Just a theory, as I am not an expert, but it is how I made sense of what was going on with my pistol and was able to take it to 100% function.

The reason the blacksmith strikes the anvil from Time  to time is to knock the scale off the face of the hammer.