Has anyone seen any reports of how reliable the M2 carbine was in actual combat?
I ask because I have two of them (one is a legally converted M1 and the other is a very late war Inland M2) and both are temperamental.
- Both are very finicky about magazines. The "new" M2, for instance, functioned with only four of the nine magazines I took with me. The two NVS magazines would not even insert far enough for the mag catch to hold them. Others, including USGI, would not feed on full-auto.
- At the range, the M2 had several failure-to-eject instances in 250 rounds. I thought the rim was being torn out, but when I released the bolt again on the chambered case, the extractor caught and the case could be extracted (although not easily).
The extractor and spring are new. The ammo was my normal load using 14.5 grains of WC820 (use H110 data) and 110-grain FMJ carbine bullets. I will try again with factory ammo, just to make sure my handloads are not to blame.
I have difficulty believing that there would have been such a wartime demand for the M2 if many were as temperamental as mine.
Thank you for any sources of information. (I have Craig Riesch's book and both War Baby! books.)
Richard
I ask because I have two of them (one is a legally converted M1 and the other is a very late war Inland M2) and both are temperamental.
- Both are very finicky about magazines. The "new" M2, for instance, functioned with only four of the nine magazines I took with me. The two NVS magazines would not even insert far enough for the mag catch to hold them. Others, including USGI, would not feed on full-auto.
- At the range, the M2 had several failure-to-eject instances in 250 rounds. I thought the rim was being torn out, but when I released the bolt again on the chambered case, the extractor caught and the case could be extracted (although not easily).
The extractor and spring are new. The ammo was my normal load using 14.5 grains of WC820 (use H110 data) and 110-grain FMJ carbine bullets. I will try again with factory ammo, just to make sure my handloads are not to blame.
I have difficulty believing that there would have been such a wartime demand for the M2 if many were as temperamental as mine.
Thank you for any sources of information. (I have Craig Riesch's book and both War Baby! books.)
Richard
