I envy those that have a range in their back yard !!!

So I take it you guys just use what came from the factory......never tailored a spring to a specific load ???

The springs in my Colt are all Wilson's. and yes. I ended up where I started. My loads work best with the 16# spring. Same as factory.

Novak front & rear sights
Wilson magazine well S/S
Wilson magazines S/S
Wilson full length guide rod and plug S/S
Wilson comp barrel and bushing S/S
Wilson extended slide stop S/S
Wilson springs throughout
Wilson extended safety S/S
Wilson extended magazine release S/S
Replaced aluminum hammer spring housing with a steel one
Trigger job done by the finest gunsmith on the west coast

Bushmaster, I see you can still use your toes as extra calculator. For me, after I stopped smoking, they started hiding, might be Vince-disease...

And about springs: I've never changed them and I understand that I should do it. I'm sure the springs on my Buckmark Silhouet are very bad, but instead of changing springs I made a new recoil-buffer from a piece of tefflon and changed amno to subsonic, what made it more than healphy again.

And honnestly: do you also change the spring in a bolt? Or just the recoilsprings in a pistol?

Like Bushmaster, I've pretty much settled on standard weight springs for most of my shooting needs except on my latest "build" pictured. Since this one is intended for heavier use and loads I set it up with 18# recoil spring and heavy firing pin spring with no buffer used. Nothing wrong with the excellent Wilson springs, but I got into the habit of using Wolff springs before Wilson started offering them and just never got around to switching.

Front sight is a Novak and the rear is an STI copy of the Novak style with the added benefit of being completely adjustable.

I think that the only spring that really takes a beating is the recoil spring in any firearm. The rest of them are not abused as much in normal use. I did have a hammer spring in a BTA-90 go bad.

I have Wolf springs in my Firestar M43 and the BTA-90.

As far as my toes are concerned (what? You have a foot fetish?). I quit smoking in April of 2000 and did gain from 130# to 165#. Decided that that wasn't any good so I got busy and am now 130 to 135# again. (You need to look into therapy for that foot fetish )

Nice build SSL !!! So how did you go about deciding on the 18# spring ???

Aloysius, I know guys that have replaced the firing pin spring in their Remington 700's. Not because they actually needed to but because the factory springs are known to bind and be inconsistent.

I settled on the 18# springs (at least on this one) for several reasons. First, fit is so snug that occasionally I would have to nudge the slide the rest of the way home using 16# springs but 18# cured that. Second, I knew that I would be feeding it a steady diet of +P level loads and wanted the extra cushioning effect. Finally, at 16# fired brass was scattered out several yards. That extra couple of pounds makes it drop brass neatly about 8 feet to my right and I don't have to spend as much time hunting those last few strays that hide in the grass!

As to the 700 Remington firing pin spring; I hear that too, but can't confirm it because I have not had that problem. I have only replaced one and that was because it was either too weak from the factory or just had a flaw. It allowed the firing pin to be retracted too early in the detonation/pressure cycle and failed to support the primer at the firing pin hole. This caused even relatively mild loads to give the appearance of "cratering" and looking like signs of over-pressure.