It does pick up the next round when I cycle by hand, and will cycle through the magazine if cycled by hand. Today I received a set of extra power springs (kind of a shot in the dark thing, but they are pretty inexpensive) and I hope to try them out this weekend. I'll post the results. My bolt also seems slightly "gritty" when I operate it. I've lubricated it well, but it is not as smooth as my buddies. I'm going to also try to polish all of the mating components to see if it will improve.

The trigger is very smooth - I'm really looking forward to getting it reliable. The sight picture definitely isn't modern!

It does seem to hit relatively hard. I read reports complaining about it being a fairly anemic round. Of course, I'll I've done is shoot a little steel from 12 yards, but it seemed to hit about as hard as a 9mm. Not scientific, just a basic impression...