Sig sued over defective pistols

[Jared]

I know they have. Plastic parts weren't substituted because they were awesome.

I'll agree that the plastic part thing isn't really ideal, but from my own experience, the guns seem to work just fine with them. Swapping out the plastic triggers for steel ones seems to smooth the trigger pull a little bit. Other than that, I've messed around with swapping guide rods and stuff on a few different 92's and it's been impossible for me to see any improvements, with the exception that I prefer the larger Elite II or Stock mag releases and they too are steel.

[MattyD380]

I know they have. Plastic parts weren't substituted because they were awesome.

True.

Nevertheless...

I don't think you hear as many "My brand new P2XX had a failure to X" kind of stuff with Beretta 92s. Maybe it's just selective awareness. But Olim9 kind of had the same point. Personally, I'd trust a brand new 92 more than I would a brand new P229/6. They've changed out some parts, yes. But seems like it's not really creating issues. And I wonder if it's because the 92 is still being made to military standards... for... ahem, the military.

I'll also say that my 2015 92 compact has a metal guide rod, a metal trigger and at least part of the safety assembly is metal. Honestly I wasn't expecting that; I know the full size models have plastic parts. On top of that... the gun was less than $600. And--correct me if I'm wrong--but Beretta isn't using MIM parts on the 92s. That's a damn good value on a great product, if you ask me.

[TGS]

I'd be interested to know how widespread classic Sigs are in the holsters of LE. Or any DA/SA guns for that matter. I did see some plainclothes officers with Sigs a few years ago here in Northern KY. But I haven't not seen a Glock or an M&P in any local duty holsters for quite a while. Though I don't exactly follow cops around to see what guns they have

Classic SIGs are still fairly ubiquitous in federal LE (USSS, FAMS, DSS, ICE, NCIS, a slew of OIGs, and some others) though agencies are switching over here and there.

NYPD still issues the SIG P226. There are a bunch of local departments in NJ that still have them, though the pendulum is definitely going the other way. A local buddy of mine said that they've had 23 cracked frames and 36 malfunctions on their P229s out of about 170 officers within the last year and a half, and the officers are aggressively trying to get the town to dump them and buy Glocks.

Legacy SIG guns are pretty much in a downward spiral.

[Sero Sed Serio]

CA local buddy of mine said that they've had 23 cracked frames and 36 malfunctions on their P229s out of about 170 officers within the last year and a half, and the officers are aggressively trying to get the town to dump them and buy Glocks.

Are these new guns that have just recently been put into service? Curious on the details on the guns and the issues they are having if you are able to provide more information.

[Stephanie B]

Big firearms companies aren't run by shooters trying to make the best product. They're run by MBAs trying to increase the stock price.

Whenever I read that a company says they have a "world-class" operation, I figure that the vultures might as well start circling.

Same goes for the armed forces: "Center of excellence" means "a bunch of people who couldn't find their asses with both hands and a map."

[Sero Sed Serio]

My impression has been that the "Cohen era" guns from 2005-2008 (I've seen various start dates, although my 05-07 "SiGARMS" marked guns are of excellent quality) until 2012 or so was the low point of SIG quality, followed by a turnaround where the guns improved, but not to the level of the pre-Cohen guns. I was also under the impression that the current LE guns are better than both the current commercial guns and the Cohen era guns, but also not as good as the pre-Cohen guns. Is this a fair assessment? Or is quality declining to the point where you would do better with a gun from the middle of the Cohen era over a current LE gun (all other factors being equal)?

[KhanRad]

My impression has been that the "Cohen era" guns from 2005-2008 (I've seen various start dates, although my 05-07 "SiGARMS" marked guns are of excellent quality) until 2012 or so was the low point of SIG quality, followed by a turnaround where the guns improved, but not to the level of the pre-Cohen guns. I was also under the impression that the current LE guns are better than both the current commercial guns and the Cohen era guns, but also not as good as the pre-Cohen guns. Is this a fair assessment? Or is quality declining to the point where you would do better with a gun from the middle of the Cohen era over a current LE gun (all other factors being equal)?

It is too early to say with certainty if the latest LE guns are good to go. So far I haven't seen any problems from my guys that are using them, but this is a small sample to base an opinion on. I have talked to another armorer in my agency in a different location, and he has had a couple of P226 .40 Elites that are showing craters in their breech faces. That is either a result of Sig using softer slide materials to make machining easier/cheaper, or they didn't properly heat treat the slides. I will say that we never saw this kind of problem with pre-Cohen stainless .40S&W slides.

Personally, I would stick with pre-Cohen guns unless you need a light rail, then I would go with the newest model you can find in 9mm. At least with 9mm, the construction of the gun isn't pushed as hard and less likely to have problems. Also, go with short external extractor(I also found the old style internal extractor on stamped slide guns to be outstanding). In my opinion the long external extractor is less reliable by design, let along the fact that it is MIM.

[jnc36rcpd]

We suffered cracked frames with a significant number of our .40 226's and, if I recall correctly, at least one 239. It was about 40% of our eighty-some pistols. While other instructors differed, I felt SigSauer did an excellent job of customer service. They provided a number of new pistols and frames and replaced all of our grips with the Enhanced Ergonomic version. (The majority of cracks were under the grips and discovered during the annual armorer inspection and cleaning.) Unfortunately, they were unable to determine the because of the problem.

Between that and their lackluster attempt to get us to try the 320, we transitioned o the FNS-9 (which is another story).

[Tamara]

My impression has been that the "Cohen era" guns from 2005-2008...

Er, when did the "Cohen era" end? I mean, dude's still HMFIC last I checked.

[JonInWA]

I know they have. Plastic parts weren't substituted because they were awesome.

Tam, to an extent they were-at least in the case of the RSA guide rod. The metal one was replaced for 2 reasons: One, GIs banging on the metal one (presumably by dropping the gun when the slide was locked back, both exposing the guide rod and making it susceptible to being bent upon landing with the weight of the gun levering it), incurring slide reciprocation issues, and Two, supposedly because the metal guide rod gathered GSR, etc and te accumulation jammed up the slide reciprocation, as the debris had no where to go (Yeah, I'm a little skeptical on that one..); the polymer replacement guide rod was both flexible and fluted, taking care of both issues such as they were.

For awhile, there was quite the discussion thread kerfluffle over in berettaforum.net land over the polymer rod; after some protracted testing and use, pretty much the conclusion was that while the metal rods were aesthetically more desirable (and available in multiple finishes), operationally the polymer was just as good, if not better. And presumably less expensive. And yeah, for the record, while I've used both, I prefer the metal one, primarily for aesthetic reasons-which is what resides in my 92D today.

The other plastic/polymer parts substitutions are a bit more controversial. The one everyone tends to get heated up about is the polymer-coated trigger, where the skeletal metal trigger stub serves to support a polymer exoskeleton. While the thing works just fine, and doubtlessly saves Beretta some materials and manufacturing costs and processes efficiencies, people tend to get heated up because they preclude using the Wolff TCU; you have to replace the polymer-coated trigger with the original Beretta metal one. I believe the other polymer component substitutions were the safety levers, the magazine release, and the mainspring cap; I'm unaware of any issues/controversies surrounding 'em.

From my point of view, acceptable operational quality/durability/longevity was maintained with the component substitutions, but manufacturing costs were decreased. I don't find that to be too onerous. I've neither heard or had any other indications that Beretta manufacturing standards slipped for DoD 92 production pistols throughout their lengthy production cycle history.

Apres-production/acceptance might well be anther story; DocGKR related to us some convincing evidence that OEM locking blocks were replaced by inferior after-market ones, with predictable inferior results operationally.

Arguably, the contractually-specified quality control standards put in place for the DoD contract guns may well have concurrently spilled over to commercial production; the 92 Series, despite a relatively high degree of complexity and component count has accrued an enviable reputation for durability and reliability over the years.

Best, Jon