A different take on reliability - Guns you've personally seen fail

[BWT]

... I don't have to look far.

DW CBOB, spurred portion of the hammer broke off and hit the ceiling. Failures to Feed from weak magazine springs, etc.

G21 Gen 3, started having light primer strikes (firing pin channel needed to be cleaned)

BCM Mid-Length AR (though, honestly, I would attribute to ammo and magazines, because the issue went away when I A) started cleaning it in appropriate interval and B) replaced all of the "problem" followers with Magpul anti-tilt), had two rounds FTF (feed, not fire), where the bullets were pushed back into the cartridge, and I've had a stuck case shooting Wolf.

My Arsenal SGL21-71 that's currently at Arsenal... haven't shot that yet, but, the safety detent wasn't milled out enough, causing it to stick to a very severe degree, the significance is that it pushes up against the dust cover and is wearing the finish off the selector. We're hoping for the best on that when it gets back. Don't know if I'd consider that reliability... Maybe it shouldn't be in the list.

I've seen FTF (Failures to Fire) from dud primers in every gun I own. (I'm not even going to mention rimfires) (Ever notice that? when someone says FTF, Is that a Failure to Feed or a Failure to Fire? How about FTE? Failure to Extract or Failure to Eject?)

Something I've learned, Warranties should be a very serious consideration when buying a firearm, every gun I've ever bought over $500 has had some "quirk" or issue that could've or has gone back to the manufacturer for.

[turbolag23]

G21 Gen 3, started having light primer strikes (firing pin channel needed to be cleaned)

I dont want to get too far off track but what do you use to clean the firing pin channel? I've typically used a long q tip with rubbing alcohol but what do you use if there is some debris thats a little more difficult to remove?

[Kyle Reese]

I use a Q Tip with a dash of M PRO 7 (or whatever I have on hand at the time), and ensure the channel is bone dry upon reassembly.

I dont want to get too far off track but what do you use to clean the firing pin channel? I've typically used a long q tip with rubbing alcohol but what do you use if there is some debris thats a little more difficult to remove?

[Slavex]

Gun:CZ Shadow
Setting: Fast Fundamentals/AFHF 2010
How did it fail: Multiple Stove pipes
What was the remedy: initially a stronger extractor spring, upon proper inspection, a new extractor
Was it your pistol or someone else's: mine

Notes: this pistol has since done multiple 2,000 round challenges, once with no cleaning until 6,120 rounds. 100% my own fault for not noticing the extractor was broken even before attending Todd's courses.

Gun: XD 9mm
Setting: Skills and Drills
How did it fail: failure to feed, extract and eject
What was the remedy: none could be found, numerous attempts at warranty repair resulted in no improvement regardless of ammo used
Was it your pistol or someone else's: a students pistol

Notes: I have yet to see an XD go 300 rounds without failure at my weekly classes. It has also been at least 1 year since the last time I saw one at class.

[3-7-77]

Gun: Springfield Armory XDm .40

Setting: PD Qual and Pistol Training

How did it fail: Multiple FTF, occasional double feed. In testing, I found as the slide was moving forward when cycling, the firing pin would not retract (striker not resetting in time), causing the rim of the round being fed to hang up on the exposed firing pin.

What was the remedy: Sent pistol back to SA with a description of the issue. They had it back in 3 weeks. Our officer used her G19 while it was away. She shot better with the G19 and IIRC sold the SA after it was repaired.

Was it your pistol or someone else's: Someone else.



Gun: Gen 2 Glock 17

Setting: PD Qual and Training

How did it fail: The trigger could not be pulled without extreme force.

What was the remedy: Detail strip and clean. The trigger assembly was filthy, I don't think the pistol had been broke down during 15 years of heavy use. A quick 15 minute clean and it was back up and running again.

Was it your pistol or someone else's: Someone else



Gun: Kimber TLE-RLII

Setting: PD Qual and Training

How did it fail: Multiple FTF

What was the remedy: Replace the recoil spring. This officer had logged over 15K rounds, and didn't seem to know that a recoil spring was something that should ever be changed. We replaced it with a spare spring I had (that had about 5K already logged) and that fixed the issue. Despite my urgings, I think he is still using my spare.

Was it your pistol or someone else's: Someone else



Gun: Kimber TLE-RLII (2 of them)

Setting: PD Qual and Pistol Training

How did it fail: Multiple FTE and Double feeds

What was the remedy: These were both during Kimber's external extractor days. Both pistols were returned to Kimber, who replaced the external extractors with the latest version. Both pistols came back running well.

Was it your pistol or someone else's: Someone else.



Gun: Gen 3 Glock 22 and Gen 3 Glock 27

Setting: PD Qual and Training

How did it fail: Multiple FTF

What was the remedy: Replace magazine springs and recoil springs. Both these pistols were 10+ years old and had never had the mag or recoil springs changed.

Was it your pistol or someone else's: Someone else.

[beltjones]

Gun: Glock 17

Setting: IDPA Classifier

How did it fail: Broken trigger spring

What was the remedy: Hold the gun upside down. Seriously, that worked to reset the trigger. Otherwise he had to replace the trigger spring.

Was it your pistol or someone else's: Someone else.

Gun: Fusion Commander in .40 (1911)

Setting: Practice Range

How did it fail: The gun absolutely refused to feed anything. The rounds wouldn't even slide on to the breechface. Upon inspection, I noticed they had fitted a 9mm slide onto the frame (with a .40S&W barrel).

What was the remedy: Sent it back to Fusion, they "fixed." it.

How did it fail pt 2: The gun came back with a new slide fitted to the frame and barrel, but there was a big dished out area under the feed ramp, and it turns out the slide/frame fit was so tight that it was galling. I posted pictures to ask for help on a certain forum and was immediately banned.

What was the remedy: I sent it to Joe Chambers and he fixed it. It wasn't cheap, but it's a great gun now provided I don't try to shoot federal ammo out of it.

Was it your pistol or someone else's: Mine.

Gun: Glock 34.

How did it fail: Light primer strikes.

What was the remedy: Took it apart and ran a couple of Q-Tips down the firing pin channel. It was full of oil and sludge.

Was it your pistol or someone else's: Someone else's.

[JonInWA]

I've had only a few, but they've been memorable:

1. A Walther P5C, whose mainspring strut was embedded in a polymer piece, and totally dependant upon its integrity for proper functioning (a different metal-to-metal support is employed on the larger P5). For some reason, Walther seemed absolutely compelled to use plastics that did not play well with common US solvents; the component structurally failed (crystallized and fractured) rendering the strut unsupported and the gun totally unfunctional.

Anecdotally, I heard/read someplace that the SAS insisted that the polymer part be replaced with a metal one for their P5C contract pieces.

2. A Beretta 8357 Cougar, which was totally seized up after a cumulative total of some 120 shots were fired through it during a steel plate match (with only some 6-18 rounds being fired consecutively at any given time during the evening). The gun was cleaned and lubed prior to the match, but evidentaly the lube was either insufficient or had evaporated off. I switched to Wilson's UltimaLube, with a thicker viscosity, which solved that problem, but then I ran into other chambering/ejection issues. ToddG and I had some very detailed discussions on the Couger/PX4 concept and execution; the ended up departing from my inventory (which was a shame-theoretically the rotating barrel was a great marriage with the .357 SIG cartridge, and the Cougar's ergos were actually quite good-amazingly similar to the SIG-Sauer P225 (to the point of the guns being interchangable holster-wise).

3. A CZ 75B obtained back in the day before CZ USA had the US concession; the gun repeatedly experienced mid-magazine failures, despite being sent back to the CZ vendor for inspection and repair. Whatever they did didn't catch; the problem remained.

4. Exactly the same issue as above with a CZ 83 in .380 obtained during the same period (mid 1990s as I recall). A subsequent CZ 75B and CZ 83 (in 9 X 18 Makarov) obtained from CZ once the US branch of CZ was established performed without issue.

5. A sear issue with a Browning Standard Hi-Power in .40 resulting in hammer follow; the gun was sent to Browning and repaired, but the exquisite trigger pull it had was lost in the repair process...

6. Endemic magazine issues with my SIG-Sauer P225, causing failures to chamber from the first round on a magazine relad with repeated magazines over time. Pressure over time exerted on the feed lips caused minute feed lip spreading, subtly altering the angle of the top cartridge in the magazine; that combined with the slower slide velocity when reloading from slidelock (as opposed to the higher velocity of the slide when reciprocating after firing) failed to sufficiently strip the top cartridge from the magazine, resulting in a very ugly tied-up gun, as not only did the cartridge fail to chamber, but the rear portion remained in the magazine, renedering it extremely difficult to strip the magazine out...The solution was to download long-term magazines by 1-2 cartridges, and/or rotate magagines out periodically, unloading the "resting" magazine.

7. On a Gen 2 SIG GSR XO, The plunger tube became unstaked at the rear of the tube, jamming the safety in the on-safe position, rendering the gun unfireable. SIG replaced the plunger tube (when it became unstaked, I probably had less than 2K rounds through the gun, and SIG had specifically designed the tube to be semi-enclosed in a milled trough in the receiver, to preclude exactly this sort of thing from happening)...ah well, it's a 1911...

Those are the memorable ones...the ones that occurred irrespective of preventive maintenance (or more correctly, in spite of or before scheduled PM of specific components).

All of the above guns were mine, with the issues occurring with me personally. All the guns weere obtained by me brand new, with the exception of the Walther P5C, which I obtained used, but it appeared to have been very lightly used prior to my getting it.

Best, Jon

[JodyH]

I RO in IPSC/IDPA.
I've seen everything fail.
The worst offenders have been 1911's and XD's.

As for my personal "failures":
My Gen 2 Glock 17 chipped the extractor at around 100k rounds which caused constant double feeds, that is the only one I can remember being a catastrophic failure.

[jslaker]

The worst offenders have been 1911's and XD's.

Sometimes I hate confirmation bias for being accurate.

[BWT]

I dont want to get too far off track but what do you use to clean the firing pin channel? I've typically used a long q tip with rubbing alcohol but what do you use if there is some debris thats a little more difficult to remove?

Tooth pick/paper clip.

I haven't found a way I'm really happy to use to clean the firing pin channel in any gun... Normally I wet a cleaning patch in solvent and kind of push it in there with a toothpick or paper clip, (in pistols anyway) and then I push it out, and then I run dry patches and rinse, some, let the slide dry, oil and reassemble.

That's what I've found to be the best system... I'm honestly curious what other people are doing?

Maybe a Dental pick might not be a bad idea? I don't think there are any piper cleaners that are small enough or stiff enough to clean carbon. It's just a hard place to clean, honestly.