Beretta M9 failures

[Moshjath]

So a buddy of mine is in a unit that happens to run the arms room that several cadre units draw from for qualification purposes. Not going to get more specific than that. Anyway, one of those organizations drew eight M9s and shot about 500 rounds through each, and got some fairly catastrophic results. 6 of the pistols experienced broken slides and broken locking blocks. Here’s my observations:

1. The same 9 pistols or so are repeatedly drawn and used over and over again.

2. Can’t tell the age, but they’ve obviously seen some use.

3. Possibly an ammo issue? 6/8 weapons breaking seems high even if abused.

4. Looking at the recoil spring in one pic, it seems the same length or slightly shorter than the barrel. From what I remember of the factory B92 armorer’s course back in 2011, this would indicate very worn recoil springs that would not attenuate recoil adequately.

5. The deadlining faults as he is relaying them to me are
“1 Broken slide
1 Fracture in slide
2 Locking block broken
1 locking block cracked
1 barrel cracked (near locking block)”

6. The locking blocks (kind of hard to tell) seem to be the latest generation with the chamfer at the right angle.

I’ve asked if he can get some pics of the ammo. We’re both interested to hear any observations the collective P-F knowledge base may have.

[JSGlock34]

I'd like to know if these were rebuilt pistols. I seem to recall there are a number of third party replacement parts in the military system, to include locking blocks, barrels (manufactured by FN), magazines...

[Willard]

Honestly, what happens in the .mil WRT firearms is essentially inapplicable to the rest of the gun carrying public. When round counts are recorded, parts replaced at normal intervals, weapons lubed properly & serviced at recommended points, etc, things far less likely to break or malfunction. No offense to OP, I appreciate the post, but have concluded experiences with mil weapons (including my own) provide little information for me.

[OlongJohnson]

Chlorinated CLP again?

[10mmfanboy]

I agree, most of the parts in inventory by now are 3rd party vendors. I'm sure parts were not replaced when they should be, nor lubricated. Most of the reliability issues were traced back to using non oem parts, especially magazines.

[Default.mp3]

Some interesting history from this thread, not sure how pertinent it is today: https://www.lightfighter.net/topic/m...etta-92-system

The Brigadiers were the first variants to come with factory dovetails for the front sight... an obvious advantage for customization. As well, they feature the beefed up hump on the slide that would withstand higher round count usage. Another obvious advantage for competition.

The Brigadier slide was Beretta's answer to NSW (SEAL) demands for a fix to the early M9 slide separation issue with some Navy guns. Internet immediate argument drills aside, that problem was a reality after the pistols were initially adopted. Not frequent by any means, but it did in fact happen. And not just to Navy guns.

I saw it on occasion (twice) with Army guns during the late 1990s. This with very high use guns in a particular Army SF battalion. Rare, but not unheard of. What was not rare was the routine failure of locking blocks (epidemic in all of my units) and the more occasional (but still common) failure of trigger springs and trigger bar return springs. Eventually leading to later generation radiused locking blocks and various aftermarket upgrades for those two springs.

The fact that Beretta generated two mechanical design changes to mitigate the slide separation issue is a glaring indictment that the problem did exist. The beef-upped Brigadier slide was one fix. Designed to prevent the slide from cracking in half to begin with. The other was to incorporate a modified hammer pin (with an over sized flange on the left end) into all military M9s. Also the defining characteristic of the 92FS. That "S" in the nomenclature indicates the model features that particular M9 fix. That exposed flange (on the left side of the weapon's frame) was/is designed to stop the back half of a broken slide from rearward travel off of the rails in the event of slide failure. Instead, it binds that part of the slide to the frame, keeping it from launching and hitting the shooter in the teeth.

Beretta didn't engineer those changes for a non-existent issue.

I forget how many Brigadier slides were purchased by SOCOM, but in the end, the USN SEAL community adopted SIGs anyway. The majority of those already purchased military Brigadiers slides (gathering dust) got transferred over to Army SF, where they were used mainly by 5th SFG(A) at least through the late 90s and early 00s. The only place I saw them in the flesh was at 5th Group. Other SF Groups may have received some, but I don't have any personal observations of that. IIRC, there were only a coupla thousand purchased for military use. It wasn't a huge number.

I know there's lots of folks out there who've put amazing round counts through Beretta 92 variants. I know Beretta has always claimed very big durability numbers. But the gun was only spec'ed (like the previous 1911A1) for a Cold War requirement of occasional annual firing (a coupla hundred rounds) and a total service life of 5000 rounds. Which translates to about 15-20 years of mild use (mostly stored away in arms rooms). In units that went to high round count routine CQB training in the late 90s... it didn't pan out that way. We broke M9s like beer steins at a Valhalla drinking party. This in units where almost every man was issued an M9. We replaced a lot of worn out guns and parts on a routine basis. Including simply replacing ALL unit guns with brand new ones after just a few years (3-5) of hard use. Rinse and repeat. They just didn't hold up against to our live fire training demands. In a unit where we were ruthless about tracking round counts and proactively replacing things like locking blocks.

In my personal experience (as an 18B Weapons Sergeant, 18Z Team Sergeant, and 18Z Company SGM), the guns simply never lived up to Beretta factory advertised round counts. Maybe they did somewhere else, but not in my Army SF units. At one point, circa 1999, my Company SGM had a little collection of broken M9 locking blocks in a big bowl on his desk. He asked that all ODAs & B-Team guys bring them in as they happened... rather than toss them. After fewer than 10 months, he had 67 of them collected. And that wasn't all of them (some getting tossed anyway). From 83 assigned M9s in the company. That was pretty typical across the board (including all sister companies and other battalions). While locking blocks are mechanically easy to replace, it's more difficult to replace guns with deformed rails caused by the tie-up event... and subsequent wooden malleting (in a shop vise) to get a locked-up gun disassembled. That used to piss me off to no end.

But not nearly as much as having one of my guys with a deadlined weapon in Northern Bosnia... where a CCW M9 was our primary weapon. Further entailing a long drive down to Eagle Base, Tuzla to steal a functional gun from somebody at HQ, and turn the un-repairable one in to depot maintenance channels. And not see it again for months. My guys temporarily out of pocket because they couldn't conduct scheduled work among the Serbian populace without a pistol... and at least two of them gone for an additional entire day (road trip out of sector) to obtain a pistol replacement. Same basic thing during the Kosovo Air Campaign (we were the ground element CSAR package). Same thing in Afghanistan. Same thing in Iraq. Same thing in Africa (except that there was no place to get a replacement pistol). I dunno, dumb grunt that I was, but I seemed to notice a pattern.

I still own a personal 92FS today, 'cause I've got a lot of training & deployed time with the design, as well as a footlocker full of spendy Safariland holsters, mags, light mount adapters, pouches, etc. Sort of a military nostalgia piece for me.

Like my formerly issued 1911A1s, it's an old friend, and comes to hand with deeply learned familiarity. But I don't love it. Because it's the single most problematic handgun I ever used in terms of mechanical parts failure. It's an accurate gun. It's an easy gun to shoot effectively. It's a very safe gun for widespread troop issue. It's a reliably cycling gun as far as digesting a variety of ammo, almost never jamming, and operating well under all field conditions.

But I had enough of them break (small parts failures) in my hand, in the hands of my team mates, and in the hands of most shooters in my units... that I'll never fully trust the M92/M9. Like a partner that's cheated on you, you never fully regain trust. ..even if you stick by them. I never went on a long training deployment, shooting course, or downrange push where somebody's M9 didn't go down hard for maintenance. Usually when we were someplace where repair or timely weapon replacement was extremely problematic. Aggravating, but we learned to live with it. We learned to procure through military channels (or personally purchase) a stockpile of spare parts. And to have a bump plan for shifting working guns to folks that absolutely had to have one. Usually leaving some unfortunate Fobbit without one. Spare pistols carried with us were only very rarely a possibility.

Love/Hate? Yeah... that describes it for me. Although I'm still very tempted to get one of the improved railed models. After my comments above, Go Figure...

Just my $.02 & YMMV.

Bear in mind that my above observations/bitches were about the military M9 version of the 92 Series. I suspect that a lot of the commercial versions were/are somehow manufactured to a higher standard... and also benefit from improvements (later generation locking blocks for instance) that the military didn't adopt in a timely manner. It's still a popular gun with lots of shooters and it's certainly a good looking gun.

But I'd not deliberately equip an organization with them if I expected to do a lot of year-in, year-out high volume shooting. For the average civilian owner or police agency... fine. For an SF CIF Company... not so much.

My current 92FS has never given me the slightest problem. Has always run like a champ. Then again, I dutifully replaced the locking block after the first 5K rounds, out of a sense of caution. And these days, I really don't shoot it that much or that often. A spare small parts kit travels with it when I do.

I'm familiar with the metallurgy reasons for early batches of the gun failing. Also the SEAL ammo question (it was NATO rated 9mm). On the point of Beretta knowing that locking blocks break, I'll simply note that such breakage wasn't part of any military discussion or PM guidance until long after the problem manifested itself during operational service.

Back then, Beretta handled M9 failings just like any good Special Forces Trooper (or Congress Critter) would: Admit Nothing, Deny Everything, & Make Counter Accusations. Then get around to fixing the problem.

My Beretta M9 experience goes back to my 18B days, when I extensively fired the actual '83 JSSAP test weapons (the same year). In a manner of speaking, the M9 is what caused me to discover internet firearms forums, back when Windows 95 was still new. I was so aggravated by unit M9 failings, that when a fellow NCO suggested that I query other's experiences on firearms forums, it was the first useful thing I ever researched on the web. Lo and behold, it was just like today. Lots of individual folks claiming amazing round counts, but a few military or police folks (usually instructors or range NCOs) noting similar issues to mine. In situations where they routinely supervised a lot of guns and a lot of ammo.

I was serving as a E-7 CQB & Combat Pistol instructor during my battalion's transition from 1911A1 to Beretta M9. Over the next decade, the frequency of failures with the new guns was exponentially greater than we ever had with M1911A1s. Or anything else (non-standard or allied weaponry like BHPs, Walthers, HKs, S&W 3rd Gen). This while conducting similar levels of training. All guns break on occasion. But those other handguns rarely did. Our M9s did with alarming regularity. More than any other military weapon I ever fired or instructed with... to include clapped out M60 machine guns. Which is quite a feat as M60's were nearly self-demolishing under heavy usage.

I've got similar high definition close-up photos of Beretta locking block failures. I took them myself. A couple came from my own issued weapons. Over the years, I've posted a few of those photos on other internet firearms sites. The thing I often noticed about locking block doubters was that they usually claimed to routinely spot their own cracks during normal disassembly maintenance and acted like it was no problem at all if a locking block let go during firing. According to them, they'd just quickly replace it on the firing line. That told me they had little 1st person experience with the problem... on two counts: 1) Early microscopic fractures can be detected by Magnaflux, not with the MK I eyeball, which will only pick up very obvious and already well developed damage while inspecting a locking block. 2) Very frequently, when a locking block lets go while firing, the gun is locked up like a chastity belt. The slide isn't coming off of the frame (or even moving from its mid-cycle jammed state) without impact tools & a vise. The gun's rails or frame are often damaged by such a failure. BTDT.

I once hosted the Commanding General of US Army Special Forces Command on my ODA's range. He & his CSM visited my range specifically to observe our M9 training and ask questions about problems with the pistol. At the time, he was entertaining very near term replacement of our M9s with an HK USP variant (as recommended unanimously by SMEs from multiple SF units). In the middle of my detailing the salient issues, my Junior Medic's M9 predictably broke a block, seized up, and provided a timely visual. One that served to emphasize my talking points. He got the message. He was hearing the same message at every visited Special Forces battalion in the Regiment. IIRC, that was 1999 or 2000.

9/11 came along and we never did get those HKs, that program getting kicked down the road until about 2004. At which point Big Army volunteered to share costs/effort on our purely SOF selection program... and then slow-rolled things to the point that the entire effort was shelved stillborn. Other wartime priorities took precedence for SOCOM funding. Mother Army the same. It took Big Green another twelve years to finally trial and adopt a new handgun... after ruling out product improved Berettas (e.g., the M9A3).

In any event, concerning the M9, who am I gonna believe? The internet, or my lyin' eyes? It's generally a hell of a gun. In my experience, it just wasn't a very durable one for fleet hard usage. (Fleet meaning the total numbers acquired & issued, not anything to do with the US Navy.)

In the same thread, @Dagga Boy said:

The current locking blocks are improved over the military ones. The same crappy ones are still supplied to the military. I have been told this is due to requirements of the TDP on the guns. It is likely why there is a huge difference in reliability between the domestic LE issue guns and the military guns.

Does make me wonder about what could have been if SF had adopted the USP...

[Sammy1]

An old test but I thought it was relevant. Note, he used a commercial 92fs not a standard issue M9.

"The Beretta 92FS," by Christopher Bartocci...
...published in Krause Publications' Handguns 2001(13th Edition), states the following information:

"With the gun's major criticisms in mind, I wanted to see how the M9/92FS would stand up to a 20,500 round torture test using mostly +P and +P+ ammunition. I purchased a stock 92FS from a local gun distributor and made some calls for some high-power ammunition. The ammunition used in this test is as follows: 9X19mm (NATO, Parabellum/Luger) manufactured by Winchester/Olin Corporation.

Beretta U.S.A. claims their pistol is serviceable to 35,000 rounds and that it will function under the most adverse conditions. Beretta U.S.A. claims 'the average reliability of all M9s tested at Beretta U.S.A. is 17,500 rounds without stoppage.' The ammunition I chose was the hottest ammunition available and I would not recommend anyone put high round counts of +P+ ammunition through any alloy-frame pistol regardless of manufacturer.

The first thing I did was fire for out-of-the-box accuracy, I used the 115-grain +P+ ammunition and at 15 yards the 15-shot group measured 1.5 inches. I had nine magazines loaded up and someone loading magazines as I emptied them and, within 20 minutes, I fired 500 rounds with no malfunctions of any type...

The next day I began firing 2,000 rounds of the 127-grain +P+SXT, by far the hottest 9mm ammunition I have ever fired. There were no malfunctions of any type using this ammunition. Over the next 3 days I fired 8,000 rounds of 9mm NATO, the standard M882 Ball ammunition issued to U.S. military personnel. The M882 ball cartridge is rated as a +P cartridge by SAAMI specifications.

The barrel was cleaned every 2,000 to 3,000 rounds. It would take us 45 to 50 minutes to fire 1,000 rounds and, at times, the pistol would become too hot to handle. I fired 1,000 rounds of Winchester USA 115-grain 9mm ball with no problems and the pistol, after 11,500 rounds, was still delivering groups in the 1.5-inch range.

At this point, the pistol was totally disassembled and cleaned. Then I fired an additional 6,000 rounds of the 115-grain FMJ with only one malfunction. There was one failure to extract due to an under-powered cartridge, not the pistol.

After about 15,000 rounds I began to notice some pitting on the right wing of the locking block. I recommend changing this part when pitting is noted, but this was a torture test and we wanted to see how long the gun will last.

As of now 17,500 rounds have been fired and I headed back to the range to fire the remaining 3,000 rounds. Finally at round count 19,498, I had a locking block failure. The left wing of the locking block broke and the pistol's slide locked up. By pushing down on the broken wing with a drift punch, the action was freed and the pistol subsequently disassembled, revealing some minimal frame damage - but nothing that would affect the operation of the pistol. I changed the locking block and within 10 minutes I was back in action and concluded the test with no other malfunctions. The last 15 rounds were fired for accuracy; the group measured about 1.75 inches at 15 yards. The accuracy had hardly changed at all.

The locking block survived 19,948 rounds, which included 2,500 rounds of +P+, 8,000 rounds of +P and 10,000 rounds of standard 9mm ball. One friend of mine put it best: 'You fired $4,000 worth of ammunition out of a $450 handgun and broke a $60 part after 19,498 rounds were fired, what more could you ask?'

I feel very few pistols will ever see this round count - except for a military pistol. For many years I have heard people claim the Beretta M9/92FS was a fragile gun because of those early, isolated incidents. Following this torture test, I know this gun is far from fragile! There is no question in my mind the pistol is serviceable to 35,000 rounds; I would not be surprised to see it last 50,000 rounds. The Beretta M9/92FS is, in my opinion, one of the most reliable firearms ever produced - and this test proved it."

[Bigghoss]

Chlorinated CLP again?

I would be surprised if people weren't cleaning these with brake cleaner. Where I work they get just retarded about how clean the weapons need to be so I see guys all the time using brake cleaning and similar stuff. Plus it's quick. And how many people actually know there's chlorinated and non-chlorinated brake cleaner, let alone what the chlorine does to metal?

[hufnagel]

@Sammy1 a citation for that would be swell. Only thing I could find was a THR thread that had the same copy/paste.

[TCinVA]

When you do not replace recoil springs at sane intervals, you will break pistols.

Every time I have met military armorers I've asked them how many times they replaced M9 recoil springs. I have run into exactly one guy who did it, and that was because he was working the arms room for a unit that shoots a lot of pistol.

The locking blocks originally spec'd on the M9 had a short lifespan. A replacement locking block was made that eliminated some of the stress points of the original locking block. This part was supplied to the military and was supposed to be retrofitted to guns in service.

I doubt you can find more than a handful of guns that had the retrofit or more than a handful of armorers who can spot the difference between the original locking blocks and the replacements.

The locking blocks are supposed to be fitted. On military guns that likely is not happening.

The military has a bad habit of taking parts from deadlined guns and reassembling them into another working pistol that only works kinda because all the parts have completely different wear patterns and, shocker, that one usually breaks in short order, too.

So when you swirl all of that together, ya. You're going to break some guns.

Remember that big military for DECADES preached that the biggest danger to the AR-15 pattern rifle was over-lubrication. And they kept using beat-to-shit magazines like they were the family silver. That they experienced problems with their pistols...especially guns that have been in service longer than most of the people on the pop charts these days have been alive...should not come as a shock.