Mis feeds brand new Hellcat. Normal break in?

[Caballoflaco]

Yup,.. I did lube the gun according to the manual first.

Went to a second range after writting this and I purchased some different ammo. Federal 147 gr HST. I finished firing both the Gold dot ammo (30 rounds) from the 13 round mags. without any problems.

Next I loaded them with the federals and I wound up experiencing even MORE misfeeds than the first time. I even started getting a few mis fires! Primer was struck but round didn't fire. (...misfire mostly occurred with the fmj reloads. But once with the federal 9mm also).

I noticed the slide is not cycling and seating fully forward. It's shy about 1mm and this isn't resetting the trigger. When I release the "MAGAZINE" the slide moves forward the rest of the way with the misfed round in the chamber. This happened several times with all types of ammo.

I didn't have any trouble with misfeeds or misfires with the range's rental Hellcat. Pretty sure the weapon is defective. But im going to disassemble, clean, lube and reassemble it and see if it works any better.



Btw,.. I reloaded one of the misfires. It had a firing pin strike mark on it but it did fire the second time.

With the current cost and scarcity of ammo I wouldn’t waste anymore hoping problems work themselves out with that gun. Contact Springfield Armory and see if they’ll take the gun back. As you’ve described it now I wouldn’t trust it at all.

[Nephrology]

New, 1st time gun owner.

I shot my brand new Springfield Armory hellcat 9mm for the first time today. My first three clips produced three or four misfeeds of the hollowpoint ammunition I was using.

I agree with this opinion.

I'll allow a firearm about 1 malfunction per 1000 rounds that cannot be attributed to the shooter or the ammunition. Anything more than that and i get suspicious.

If it cannot make it through 3 magazines loaded with quality factor ammo (like your gold dots), I would send it right back to the factory, no question. Lubed or not, it should not choke on ~ 10% of the rounds it fires. Definitely not with Speer Gold Dots.

[RJ]

With the current cost and scarcity of ammo I wouldn’t waste anymore hoping problems work themselves out with that gun. Contact Springfield Armory and see if they’ll take the gun back. As you’ve described it now I wouldn’t trust it at all.

+1

@Chomps what you've described is not normal operation, at all. The ammo you are shooting (Federal 147 HST and Speer Gold Dot) are two of the most recommended loads for self defence. They are also a bit pricey in normal times, but at today's inflated costs, replacements will be north of $1 a round.

Highly recommend what @Caballoflaco and @Nephrology are suggesting; contact SA and get a return label to ship it back to the factory. In the event you end up being interested in replacing it, the guys above have made some suggestions ( @HCM ) that would be worth looking into.

But for the moment, it sounds like you are kinda stuck getting it fixed. Sorry

[Joe in PNG]

With one exception*, all the brand new centerfire guns I've bought have all worked right out of the box.

I suspect that you got a problem gun. It's to be expected in this time of high demand.

*My Colt 1911 did need some extractor tuning to work, but that's 1911 normal.

[11B10]

Chomps - welcome to pistol-forum! Everyone here at PF will give you the straight skinny on anything you ask. However, one thing I didn't see mentioned so far (maybe I missed it because I scanned the thread pretty fast) is your grip. On a small, light (18.3 oz) gun like the Hellcat, an absolute crush grip is mandatory - you can have all kinds of issues without it - ask me how I know. If your grip is solid, your Hellcat should be returned to Springfield. One thing I know personally about Springfield was the customer service I received about 7 years ago when they recalled ALL 3.3 " XD-S pistols. What impressed me with that was they didn't try to buy some time or stall - they just got them all back, found the problem and fixed them. I had mine back in less than 60 days, IIRC. I also had a terrific customer service encounter with Glock some 5 years ago. They actually called me the day they received my G30S and asked me 2 questions: Was this my 1st Glock? When I said yes, they apologized and asked question #2: Which FFL would I like my new, replacement G30S sent to. I had the new one in 3 days - true story.

Good luck - keep us posted.

[Chomps]

Chomps - welcome to pistol-forum! Everyone here at PF will give you the straight skinny on anything you ask. However, one thing I didn't see mentioned so far (maybe I missed it because I scanned the thread pretty fast) is your grip. On a small, light (18.3 oz) gun like the Hellcat, an absolute crush grip is mandatory - you can have all kinds of issues without it - ask me how I know. If your grip is solid, your Hellcat should be returned to Springfield. One thing I know personally about Springfield was the customer service I received about 7 years ago when they recalled ALL 3.3 " XD-S pistols. What impressed me with that was they didn't try to buy some time or stall - they just got them all back, found the problem and fixed them. I had mine back in less than 60 days, IIRC. I also had a terrific customer service encounter with Glock some 5 years ago. They actually called me the day they received my G30S and asked me 2 questions: Was this my 1st Glock? When I said yes, they apologized and asked question #2: Which FFL would I like my new, replacement G30S sent to. I had the new one in 3 days - true story.

Good luck - keep us posted.

I was a little concerned about that. I was focusing tips to improve on my grip to help with my accuracy. I do have arthritis and a buddy mentioned "Limp Wristing" as a potential problem. I can't be entirely certain if my grip is good or not as I am really new to shooting.

If it makes any difference to determine if my grip is any good but, The first range session I shot 98 rounds,.. I had 6 misses. Not tight groupings or anything, but ALL in the black.

Also,.. I rented a Glock 48 and a hellcat @ the range last week and I didn't have any issues with misfeeds! Granted,.. it was with shooting the lighter fmj range reloads. But today,.. those same 105gr FMJ rounds misfed & misfired more than a half dozen times in 20-30 rounds. Same with the heavier Federals.

I suppose it's possible that by my second session I might have been tired, sore & kinda freaked about spending a small fortune to have a potentially defective weapon. My accuracy was certainly Waaaay worse on the second go round.

[Chomps]

Aaaaaarrg!!!

15 min composing an answer on my grip and somehow it got deleted!!!

Ill try again tomorrow!

[Rick R]

The agency I worked for issued XD-45 pistols quite successfully, @120 guns. So several guys bought XDs pistols and showed up at the range often tearing the tags off then firing a 50 round qualification course with no break in or even cleaning. I saw one gun glitch one time and then run smoothly ever after, all the rest were boringly reliable.

The issues you’ve described don’t sound like something that will sort itself out, I’d call SA and get a return authorization. In a couple weeks you’ll probably get a gun back that works quite well for your needs. Every company can produce a problem child. I’ve seen them from S&W, Colt, and Ruger. Poopoo occurs, unfortunately you got shat on.

[TheNewbie]

The agency I worked for issued XD-45 pistols quite successfully, @120 guns. So several guys bought XDs pistols and showed up at the range often tearing the tags off then firing a 50 round qualification course with no break in or even cleaning. I saw one gun glitch one time and then run smoothly ever after, all the rest were boringly reliable.

The issues you’ve described don’t sound like something that will sort itself out, I’d call SA and get a return authorization. In a couple weeks you’ll probably get a gun back that works quite well for your needs. Every company can produce a problem child. I’ve seen them from S&W, Colt, and Ruger. Poopoo occurs, unfortunately you got shat on.

An LEO agency issued XD-45s?

Interesting.

[Wise_A]

le sigh.

Without someone laying eyes on the gun, how you're shooting it, where your hands are, how you're handling it, etc, any guess is exactly that--a guess. Nobody knows.

What you're describing in your last post is that the slide isn't going back into battery, including the misfires. That could be a shitload of different things. Could be barrel--chamber issue, feed ramp, barrel hood, muzzle. Could be the magazine (number your magazines--it's literally the first thing I do after buying a pistol). Could be the ammo, although I would be surprised given that you've tried two different brands and I'd be a little surprised to see that sort of problem at all.

Another note: I'm not familiar with the specifics of the Hellcat. Does the manual specify releasing from the slide stop, or slingshotting the slide? I know the XD specified one or the other, and some of them ran perfectly when you followed the directions, but weren't reliable at all if you didn't (and still others that didn't care and worked fine). Could also be your technique--riding the slide stop, riding the slide, something like that.

On that note, I'd consider it somewhat odd that you could have problems with the first run of Gold Dots, come back on a different day, and have them work fine. That smacks of operator error or a magazine issue.

That said, if I'm checking to see if a serious-ish pistol is reliable, I tend to deliberately mishandle it, at least a little. I ride the slide stop, I ride the slide, I push and pull on the magazine, limp-wrist the hell out of it, etc. I want it to work even if I'm screwing everything else up.