Are All Your Weapons 100% Reliable?

[StrikeFire83]

I ask this question not in spite, but as a serious inquiry of my fellow gun owners. Around these forums I see people refer lovingly to their “safe queens” or “range machines” and it makes me stop and wonder. People talk about new handguns they’ve bought, often surpassing the $1,000 mark, which are simply too unreliable to use as defensive weapons. I owned a Kimber Custom II, which I loved to shoot and was crazy accurate with, but the thing would JAM or MALFUNCTION at least once (and often many more times) with every box of ammo. Needless to say I sold it at a loss. At this point in my life, being 23 and with limited monetary resources, there is no room in my life for unreliable firearms.

Now I understand that many folks use guns for reasons other than myself, and it’s not my place to judge how others enjoy their firearms. Some people are into the competitive speed shooting game, others love long range bulls eye championships, and others collect weapons for their beauty/historical value. I was always taught that a gun is a weapon, a tool used to kill. I admit to enjoying the practice of developing my shooting abilities at the range, preparing for a tactical situation that I hope will never come, but I don’t understand the value of owning a weapon that couldn’t function in its given purpose if the time came to use it. For me, the only legitimate “safe queen” would be a family piece used by either my father or grandfather in combat, which I will someday inherit when each of them pass on.

So I pose the poll question to everybody. Here are my personal stats:

1) Glock 17 – 2500 rounds downrange, ZERO MALFUNCTIONS
2) Springfield XD-45 Tactical – 600 rounds downrange, ZERO MALFUNCTIONS
3) Ruger SP-101 – 450 rounds downrange, ZERO MALFUNCTIONS

 

[gudel]

All HK's/Glock/Beretta. Of course they're reliable

I don't keep jamomatic, not even if it says 1911 or Sig on the slide.

 

[Rotorflyr]

Strictly speaking, NOTHING is 100% reliable, any mechanical item can break at any given time, and just because it hasn't yet doesn't mean it won't

 

[StrikeFire83]

Yes, yes. I understand that my firend. I'm talking about 100 percent reliability given reasonable maintenance and care, proper ammunition, and use by an intelligent person. Meaning not having to try 300 types of mags before finding one that works, or dumping a bucket of grease through the gun every 7 shots to ensure reliable feeding and extraction.

 

[White Horseradish]

I have "guns I use" and "guns I fix". The amateur gunsmithing is a fun hobby in and of itself.

 

[Jackal]

I have guns I know will work and that I can bet my life on. I also have guns that I really don't care about being reliable or not. If a burglar knocks down my door, he's gonna get a face full of my Bushmaster, which has never malfunctioned on me after the 500 rounds i've fired. The Bushmaster is a rifle I "need". However, my customized 10/22 jams about once per magazine. Do I care? Nope. It isn't a gun I'll ever truly "need". So, basically, there is an even medium to be struck between whether a gun needs to be "bet my life on it" reliable and a gun thats just for fun.

 

[Gordon]

Lets see: the Nambu is NOT reliable, the rest(46 semi auto's and 91 revolvers and 14 assorted other pistols) are pretty good since I got rid of the ones that were NOT really(capable of being reliable) shooters a few years back!

 

[jeepmor]

Two good, one not so good

My Taurus pistols work wonderfully. My witness no so much. It's getting better with tweaking, but not 100% by any means.

jeepmor

 

[Skywarp]

Yep. I don't clean my guns for extended periods of time. If i cant shoot them for 2K rounds without more than a wipe down and maybe a drop of oil on the slides I don't keep them. The sigs are well over that now and my springer is at 1800. Dirty as hell but she's chugging along.


its not that I'm an elite tactical operator ninja, it's that I dont like things that have to be babied or that i have to attend to special needs.


Its stupid to have to clean a gun every single time to ensure maximum performance.

 

[StrikeFire83]

^ I'm inclined to agree. But 2k rounds with ZERO malfs between cleaning is a pretty high standard to hold any machine to. Might I inquire as to which guns have passed your test?

The longest I shot the glock between field stripping was 400 rounds, and I got a little nervous by the end of it.

 

[grizz]

I've had a few minor issues with my XD-40 5" and my Ruger Mk III hunter, but I'm pretty sure fine Utah sand/ dirt in the mags was the culprit in both cases.

The RSRH .44 mag has never let me down.

 

[yongxingfreesty]

yup, every single one. the 92 and 1911 are my safe queens. the sw,glock and cz are my shooters.

 

[jlbraun]

My CZ P-01 went 2300 rounds with no cleaning and no lube before I got a FTF jam (that I think was mag related anyway). The P226's clean-me-please point is about 600 rounds. I'm considering selling it.

 

[Majic]

You want a 100% reliable weapon? Get yourself a good knife.

 

[SAG0282]

I dont do the collector thing.....my absolute primary interest has to do with CCW, so I have pair of flawless pistols to that end. My secondary is hunting, and it's hard to go wrong with a good pump gun.

 

[Skywarp]

I'm inclined to agree. But 2k rounds with ZERO malfs between cleaning is a pretty high standard to hold any machine to. Might I inquire as to which guns have passed your test?

Not a problem. My 226 hit 2.1K rounds before i cleaned it, it was dirty but still functioned perfectly, no functional accuracy issues. The 239 looked like hell but made it to 2K, the short barrel left alot of crap all over the muzzle area of the gun. 229 passed like the 226.

I think sigs shoot better dirty anyways

The springer has had a mag issue but nothing to merit stripping it yet. it keeps going, im gonna hose her down after the next range trip, she should hit 2K after that she'll get more love.

My glock 20 is on the way i just gotta keep up my reloading. the barrel and gun look good after 700ish rounds .

my Walther p99 did 2k rounds without a hiccup too. i love this gun, perfect in my hand and sexy as hell. i have the titanium coated slide so it looked dirty as hell but only had a mag floorplate crack but they replaced that.



I think religious cleaning is silly and torture test my weapons to ensure if i need them no matter what their state is they will work when i need them. Dirty, clean, not perfectly lubed, lubed, gunked up, or clean they WILL work.


Finnicky guns have no place in my safe.

 

[BullfrogKen]

Majic said: You want a 100% reliable weapon? Get yourself a good knife.

Agree 100%.


Nothing mechanical works 100% of the time.

Even I don't work right 100% of the time. So, I practice malfunctions drills. Again . . . and again . . . and again. That's the only way to approach this problem. Buy some orange dummy rounds and stuff 'em at odd intervals into your magazines, and shoot, TRB, shoot. Do it again and again until you get to the point you do it without consciously thinking "that round didn't go off, I need to TRB".

Even if you somehow got THE perfect gun, and you shot it perfectly every day you shoot, your ammo isn't perfect. I posted on a thread a while back about the DOJ's RFP for a new pistol, in .40 cal. An engineering buddy of mine was on the selection staff leading the testing. The ammo specs were explicit, every manufacturer had them months ahead of time, and every single one failed in the first lot for reliability and standards. And ALL the "big names" submitted, and all of the smaller ones that entered, too. NONE passed. Nothing is 100%. Of all the things that contribute to making a gun run, only 1 has to go wrong. The only 1 thing we can control is how we react to it.


If ya got a crapper of a gun, or mags, then ditch it.


I spent over $2500 on my two carry guns, $2500 for each. If they have an occasional malfunction in training, or houseclearing, or shooting steel, I don't even notice. Truthfully. I don't. I TRB, and move on. Anyone who says "their" gun hasn't malfunctioned, either:

• isn't being honest (mostly to themselves), or
• hasn't shot enough rounds through it to experience one

I shoot well in excess of 5,000 rounds a year through my MAIN carry when I'm healthy. If I had 99.5% reliability, that means out of 5000 rounds, I had to TRB 25 times last year. Eventually, if you shoot enough, you'll have one. Find a level of reliability you are comfortable with below 100%, and resolve to deal with the rest through practice.

 

[strambo]

I voted no, even though none of my current firearms (except my 22/45) have ever jammed. No machine is 100% and eventually one will jam due to poor ammo, grit or parts failure. No biggie, get better ammo, clean it or put a new part in. The odds of one of my clean, properly lubed, defensive guns loaded with good ammo jamming in the 1-7 or so rounds likely to be fired in a defensive scenario are astronomically low.

The poster who is considering selling his P226 because it gets finiky at 600 rds without cleaning, shouldn't. If my Sig only went 500 rounds without cleaning before a failure, that would be plenty (beats me what the # is, at least 400 at a course I went to). It is clean in my holster and I certainly don't carry 500 rounds to possibly use in a defensive shooting. I only carry 45 rounds of 9mm in a war zone. Sure you want a lot of extra reliability margin, but 4-500 rds in between cleanings ought to be plenty. Jamming at 100 would be more worrysome.

You want a 100% reliable weapon? Get yourself a good knife.

Not even that. Tip breakage certainly happens in knife combat as well as issues with dull/chipped edges. Make it a folder...and we have other problems related to blade and lock strength to contend with.

No machine is 100% even simple ones. Training is key. Malfunction drills are more important to practice if you gun is very reliable. If you don't practice them, if your gun does malfunction in combat, you will be caught completely off guard. The guy with a more frequently jamming gun would TRB without hesitation.

 

[Chris Rhines]

My Glock 35 Limited gun has around 6000 rounds through it to date. I can induce a feedway stoppage any time I want simply by installing the Bar-Sto barrel. With the factory barrel, I've had maybe ten malfunctions out of ~6000 rounds, mostly involving dirt and grit in the magazines.

My Glock 19 has had around 1000 rounds through it, no malfunctions as of yet. It did lose the front sight one time, which was promptly replaced.

My JP AR-15 has recently hit the 10k mark. It recently had a few trigger malfunctions, two failures to reset and two light strikes. Both problems went away after a through scrubbing and tune-up of the trigger group. 10000 rounds on a JP trigger with no cleaning or adjustment is a pretty good run.

My backup parts-gun AR has maybe 2000 rounds, and it had a few malfunctions earlier in it's life. None in the last thousand or so rounds.

My shotgun also had a recent spate of malfunctions, related to a worn out mag tube spring that wouldn't feed the last #%*%@! round. A new spring seems to have fixed that one, and it rent through the last match without a hitch. Maybe 500 rounds on that gun since the most recent rebuild.

- Chris

 

[AStone]

So far, yes.

870P: impeccable. Just like the 870 Wingmaster of my youth: no malfunction.

Same with the K9 & SW642: they just fire everytime.

Soon to come: Marlin 336 in .30-30. I expect it will fire everytime.

But wait, what was the question?

 

[Murphster]

I've temporarily owned unreliable pistols. But only until I could trade or sell them off. With a rock, you know you've got one good lob. With an unreliable pistol, you never know if you've got a missile to throw, a club to swing, or a gun to shoot. I like to know.

 

[redneckdan]

Both of my pistols are reliable. I had jams with my 1911 when I first started loading for it. It was my first experience loading for a semi and I didn't know that OAL mattered that much.

 

[Dr. Dickie]

The only malfunctions I have had on my weapons were either bad magazines or when trying to find the correct OAL for a handload.

 

[mmissile]

I shot about 5000 rounds thru one of my USP 40's without cleaning it. It never failed to function[had a bad primer in one round though]. I finally cleaned it, due to getting so dirty myself when shooting it. I've had a couple of finicky Colts, and a few other pistols that I don't think I'd trust my life to. All my rifles and shotguns seem to function flawlessly though.

 

[lee n. field]

2) Springfield XD-45 Tactical – 600 rounds downrange, ZERO MALFUNCTIONS
3) Ruger SP-101 – 450 rounds downrange, ZERO MALFUNCTIONS

450 rounds? 600 rounds? Pshaw -- those aren't hardly even dirty yet.