Have you ever had a gun fail completely?

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Yes, I have had a gun totally fail and rather dramatically at that.

My father gave me a Walther 32acp when I moved away from home and out of state (he understood the 'real' world out there).

That Walther was my one and only firearm for years. I had never even shot it, but I just assumed it was fine - wrong!

One day I had a chance to fire it and guess what? The entire slide flew off the gun after cycling the first round fired! :eek:

I mean the slide just flew forward off the frame and landed on the ground in front of me.

If I had ever needed that gun in a real firefight, I would have been in a real pickle if I had needed more that one shot!

My father had the gun repaired years before for the same problem and thought it was OK.

Live & learn.
 
i bought a 'standard arms' 9MM at a gun show. it was a poly frme with aluminum insert frame. after about 200 rouns the inner frame broke up in little bitty pieces. it had a lifetime warrenty and they replaced it quickly and the new one did the same thing. i sold it to a friend for a parts gun, 'cause he had one too. the magazine was a mecgar, high quality. anyway, his frame broke up, too. the company must have went out of business, because we couldn't contact them.

kinda funny.. when it did shoot, it was an outstanding shooter. very accurate. it would have been an excellent carry weapon had it stayed together.
 
I had a 940 smith that would lock up due to pierced primer. Firing pin was too sharp and ammo was too hot (corbon). Fixed f/p and no more corbon for me. Have a ruger mini 14 pos that was jamming on my son and me too. He handed me the dang thing and I pulled the mag. out, cleared the chamber and threw the whole 9 yards as far as I could. Never did like rugers. I like older s & w's, 1911's, browning.

NAA .22 MAG - Firing pin too sharp for w/w ammo. Was denting the rim and when cylinder indexed across the frame she would not rotate. Took a little off the firing pin and she works fine now.

S & W model 60 - Was teaching my oldest son how to fire a revolver. I told him not to fire it single action. He knew better than his old man. His hands were so small that when he was cocking the hammer he broke the hammer stud by putting too much downward force on the hammer. Revolver continued to fire until firing pin broke several rounds later.


Nothing cata
 
I was firing a single shot Henry youth rifle, which has just one moving part, and maybe I shouldn't have used high velocity ammo or something, but the bolt broke in half (it is machined with a huge slot in it, which makes it quite weak). It just separated, so there was no way to cock the hammer.

I also was firing my 1894C Marlin .357 lever rifle once, and it jammed up very tightly, I had to unscrew the lever to get the case out. I don't fire .38 specials in it anymore because of that.
 
I have a broken frame from a Hk Model4. It's .380, and I was shooting it at the range, when suddenly the slide stopped about half way back. The pistol looked bent like a banana, and the trigger loop was busted. I took it apart[difficult] and found it was cracked at the bend also. I think it had been shot a lot before I got it. Maybe modern .380 ammo was a bit hard on it??? The buffer was pretty hard, so that may have been the culprit also. Anyway, I sold all the parts from it, for more than I paid for the pistol.:)
 
No Ruger, life is too short

Ruger P89: slide seized up.

Got it fixed, then someone offered me $$ for it, took the offer and don't plan to purchase Ruger ever again (not just b/c of that but also b/c of them getting into bed with the antis by going along with capacity limits ... but this isn't a history thread so I'll stop there).
 
S&W Model 66, internal firing pin variant. Broke the transfer bar and locked up the gun. Repaired by S&W service centre and was fine from there.
I also had the same part break in a S&W 60-9, but it continued to fire.
 
Buddy had a new AR-15 and 500 rounds of crappy Golden Bear ammunition. FTF every couple of rounds

It locked up while I was shooting (just my luck), and we had to take it down and spend several minutes trying to unjam it. He and I would take turns shooting the other guns we had and working on it. Took a while to get it ejected. After that, I said, we'd just better put it up and get some better ammo later. Fortunately, we had a 336, 10/22, and a Glock in .45 GAP to have fun with, so the trip was not entirely ruined.
 
I've seen hundreds of failures on 1911A1 and Beretta 96s and a few with Beretta 92s. I think the 96s were the worst, mostly related to a spring in the trigger group.

EDIT: forgot to add that I've seen a few problems with the HK related to the trigger group.
 
If you mean fail as in jammed beyond hope of recovery without major intervention, then yes, in several cases.

1. Internal lock in Taurus PT1911 failed, renedered gun inoperable. Replaced hammer with ed brown, perfect since.

2. Loaded shell slipped past the stop, jamming the action on a Rem 870.

3. Mosin Nagant Carbine had would never, ever, extract. the cases ALWAYS stuck, requiring gunsmith attention all four times I tried to shoot it. never did get fixed.

4. Mix-n-match Win '97: every time I pull the trigger, the bolt blows off the hook on the action bar. This results in a seriously jammed up mess. Still haven't gotten it fixed. Did get another '97, though.

~~~Mat
 
HK P9S in 45. The front buffer housing retention widget cracked and locked the slide out of battery. Wasn't easy to clear either.
 
Was firing my Hk model-4. After about 20 rounds that day...bang!, and the slide stops halfway back. After getting it apart..........:eek:

67spg1t.gif
 
I've seen two Sigs fail, both with bulged barrels. Also two Glocks that kaboomed, both .40 with lead reloads, Para Ordnance P14 with a cracked frame, Springfield 1911 that launched it's barrel down range, H&K USP with broken firing pin, Beretta Tomcat with broken firing pin, S&W 4006 with the slide locked closed, I'm sure there are others.
 
Just buy yourselves a good blackpowder handgun. Keep it clean and load it properly, and you won't ever have any of these problems that I've been sitting here reading and laughing about! I shoot blackpowder. (well, actually blackpowder substitute Triple Seven; 3f (fffg) to be exact) On my oldest, the one I use all of the time, which is a Pietta replica of the Remington 1858 New Model Army .44, I have made (I swear before God I'm telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God) in excess of 7000 shots over the last 49 to 50 years on that gun alone and I have had only one mishap, and that was a Remington #10 cap that had been wet. I messed around with it and tried to fire it just for the hell of it. It wouldn't fire, so I pried it off and threw it away. My normal powder load is 24 grains, although I have been on 28 thousands of times and up to 31 grains hundreds of times. I have killed 5 Timber Wolves, maybe 3 dozen Coyotes, 1 Mountain Lion, 1 young Black Bear, (shot him in the ear) 3 Panthers (painters), 2 Hoot Owls, 4 Catfish (Blue Channel Cat) Maybe 2 dozen turtles, 6 Ducks, 1 Goose, about 25 Deer (whitetail) 1 big Alligator and 2 little Alligators, 1 Crow, maybe 2 Chickens, about 400 Cottonmouths and Water Moccasins (all together) about 2 dozen Rattlesnakes, 2 Copperheads, 1 Corel Snake, 1 Black Racer Snake, about 300 Rats, 2 Hornet Nests, 1 'Possum, 7 Wild Hogs, and an absolutely uncountable number of Squirrels, Rabbits, and 'Coons. (Not to mention all of the tin cans I have blown to hell in my life) Every couple of months or so I sit here and painstakenly reblue the piece, lightly sand the old Tru-Oil off of the grips and apply a new coat, very carefully examine all (ALL) of the metal parts for undue wear and stress, and check the inside of the bore. It's still clean and shiny in there with good looking, well raised rifling. (twists) (lands and grooves) Well, ya'll have fun with those new fangled toys, and every time I take a deep breath, then let half of it out, and then hold the rest while I sqquueezzeeee the trigger, I'll be thinking about ya'll!..
 
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Had a Springfield XD lock up on me at the range. Dunno what happened to it--the owner couldn't even get it disassembled--locked up tighter than a drum.
my xd that broke but other than that no. the trigger bar thing broke near the trigger and the sear couldn't be released, i couldn't even disassemble it.
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That sounds about like what happened to the one I was shooting...

It was a rental gun--who knows what it had been through.

Had a Ruger P97 that was defective from the factory. The lever that operates the firing pin safety was a tad too short (casting glitch) and wouldn't reliably deactivate the safety and allow the gun to fire. Irritating. Ruger sent me a new part free of charge and that got it working.

That's it.
 
The pin that holds the trigger stationary on the trigger axis on my Kel-Tec P32 fell out. I sent it back to KT, they fixed it and polished the feed ramp and chamber. It's been great ever since.
 
Poor HK4

I had an extractor tip break on a FEG hi-power clone.. in a pinch it became a manually operated repeater. Good thing it broke on a range day.


Had a Savage pump shotgun (single side bar) break on a hunt... safety fell OUT. Ruined a good hunting day.

Have a custom 1911 that WENT OFF when I racked the slide... hammer followed down. Good thing to follow 4 rules, it was pointed downrange. Scared the snot out of me though.
 
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When I do buy another it will be a big heavy over build Ruger
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I have had two transfer bar breakages on Rugers

other than breaking firing pins on guns known for breaking firing pins I have had no other failures
Unless you count not realizing that modern lever guns have safeties

Another Taurus failure
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I guess y'all didn't notice that almost every gun maker has been represented in this thread some of them repeatedly, even the "respected" brands
Taurus is actually running way behind the pack here
 
I had a Taurus 605 a long time ago. While shooting it at the range one day the cylinder locked up. Couldn't pull the trigger or release the cylinder to unload it and it still had a couple live rounds of .357 in it. Called Taurus and they told me to send it back as it was so that's what I did. They replaced the gun and shortly thereafter the barrel on the replacement gun started to unscrew itself from the frame so that the ejector rod wouldn't lock up anymore. Got a full refund and bought a 640 Centennial and never looked back.
 
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