Walther PPK/S problem

[eagle24]

Here's the background info:

Walther PPK/S Stainless. Two factory magazines that came with the gun. Have tried 6 or 7 different types ammunition, all with brass cases, some fmj ball and some jhp. Getting 15 to 20 nose up FTF malfunctions per 100 rounds. I can't say that it happens on any particular round, it seems to be random at which round the malfunction will occur on. Also, cannot say that one ammo seems to be better or worse than another. It does seem that one of the two magazines seems to be worse than the other, but neither will function reliably. I have thoroughly cleaned the gun and it is well lubricated with Break Free before firing. Would this normally be gun related or magazine related? We have not had any stovepipes or FTE malfunctions. Also, sometimes the round starts into the chamber but fails to go into full battery.

 

[dfariswheel]

Nose UP stoppages are "usually" magazine related, in that the magazine may be releasing the round too soon.

Here's some common "fixes" and checks:
Disassemble and clean the magazine. Make sure the spring is oriented right way around.

Buy a new, genuine Walther magazine.

Polish the feed ramp. (This means SMOOTH, NOT "like a mirror").

Replace the recoil spring with a new FACTORY WEIGHT spring. NO "extra power".

Check the breech face for any roughness that may be preventing the round from sliding up the breech face.

Check the extractor for any roughness, burrs, or sharpness that may be interfering with the cartridge sliding up the breech face. Make sure the extractor is free and has correct spring tension.

If this is a used firearm, there's an excellent chance a previous owner has replaced the recoil spring with a non-factory weight spring, or has altered or tampered with something.

 

[eagle24]

If this is a used firearm, there's an excellent chance a previous owner has replaced the recoil spring with a non-factory weight spring, or has altered or tampered with something.

dfariswheel,

thanks for the reply, I have polished the feedramp and checked for burrs inside the gun. Only place I found any roughness was frame and slide rails. I have not replaced any springs nor have I tried any other magazines. The gun is a new Interarms Walther, manufactured in Gadsden, AL.

 

[dfariswheel]

If worse comes to worse, S&W is now the licensed maker of the PP series guns, and they do repairs.

 

[Jim K]

I can't be sure without seeing the gun, but one common problem with those guns is too strong a recoil spring. The slide comes back, but the spring snubs it down too soon and the slide tries to pick up the brass in the extraction groove rather than at the base as it should. This causes nose-up failures to feed.

What I do, and it is a bit tricky, is to roll the spring on a belt sander to reduce the tension. But this can easily ruin a spring so you might be better off to order a new spring from Wolff before messing with anything. If the new spring works, that is the solution; if not, you have a backup while you tinker.

Jim

 

[eagle24]

Jim,

I have also thought the recoil spring might be the culprit. I don't know how strong it should be but it is darn strong. There is no way most women could operate the slide on this gun. I work with my hands and I would bet they are stronger than average for a man, and I have to take a firm grip to push the slide all the way back to the stop. This gun belongs to my dad (who is in his late 60's) and he has a hard time with the slide.

Tonight I took the gun apart, cleaned it very thoroughly, polished some more on the feed ramp and a couple of places on the rails, took the magazines apart and cleaned them, and lubricated everything before reassembly. It seemed to cycle rounds better by hand.

One other thing that it is doing is that when you insert a loaded magazine and pull the slide back to chamber the first round, the round will hold the slide back without leaving the magazine. If you assist the slide just a little it will move forward into battery. That seems to go against the strong spring theory.

There is no way I'm sending this gun in for repair! It irks me that a $500+ gun only has a one year warranty. If this had not been my dads gun I wouldn't have fooled with it this long. I'll take it to a gunsmith before I pay anyone affiliated with Walther anything to repair it and there will never be a Walther in my gun safe! Yep I'm ticked off!

PS. I do appreciate your suggestions though. Thanks!

 

[Onmilo]

All I'm going to say is that there is a reason I prefer .32 acp pistols to .380 acp pistols.
Smith and Wesson lifetime warranty says send it back and they will make it right and 97 times out of a hundred, they do.

 

[eagle24]

Smith and Wesson lifetime warranty says send it back and they will make it right and 97 times out of a hundred, they do.

They only warranty the Walthers 1 year. This one is out of warranty.

 

[Jim K]

The failure to feed on the initial round probably can be helped with a little work on the magazine, but the real problem may be the common one today of babying a pistol. Everyone seems to think that a pistol should be loaded by gently retracting the slide, then carefully and slowly easing it forward. People go berserk if they see a slide being "dropped"; they roll on the floor and froth at the mouth. But that is the way the guns are meant to work. Yank that slide back hard and let it go quickly. I think the problem might go away.

Onmilo has a good point. Those Walthers were designed around the .32 ACP; a few .380's were made in Germany, but the caliber was mainly to get "points" for import into the U.S. They never worked well in .380.

Jim

 

[RecoilRob]

I had one a while back and it had an absolutely awful double action pull. Heaviest I have ever felt and most rediculous on such a small pistol.

Hammer spring seemed WAY too strong, so some substitutions/modifications were made. Yes, the hammer serves to help keep the slide closed as well as ignite the primer so careful inspection of the first fired cases was made to make sure the slide wasn't opening too soon. No problems evident and the double action pull was much reduced and the slide became much easier to retract.

Many rounds fired afterwards with pretty much 100% reliability. This thinking works well with the 'too strong recoil spring' theory which I agree with.

 

[eagle24]

The failure to feed on the initial round probably can be helped with a little work on the magazine, but the real problem may be the common one today of babying a pistol. Everyone seems to think that a pistol should be loaded by gently retracting the slide, then carefully and slowly easing it forward. People go berserk if they see a slide being "dropped"; they roll on the floor and froth at the mouth. But that is the way the guns are meant to work. Yank that slide back hard and let it go quickly. I think the problem might go away.

Jim, I know what you are saying, but I'm definitely not babying it. I'm pulling the slide abrubtly all the way back to stop and dropping it. I cycled a full magazine of rounds through about 15 times that way and noticed the bullets were knocked back into the cases. Not sure if that is an indication of anything significant or not? I won't shoot those for fear of high pressures.

 

[Jim K]

The feed ramp may need a little work as well. But understand that those guns were not made as hobby guns to be played with. The idea was to load the gun and leave it loaded unless one had to shoot it. That is why I don't get too upset about repeated loading of the same round resulting in a bullet being driven back; it just doesn't happen in normal use.

Jim

 

[bubbygator]

How about the magazine lip spacing? Maybe it got dropped/banged?? That's what I'd suspect from a hanging 1st round.

 

[eagle24]

The feed ramp may need a little work as well.

I noticed the obvious difference in the feed ramp and throats between the Walther & my Bersa (which by the way functions reliably with anything I stuff in the magazine). The Walther is throated all the way around the barrel and there is a gap between the feed ramp and the barrel throat. The Bersa is elongated only on the bottom of the barrel throat and opened up a lot more on the bottom and the feed ramp makes almost a smooth transition into the barrel throat. I'm not proposing doing that to the Walther but it did make me scratch my head a little. The Walther is slightly more accurate than the Bersa, but from a novice viewpoint it sure looks like the ramp and throat on the Bersa make more sense and would feed more reliably.

 

[jrhines]

that's called the "jump"...

The small gap between the frame feed ramp and the barrel is called a jump. It should be .002-.003" wide, with the barrel slightly forward of the frame. My advice is do not polish this out flat, the pistol was designed with it in. Once it is polished out you have to push the barrel forward to restore the jump, a job that requires a press and special fixtures to prevent warping the frame.
My guess is that there are some problems with the magazines feed lips, just my guess.

 

[Geno]

Wow! I can't believe the Walther lacking quality!

I used to own a PPK/S, and was thinking of buying one. As I looked at the S&W ones here a month ago, I was literally appalled! The fit was horrid! The machining was worse!! The finish was the worst!!! Then, I picked up a 30ish year old PPK from Germany that was right beside the 5 PPKs and PPK/S that I had looked at. Ooookaaaaay! Houston, we have a problem! S&W might as well pack up, close shop and save the steel. These are the same model I owned, but they aren't they same quality. I hope they get it right!

Best of luck!

Doc2005

 

[eagle24]

I used to own a PPK/S, and was thinking of buying one. As I looked at the S&W ones here a month ago, I was literally appalled! The fit was horrid! The machining was worse!! The finish was the worst!!! Then, I picked up a 30ish year old PPK from Germany that was right beside the 5 PPKs and PPK/S that I had looked at. Ooookaaaaay! Houston, we have a problem! S&W might as well pack up, close shop and save the steel. These are the same model I owned, but they aren't they same quality. I hope they get it right!

This is an American made Interarms Walther prior to S&W building them for Walther. I really don't see any fit and finish problems, but it may not be of the quality of the German made guns.

Anyway, I'm pulling my hair out over it. I have polished the feed ramp (by hand) as much as I'm comfortable polishing. It can't be made any smoother. The only thing that could be done to the ramp and throat would be to actually remove metal and change angles. The breech face looks good as well. I have no clue about the extractor tension. Only thing I can say is that when it functions correctly it throws the brass about 5' to the right and slightly back of the shooting line. It does seem that it is about twice as bad with one magazine than the other. Also, it definitely starts getting worse after about 50 rounds. We took it to the range Sunday and had 3 nose up FTF's in the first 50 rounds of ball ammo. The next 50 rounds resulted in 3 or 4 more nose up FTF's and we started getting some rounds that went in straight but failed to chamber to full battery.

I have cleaned the gun well, cleaned the mags, and lubricated the gun. I ordered a Wolff 17lb reduced power recoil spring and will try it when it arrives. If that doesn't work I guess I'll take it to a gunsmith.

 

[cazio]

I thought interarms imported them from walther not manufacture them here in the states. I have had a couple of the interarms walthers one blued and one stainless both worked great, I have a friend who has one he carries as a back up that he says is 100% reliable. I don't have any ideas except for calling S&W and if that fails call walther directly. Call a good gunsmith and explain the problems and ask for some advice on fixing it without sending it to them. Maybe they can help you out. Good luck.

Cazio

 

[eagle24]

I thought interarms imported them from walther not manufacture them here in the states.

Don't know if this is the case with all the Interarms Walthers but a few years ago they were manufactured in Gadsden, AL. Mine was one of them.

I don't have any ideas except for calling S&W and if that fails call walther directly.

I called S&W and the gun is not in warranty. That doesn't sit well with me for a $500+ pistol. Anyway, I'm sure S&W would fix it but I'll go to a competent gunsmith before I pay them or Walther to take care of a problem that has caused the gun to malfunction from day 1. However, it plainly states that the warranty is 1 year, so I guess that is my fault.

 

[Plink]

Eagle, you might try opening the front of the magazine lips, so the nose of the round sits slightly higher, more in line with the barrel. A lot of problems are caused by incorrect feed angle. I end up having to tune my .22 magazines every time I change brands for that very reason, and had to tune the magazines for my AMT Backup because it would jam with HP. Easy does it, bend carefully, a tiny bit at a time, then test. If you see a positive improvement, go only as far as needed to function 100%. I hope this helps.

 

[eagle24]

Well I finally gave up on getting the Walther to run smooth on my own. I did have a lot of info to give the gunsmith and he assured me it would run fine when he got through with it. Based on the info I gave him on what and when it was doing "bad things", and based on his 30 minute inspection, he felt pretty sure it was the extractor and maybe some roughness on both the extractor and the breech face. I did replace the recoil spring with a 17# wolff spring and that helped quite a bit, but the gun still was not completely reliable with any of the ammo I tried. Hopefully, when its done I can put it aside and go back to shooting the guns I really like to shoot. Many thanks to those of you who offered advice and possible culprits of the problem. I realize that you can't really give good advice without seeing the gun, but thanks for your input. This one proved to be a little beyond my "hobby gunsmith" capabilities.