[hppd648]

My lieutenant, a nationally ranked IPSC shooter and Glock fanatic, finally broke down and, at my urging, bought an M&P9 to shoot in Production class.



He hasn't competed with it yet but test fired it a few days ago. He has put 150 rounds through it thus far and has dry fired it another 250 times.



When I walked into the office today, he handed me the tiniest piece of metal and asked me if I could ID it. I told him I couldn't and he advised that it was the end of his firing pin!



He is a Glock and S&W armorer and said he had to strip the slide to get it out. He said the broken piece was stock in the breech face and required a punch to dislodge it.



He has spoken to the forensic firearms examiner with the NC SBI (he's a fellow IPSC shooter) who said he has seen this with a couple of M&P's and that this is caused by "excessive" dry firing. Not sure what constitutes "excessive" though. He said he heard the same thing from some friends at "Speed Shooters" and I assume he meant Speed Shooters International. Not certain though.



My Lt. has put in a call to S&W and left a mesage as well as an e-mail. He has not heard back rom them yet.



Has anyone else heard of dry firing causing premature wear of the firing pin?

 

[nikon777]

SNAP CAPS

 

[rowe_s]

There was a poll on this forum some time back about broken strikers. Maybe somebody can find that and post a shortcut. (I can't find it!) The way I remember it, those that did not dry fire had no broken strikers.

 

[hppd648]

I have thousands of dry firing cycles through my issued G22 without any striker damage or issues. I'm certainly not trying to start a Glock vs M&P thread here since i own and like both brands, I'm just wondering what the difference is between the two that would allow dry firing to damage one and not the other. I LOVE my M&Ps and I dry fire them a lot for practice.



Do you think S&W needs to add some sort of caution against dry firing to the M&P manual or is it possible that the striker damage is limited to a particular run of guns or to a specific caliber? :?: I don't know, I'm just thinking out loud (well sort of...I mean, you can't really hear me...it's a computer after all)

 

[FieroCDSP]

I'm just wondering what the difference is between the two that would allow dry firing to damage one and not the other

Possibly the shape of the pin? Glocks have that distinctive rectangular shape firing pin. I've never seen the inside edge, but I can't see it being tapered any. Also, the striker might bear the full brunt of the impact on the back of the pin-hole.



The M&P's have the rounded pin, and I believe a taper to it. Even if it's not supposed to be tapered, it's not hard to see the occasional out of spec one getting by. If you were to dry fire that enough, it could get stuck. With enough stress, it could break at the stoppage or fracture at the base of the firing pin where it meets the striker.



I invested in snap caps when I bought my Sigma. The $15 bucks you pay means you don't have to replace pins. Anyway, the taper is just my theory.

 

[raz-0]

I had a striker break. But they ahve since been revised and there were changes in the area it broke.



I couldn't see the striker being able to get any of the bits stuck in the breechface unless they deformed. If they deformed, then there is something isn't right with the alloy or hardening i suspect.



Personally I think S&W's biggest issue with the M&P line is QC. Their practices just aren't keeping pace. It's not like they aren't there, just things keep on sneaking through. Pound one nail in, and another pops up.

 

[ER_STL]

Those of you suggesting Snap Caps for dry practice need to make sure that your striker is actually striking the 'primer' in the dummy rounds. I originally bought the orange training snap caps (whatever brand that is) and used them for quite a while in my G19 only to realize later than the recess in the 'primer' was deep enough to keep my striker from actually contacting it with much force. IOW, I was pretty much dry-firing without one in there.



I now use AZoom's Action Trainers and I know for a fact that they are preventing my G19's striker from slamming into the breech-face. Each individual round seems to be good for about a thousand dry-fires or so before the 'primer' wears out. I haven't yet been able to determine if they do much for the M&P's striker, which seems to protrude much less from the breech-face than the Glock's.