Has anyone here experienced hard primers/failures to fire with Underwood ammo? I have a new Gen. 4 Glock 29. I ordered 3 boxes of the UW 180 TMJ believing it would be great for paper and woodland carry. The ammo was shipped within about 30 minutes of ordering and I was stoked.
When I received it, it looked high quality from the box to the individual rounds. When I went to the range, I shot a partial box since I didn't have much time. I also fired some very old Winchester Silver Tips and some Federal .40 through a Lone Wolf conversion barrel. I had one UW round take a good primer hit but FTF. Knowing this can happen and that most will go a second time, I ran it again and it went off. Everything else worked flawlessly.
The second time at the range, the same thing happened. Two failures to fire in total, each with a good primer hit, within 40 rounds! Less than one box of ammo and two malfunctions. I took photos of that round and put it away. I have been shooting for a long time and have seen hard/bad primers with the big name manufacturers, so I know it can happen. But to have it happen twice in 40 rounds is unacceptable.
On Sept. 12 (I know, it was a Saturday), I sent UW an email through their website explaining the situation and that I could no longer trust that ammo for anything except plinking. Since there was no option to attach a pic in their system, I told them to contact me if they wanted the pics.
I've heard nothing from UW. I expected them to want to know batch info. I thought they may even offer to replace the left over two boxes (honestly, that's the least I would expect), but I've heard nothing.
I'm pretty upset because I really thought I'd found the company and the round to feed my G29. Has anyone else experienced this before? I hate for my first post to be negative, but I've been a lurker and 1) wanted to know if this is common with them, and 2) wanted to let people know what I experienced in case it happens to them. If I can, I'll try to post some pics soon, though I may be unable for a while.
PS. The gun shoots great. I'm also extremely pleased with the LW .40 barrel. $89 on sale and it is beautiful (with the small logo) and shoots great.
How many rounds have you run through the gun? Might be time to replace the striker spring. I do it every 500 rounds in my Glock 20 or else I start getting light strikes.
You may want to inspect the striker, striker spring, channel and spring cups that they are clean, free of any debris or damage. Oil, carbon, debris, plating form primers inside the striker channel can slow the forward progress leading to a light or no strike condition... ::)
The gun has less than 150 rounds. The primer hits look really good. They're not shallow at all. UW was the only brand out of three to FTF. It's puzzling since I hear so much good about the company and the rounds looked high quality in every way. I'm guessing it was just a bad batch of primers. I know it's a primer issue, not something UW did. I do hate that I now have $60 of questionable ammo though. Plus, I'll have to get some trigger time with a number of flawless UW rounds to build confidence in the brand. I wish they would've contacted me. As it is, I'm left with the impression they're not too concerned.
Shadow, I've seen light strikes, that's why I explained in the OP that these primers took solid hits. BTW, not sure why the rolling eyes emoji was used. I've been shooting for a very long time. I'm also a Glock armorer.
Thanks guys.
Johnny welcome to the forum, BTW nothing was meant by the eyes...However you being an armorer I would suspect you would have checked those things I mentioned out...Sometimes the simplest can have you second guessing.
I would agree that primers can be the problem, back in the day when Glocks started to make it to market, many primers were too hard for the striker fired pistols reliability, therefore companies made softer primers to compensate for this.
I will say I have seen the slightest amount of debris slow the striker travel, it can be different between shots and be an issue with a piece of plating or a pierced primer that pushed a jet of gas inside the channel.
Recently I had a small piece of cast bullet roll up and stick to the edge of the end of my chamber, it was enough to cause a light strike situation. Once it was removed all was good.
Best regards!
Shadow, thanks for the explanation. I thought your post was positive, that's why I was confused. My agency experienced failures to fire with 9mm a few years ago. We, the FI's, assumed it was an issue with the guns (G26's) at first. We were checking the things you mentioned. Then we saw it happening with MP5's and knew there was an issue. It turned out to be a bad production run by a big name manufacturer. On my issue, I ran more Fed. .40 through the gun than 10mm, and it was flawless. I'll try to post a pic and see what you guys think of the primer hit. I'd much rather it be a bit of debris than bad ammo. That stuff isn't cheap! Thanks again and glad we got things cleared up.
I have had no trouble, yet.
Sorry for the gigantic size ;D. Opinions are welcome, so please let me know what you think. Thanks.
(http://i909.photobucket.com/albums/ac298/jdk112/IMG_0509_zpsuzmscdww.jpg)
(http://i909.photobucket.com/albums/ac298/jdk112/IMG_0507_zpscc9itkoj.jpg)
Pictures?
Got it! I see one way off-center. Anything else?
I noticed the off center hit as well. I can't say I paid attention to the rest of the brass, which I gave to a friend who loads 10. Does the hit mean anything to you guys? It seems no one else, so far anyway, has had the problem which indicates either my gun is the problem or its isolated to a small batch of ammo. Since my gun handled the other brands well, I have to suspect the ammo.
I looks like a light strike, but another thing that comes to mind here is the primer may not have been fully seated and moved forward when struck. I have seen some Starling brass exhibit slightly loose primer pockets, that led to primers popping out when shot. Underwood I think contracts with Starline...
Interesting. Could that cause the off center hit? Thanks again for the help.
To me, I'd say off center and light strike. I'd guess a tight chamber that caused a round that was close to fully chambered, close enough for the striker to release, but the round went into battery upon being hit.
Lone wolf are generally too tight. I stopped using my LW and stuck to stock Glock and my problems went away. Bang each and every time, except UW 220g hard cast. Mine doesn't feed them worth a damn.
Greg
Thinking about the off center hit and being a light strike a slightly out of battery position with the cartridge being low and off centered such as the case head wedged and not sliding completely under the extractor. What can cause that? Thicker or dented case extractor rim, sticky, tight or bent extractor trapping the case rim. These can be hard to understand if the slide moves into complete battery when the striker taps the cartridge knocking the slide into full battery without ignition.
Slide being dry or dirty could add to a lazy return to battery.
I'm not an expert and I'm not saying this is the definitive answer, but things to think about as the firearm is a dynamic tool, with moving parts and ammunition trying to fit the chamber during the cycle of timing with the moving parts...Underwood ammo has a higher impulse that increases the slide velocity during the rearward travel. This also translates to the shooter having recoil impulse to his or her grip. This has shifted shooters grip as such, that their thumbs can ride the slide and even engage the slide lock. The ammo can shift in the magazine due to the impulse as well.
Short of having a high speed camera recording this kind of stuff and view it at slow motion playback it would not be easy to see and study.
Bought three boxes of the 180gr FMJ few weeks ago for my G20 and I have had 0 issues with 100rds fired
I really appreciate all the replies gents. For clarification, the LW barrel is a .40 S&W conversion and is great. The 10 barrel is stock G29. This is a lot of very good info and it may very well be me. I'm used to shooting Glock 9s and my grip doesn't shift. I also shoot thumbs forward, with my slide rarely locking back on an empty mag. This together could be doing exactly what y'all suspect. I'm going to check on that as soon as I get on the range. Thanks again guys. This makes me feel better as I really wanted that ammo to work. I'll update as soon as I get it figured out.
I have a stock 29 gen 3. I had a failure to fire/light strike/bad primer on an Underwood 180 Gold Dot a few years ago. It only happened once but the primer looked a lot like the picture above.
No idea if the gun or the round were at fault. I will say it was the within the first 100 rounds through the 29 and it was right after I fixed a return to battery issue with a new recoil spring.
I've also had an issue with the slide not locking back after the last round, but I believe that is user error......
JohnnyGunz,
I had a bad batch of Underwood a while back. It was the 165 grain Gold Dot. I contacted Underwood via email, explained the issue, which was light loaded rounds. Cody Craig from Underwood emailed me back and said he would notify their development team on the issue, and sent me a coupon for another ammo purchase to make up for it (I don't remember how much). I thanked Cody for his help.
I then ordered some more 165 grain Gold Dot to replace the bad batch I had gotten. I mean, bad batches can happen with ALL ammo manufacturers, right? I then went to the range and fired the ammo again. This time I had more failure to fires and light loaded rounds. I brought the empty ammo boxes home and checked the lot number. Underwood had sent me replacement ammo from the same bad lot.
I took the time to email Cody again. This is what I had sent:
Cody,
Regarding the earlier below emails, I received an order of 3 boxes of 165 grain Gold Dot from the same lot #(005). I had three failures to fire this time out of the 60 rounds.
I didn't realize I had been sent the same lot number again. I think you should be aware of this lot as being problematic.
Please look into this issue. I have been a big fan of your ammo but now I am starting to question it.
Cody responded with this:
Cody Craig <sales@underwoodammo.com> Jul 20 at 11:56 AM
To
'Nick
Thank you for bringing this to our attention. I will definitely make note of this and let the developing team know.
Now, as a faithful Underwood customer, let's say I am more than a little disappointed in the response. Underwood ammo has always been superb. Their service has always been great. But, this response from them sending me more of the same bad ammo, and saying they will notify their development team again, all the while never removing the bad batch of ammo, is disconcerting to say the least.
I am not one to bash ammo makers on forums. As you can see from the email date I held on to this for months. But since you bring up a similar issue, I thought it to be appropriate to bring up the issue now.
Underwood is by far my favorite ammo company, especially for 10mm and .357 Sig. But for now, I have lost confidence in their ammo for carry, as well as their handling of this problem.
If Kevin sees this post, I certainly hope he takes the steps to make this right. I wish to continue to be an Underwood customer in the future.
I work for a customer service outsourcing company. Biggest one in the world in fact.
It is entirely possible that Cody is completely disassociated with the production floor. In fact, he may not even be a direct Underwood employee. He probably has a script and a CRM tool and logs a case that is assigned to the load development team.
maybe not, but the responses certainly sound to me more like scripted process.
I'm just sitting over here looking to get my first non-firing Underwood round in four calibers ;D
In all the ammo I have fired... one .44 not fully seated and one squib 10mm. Everything else has went bang!
Quote from: Intercooler on September 24 2015 09:28:20 AM MDT
In all the ammo I have fired... one .44 not fully seated and one squib 10mm. Everything else has went bang!
always better the two scenarios you had over a ka-boom from double load.
Quote from: sqlbullet on September 24 2015 07:54:07 AM MDT
I work for a customer service outsourcing company. Biggest one in the world in fact.
It is entirely possible that Cody is completely disassociated with the production floor. In fact, he may not even be a direct Underwood employee. He probably has a script and a CRM tool and logs a case that is assigned to the load development team.
maybe not, but the responses certainly sound to me more like scripted process.
Could be. This might explain the apparent lack of urgency and concern.
I was at the range and was able to get 30-40 rounds of UW through the G29 without any issues. I really can't say what happened with those two FTF rounds. Comparing the firing pin marks, the problem round I kept sure looks like it took a lighter hit than the rest. But, the off-center hit appears normal. The FP hits deepest off-center. The FP and channel are GTG. As well, the breech face and all is good. There's not anything mechanically which would appear to cause a light hit. I'm not sure what to think. Nothing changed except the rounds. Maybe it was a couple of fluke hard primers. It happens. I'll continue to monitor things and if it happens again, I'll let everyone know. Unfortunately, there is a question mark hanging over this ammo in my mind. As well, the lack of CS response is disappointing.
The not knowing is a real question mark for sure! Glad to hear it running better... :)
Quote from: The_Shadow on September 22 2015 02:30:08 PM MDT
You may want to inspect the striker, striker spring, channel and spring cups that they are clean, free of any debris or damage. Oil, carbon, debris, plating form primers inside the striker channel can slow the forward progress leading to a light or no strike condition... ::)
I don't see why more people do not clean the firing pin channel. It only takes a few minutes. The backing plate and firing pin assembly can be removed with the slide still on the gun. The extractor channel can also be cleaned at the same time. Quick and easy.
.
Quote from: Johnny Gunz on September 24 2015 04:23:13 PM MDT
I was at the range and was able to get 30-40 rounds of UW through the G29 without any issues. I really can't say what happened with those two FTF rounds. Comparing the firing pin marks, the problem round I kept sure looks like it took a lighter hit than the rest. But, the off-center hit appears normal. The FP hits deepest off-center. The FP and channel are GTG. As well, the breech face and all is good. There's not anything mechanically which would appear to cause a light hit. I'm not sure what to think. Nothing changed except the rounds. Maybe it was a couple of fluke hard primers. It happens. I'll continue to monitor things and if it happens again, I'll let everyone know. Unfortunately, there is a question mark hanging over this ammo in my mind. As well, the lack of CS response is disappointing.
Pardon me if I sound blunt, but if you get any strikes that far off center, even once, your gun is broken.
Most all common primers have a very small "sweet spot" in the center of the primer. Strike outside of that with a typical striker/pin, it won't fire. The anvil (internal fluted disc) has a small center pin that the primer case strikes against, causing ignition of the compound. It's no surprise that round didn't fire.
As far as the strike appearing light/shallow, it should. It hasn't fired. Firing, especially high/full pressure rounds like UW's, will force the primer against the breach and striker, making it appear deeper, often embossing the striker channel hole onto the primer, exaggerating it further. The strike pictured appears deep enough to have caused a discharge, had it struck center.
I suggest checking very carefully, the locking block, locking block frame channel, pins, pin holes, barrel locking lugs and FP safety. Better yet, just send it in. Any healthy Glock pistol simply should not allow a striker fall that far off center. Ever. If it does, it's broken.
Very good points!
What would allow that much travel off-center? I'm not real up on striker-fired pistols and can't picture how the firing pin could go through the opening being that far off.
Might not be the firing pin not centered in the channel. It could be the barrel not seating quite fully into battery. This would cause off-center high strikes. Or an out-of-spec barrel might center the bore too high in the breech, resulting in off-center low strikes.
Quote from: Intercooler on September 25 2015 02:42:27 AM MDT
Very good points!
What would allow that much travel off-center? I'm not real up on striker-fired pistols and can't picture how the firing pin could go through the opening being that far off.
It can't, unless it's broken.
Quote from: sqlbullet on September 25 2015 09:11:36 AM MDT
Might not be the firing pin not centered in the channel. It could be the barrel not seating quite fully into battery. This would cause off-center high strikes. Or an out-of-spec barrel might center the bore too high in the breech, resulting in off-center low strikes.
Any of these conditions indicate a broken pistol.
If the FP safety is failed, and somehow does allow the striker to fall if it's out of battery enough to allow the chamber low enough to make that strike, the trigger shouldn't engage the striker lug (it will cam out of position = dead trigger). A defective locking block or barrel lug can allow the condition, but I think it would be more frequent, and should be visually obvious. Unless the barrel or slide is WAY out of spec (and visually obvious), the barrel can't position too high in the slide. Unlike 1911-type pistols, the slide does not secure the barrel. Glock pistol barrel (lugs) determine the state of battery proportionate to the slide position (barrel lug and locking block engagement). If not for the barrel lugs (and slide lock), the slide and barrel would just launch off the frame at the first chambering. This is also possible on a healthy pistol, if the slide lock is damaged or installed backwards.
Glock OEM striker and striker channel have a very tight tolerance. A failure here would much more likely prevent a strike, rather than allow an off-center strike. The firing pin is flat, and tapered. If the spring cups did allow the striker to misalign, the shape of the FP would center it well before it extended enough to cause a primer strike. The striker travels and centers perfectly, even with the spring cups completely removed (just tried it). However, there's no way it would fire, as the striker has no spring-tension in this condition. Ultimately, if any condition allows the FP to strike off-center at any time, the slide is probably irreparably damaged/defective. Otherwise, this condition would exist much more often than not, and I seriously doubt it would survive many firings, let alone a couple hundred.
I appreciate all the responses and assistance gents. I performed a pretty detailed exam and everything in the pistol appears perfect. The FP is undamaged and centered, but seems to leave a slightly deeper indentation on one side of a strike. The 9 mm cases we looked at fired from Glocks seemed to have a similar strike. All I can do is watch it and be mindful of the suggestions given here.
I've been a lurker, but joined up for some help. That's exactly what I got and it's appreciated. I have to say I'm really glad I finally got into the 10 mm club. I shoot Glocks regularly, but didn't have one I felt was fit for critter protection. I have a beautiful Dave Clements custom Redhawk, but shooting it is not instinctive anymore after constant Glock use (and it weighs almost 50 oz. before being stuffed with 320 grain slugs :o). The G29 solved this problem very well. I must also give props to the Lone Wolf .40 conversion barrel. It shoots great, and easy, and makes the Glock 10 mm's just about the most versatile handgun around.
I'll keep y'all posted if anything developments with the ammo. Until then, I do think the UW 180 TMJ is an ideal woods round and is nice shooting, considering the power, in even the G29. Take care and thanks again everyone.
BTW, I changed the title to sound less critical of UW. The price, fast shipping, over quality, accuracy, and variety of the rounds is awesome. I do not wish to malign the company as it has a long and solid reputation among 10 mm shooters. Besides, this issue could be me or the gun, and maybe just a break in thing. Who knows, but I'm giving UW the benefit of the doubt at this point. And if an occasional hard primer does slip in, it's no different than any big name ammo company anyway. Be safe.
You, as a Glock armorer, should be at least familiar with the designed function of Glock pistols and their various safeties. The off-center primer strikes you've experienced, more than once, renders that pistol unreliable, regardless of how it appears or functions now. It isn't a "break-in thing", nor is it the ammo. At least 2 internal failures had to have occurred for that to happen, and it will happen again. Just hope it isn't at a time someone's life depends on it.
As far as suspecting "hard" primers, I don't buy that. Primer lots can be bad, but not because they are "hard". When I do custom work on any trigger or striker, it gets a full test with rifle primers. Stock pistols don't see any difference whatsoever, and only the lightest striker springs have had an issue.
I like Underwood as much as the next guy but have had hard primers in the past as well. It's not some phantom thing that does not exist. It was their 180 grain target load about 2 years ago. Just would never run very well. Also, the 147 grain +p+ 9mm didn't feed in my Glock 17 or PPQ. Factory recoil spring not up to the task? Anyway I bought their +p version after and that runs fine.
Thanks for the honest assessment, Dave.
No ammo company is beyond reproach.
It's not just you, Senor Gunz. I have had primers fail to ignite on 10mm Underwood 180gr TMJ, 180gr XTP, and 220gr HC. Sometimes a second strike lit them, sometimes not. On one box of 50 Underwood 220gr HC I had 6 failures to fire. I have had no failures at all with Hornady, Remington, Double Tap, or Precision One 10mm.
I want to love Underwood 10mm but I need to decide if a slower, more expensive round from Double Tap or Buffalo Bore is worth it to know that first round will go off when intended, under duress. It's ironic because I've never had feeding issues with Underwood, just bad primers. And I keep the firing pin channel scrupulously clean and dry on my G20. Stock striker spring, too.