Most of those 9mm's I'm sure were before mid 2010 or so. Saying that there are newer ones for sure that will get 3" and sometimes 2", but those are the exception by and large. The .45's have always been very accurate from what I've read through the years on many other forums. Same goes for the .40's, but there are very few FS .40s that have accuracy problems, but I've read there are some. Nothing that S&W won't fix for you though.

I assume most aftermarket barrels are just a little bit bigger and have less play. I know that Grant from G&RTactical is getting __Oversized__ barrels from Storm Lake that they will ONLY allow him to install. They have to be custom fitted to the slide, that's how he's been getting 1" to sub 1" groups. He's charging $200 with it fitted, which is a good price, but then again you shouldn't have to do this either. I know if the M&P 9 FS were coming out of the factory getting 2" groups there would still be people paying for 1" and below groups, but it wouldn't be many. Apparently custom fit over-sized barrels is what the S&W Pro shooters have been getting for years for the M&P's, and I assume any gun they get that's not a revolver.

Now hopefully Apex's new locking block will make most 9mm FS's the way they should of been from the factory. I'm sure it'll make the M&P9C a little bit better, but I'm not 100% sure on this. I'd assume it'd make the .40's tighten up the groups a little bit more.

Let's hope in the future that S&W will have lasers on the mfg line that will read the dimensions of the whole slide down to 10,000's of an inch and also the barrel. Then they'll have to program a way of trying to match the slide to the barrel as best as they can. I'm sure it would improve the accuracy on all of the guns that are produced. Now if they also addressed the dwell time in the M&P 9 FS it would make them more accurate right away, but if they also did the laser matching it would be very, very accurate I'd assume. I'm sure it wouldn't be cheap, but maybe if they do an upgrade in 5-10 years they might look into something like this. First step is fixing the issue with the dwell time right away. It'd be nice if Apex could license the new locking block to S&W and if you'd call them with your M&P9 FS you'd get one. Maybe for your M&P9C and M&P40 FS you'd have to pay a little money for one.

I've been waiting to purchase a new M&P9 FS from Grant, which I guess the barrels won't be ready until end of this month at the earlies or probably mid August. I've been looking on local AL postings and keep coming across G17 and G19 Gen4's. I shot a G17 G4 but it had the FTE issues a lot. It was very annoying. I'd much rather have 6" groups out to 25 yards with the M&P9 FS (which I think is very unacceptable though) than 9mm Gen4 FTE issues which can really ruin your day if your defending yourself. Was a good deal on the G17 Gen4 for $450, but still couldn't bite since just don't know if you'll run into the FTE issue right away or from what I've read it's more prone to happen after 1200 rounds or so.

I just wish I knew the estimated price on the Apex locking block, if it was $25-30 shipped then I'd just pick up a used M&P9 FS and be done with it. Since their stuff is generally pretty expensive, then that's why I'm very heavily leaning towards the $200 custom fit barrel. Why I'm willing to wait to get a new one from Grant is so I don't have to pay SH back and forth for the slide, so I'd save $25-30. Then again I assume you could do USPS though, but haven't looked into that though, then it'd be a lot cheaper than that.

Oh I forgot, I would sell the Glock Gen4 once I knew if I'd go the Apex locking block direction or the G&RTactical one. Even though I just might get a M&P9 FS that does shoot good enough (under 2.5" to 25 yds). I will eventually start shooting out that far.