Here's an except I think was pretty telling...

I tested the sample gun from my 25-yard bench on an MTM gun rest. I followed my usual protocol of measuring five-shot groups for an indication of how well the gun would group for an experienced shooter on a calm day with minimum wobble, and measuring again for the best three shots to factor out human error and to get a prediction of the pistol’s inherent mechanical accuracy.

Winchester 230-grain Ranger high-tech hollow points have earned an excellent reputation “on the street” with American police departments. Five shots measured 3.6 inches center-to-center within the generous 4-inch limit generally specified as “acceptable service pistol accuracy.” However, the best three shots grouped only 1.35 inches apart. That was more like it.

Federal Classic 185-grain JHP was next. This is a soft-kicking load that has earned its chops on the street, and has also earned a reputation for extraordinary accuracy. It has frequently proven itself the most accurate ammo in various .45ACP tests, and came through again this time. The overall five-shot group measured 2.15 inches, and the best three cluster was an extraordinary 0.20 of an inch, a measurement center-to-center that was less than half the size of a single .45 hole. If multiple observers hadn’t been spotting the hits, we would have thought it was a double instead of a triple. The three hits were in one hole that measured 0.55 of an inch apart. The best four out of five hits were 1.15 inches.

The gun didn’t like one particular load for accuracy, but other than that, I have no complaints with it. Joe Bergeron designed the M&P .45 for battle, not competition, but interestingly enough it does pretty well in competition too.

My friend Chris Christian, an outdoor writer, is a big fan of the M&P and has been shooting the 9mm version for some months now in IDPA competition. In July of 2007, he used the .45ACP version (slick slide, no thumb safety and no disconnector) to shoot against the 1911s in the Custom Defense Pistol category at a match in Jacksonville, Florida. Chris came in first place overall in that division by a significant margin.

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Jack C

Actually that claim about him being a big Gen 3 guy is the reason he's doing it. And like he said about the M&P guy defending his pistol to feel better about his purchase, I'd say the pot is calling the kettle black here again.

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Rod
M&P 22A, 40c, 15A, 15-22

Actually, that's not true at all. He doesn't have to, nor does anyone else that likes M&P's, knock the Gen 3's.. to feel good about anything. So I guess maybe you can try another excuse to justify your 'stuff"

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Jack C

Of course it was. It was an attitude problem, plain and simple.

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

I think you may have misunderstood what crracer was getting at with his reply.

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

Hey, I don't own a Glock or an M&P pistol. I wasn't the one trying to justify my 'stuff'. Nor do I, my stuff is my stuff, I don't have to justify or defend it to anyone.

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Rod
M&P 22A, 40c, 15A, 15-22

Since you don't have to "justify", do I have to apologize... for misunderstanding... sorry, if I misunderstood your response.

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Jack C

No, I didn't take any offense to anything you said

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Rod
M&P 22A, 40c, 15A, 15-22

The slide on my Glock 19 has always closed when the magazine is inserted with a slam...I always thought was a good feature.

It is not supposed to do that. Anyway, I was not slamming it in at the time. Well look everyone, If you like to have your guns malfunction on you all the time then that is your deal. I wnat my guns to perform like they were supposed to all the time. Guns ar3e not supposed to load themselves. Just to clarify one more thing incase you did not this either, You gun is not supposed to shoot itself either.

Please CLOSE THIS THREAD.

If you got a link to a video showing a gun shooting itself, I really want to see that!

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Rod
M&P 22A, 40c, 15A, 15-22

As a competitive IDPA shooter I want the slide to go forward after inserting a loaded magazine, it saves a step and saves time. If one of my autos “sticks” I try to have it fixed. You do it however you want and I will do the same, be it a M&P, Kimber, Para or Glock , mag in slide forward saves time.

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Shoot fast & live long
Warren

Nearly every semi-auto in existence can be made to "auto forward" under certain conditions, whether they are "supposed to" or not. If you want an auto-loader that will "perform like they are supposed to all the time", such as what you suggest above, then the Glock probably isn't for you. There are many, many documented cases of Glock pistols that "auto forward", either consistently, or at random. So what are you going to do if/when that happens with yours? Are you going to stand around and throw a fit, or are you going to keep your head in the game and run the gun anyway?

IMHO, you should always expect the unexpected. You should expect your gun/holster/ammunition/gear/rig to do something you don't think it should do, and you should have a contingency in place for when it does. If something as minor as your slide "auto-forwarding" is enough to take your mind out of the fight, then you need to really address the numerous possible issues that could come up with your gun/gear/rig in your training, before you are standing around wondering what to do about them in the middle of a fight.

As for me, I've got two different Glock's that will "auto-forward" from time to time on a reload. The only thing that crosses my mind at that point is, "extend - touch - press........".

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

Are you making a statement about the gun's design and engineering, as in "S&W designed the M&P so that the slide is will not close if you whack the magazine."?

If so, S&W disagrees. From page 16 of the M&P Owner Manual, found at http://www.smith-wesson.com/wcsstore..._10-30-10.pdf:

WARNING: DO NOT USE EXCESSIVE UPWARD FORCE
WHEN INSERTING A LOADED MAGAZINE INTO THE
PISTOL. EXCESSIVE UPWARD FORCE COULD CAUSE
THE SLIDE TO MOVE FORWARD, CHAMBERING A ROUND AND
MAKING THE PISTOL READY TO FIRE.

I interpret this as follows:

(1) S&W acknowledges this is a possible behavior of the pistol when whacking home the magazine. This acknowledgement is sufficient to understand that S&W did not design the pistol's innards such that this is actively prevented. (Examination of the gun's guts also shows this to be true.) Furthermore, their testing and use of the gun shows this can and does happen, and they don't consider it a flaw to be engineered out of the gun.

(2) They clearly state the reason for their warning, which is that the slide may chamber a round, leading to a loaded gun which could fire with negligence or a *real* malfunction, like a protruding firing pin. It should be noted, however, that in the case of a protruding firing pin, the gun may fire regardless of the method by which the slide is closed short of pinching it and sloooooowly closing it -- which none of us do. If you close the slide with the slide release, it will move into battery as forcefully as it does when slamming the magazine causes the slide to close.

At the range, I often slap the magazine home to load my gun. It is not a fault in the gun; and it is not mishandling on my part because I desire and intend for this to happen. I ensure that any risk of an unintended discharge is minimized by proper gun handling. The gun is not pointed at anything I am unwilling to destroy, and I am sure of my target and what is behind it.

Just so you all know this to, I sent an email to s&w and they repied. If your gun is doing this send it back so it does not MALFUNCTION, have them fix it.


____________________________________________________
No sir they should not do that.

Regards, Miguel
1-800-331-0852 Ext. 4125


From: -----
Sent: Wednesday, February 29, 2012 4:07 PM
To: Smith & Wesson Support
Subject: M&P question

I am looking into purchasing a M&P 45. I was able to shoot one at my local range. My question to S&W is; Are the M&P pistols’ slide supposed to close automatically when a full magazine is placed into them?

I can't imagine the slide closing just from inserting the mag after having just bought a 40c. My slide lock is so tight, it takes real effort to use as a release.

However, like most of my Rugers, I don't use them as a release and I'm not convinced they were intended to be used that way what with their smallish design. Totally unlike the actual slide release on my P91DC. I am loving this pistol though!

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Rod
M&P 22A, 40c, 15A, 15-22

My M&P40c will "auto forward" without fail, if I insert the loaded magazine
hard enough, and it has since the day I bought it. It's not a matter of the slide lock being "tight" or "loose", rather it is a product of the inertia and the subsequent energy that inertia creates, that has to be dissipated when the loaded magazine is "sent home" with a bit of force. Most semi-autos, regardless of make/model, can be made to "auto-forward" if the mag is inserted firmly enough, especially after they get a bit of wear on the slide-stop lever and mating surface on the slide.

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

I bought my first S&W revolver Model 19 .357 mag in 1972 and I carried it on duty for 10 years and I have kept the gun ever since. My department then mandated the S&W model 66 for the next five years. We then switched to the Beretta 92F and I carried that for 15 years until I retired. I had carried S&W model 39 and 459 for awhile as alternate weapons but they were not good guns. My department is now switching over to the M&P 40, so I bought one to use in private security work.

I have fired about 200 rounds through it. It auto loads whenever I tap the magazine in, I am not happy with this since none of my semi auto's have ever done this. I also am not happy with the 40 cal round but will keep it since many security jobs call for a CCW with 40 cal pistols.

I shoot an XDM 4.5 9mm in USPSA Limited class and a Glock 17 3rd gen 9mm in Open class. As a former rangemaster, I found that one gun design will not make everyone happy. You need to test what feels right for you. S&W had a poor reputation for building semi autos in the 70's and 80's, that allowed Glock and Beretta to come on strong in the law enforcement market in the mid 1980's. I hope my S&W continues to be free from any problems as my Beretta.

You are right. I got mine to do it last night, but it took a REALLY good slap to have this happen. I could see after some time that it could be easier to do.

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Rod
M&P 22A, 40c, 15A, 15-22

Once again, your guns are not operating correctly if the slide closes when you insert a magazine. "Auto-Forward" is a name given to the malfunction of somebodies gun that does not want to do anything about it. I spoke to S&W, they want you to send in a gun that is not working correctly. They will and have corrected this malfunction on many M&P handguns. The Glock that I picked up today, G17/G3 does not do this. Because of all the people saying it would, I really slammed that mag in there and the slide would not close unless I closed it. The Glock is not Malfunctioning.

All 3 of my M&Ps "auto-forward" if I slap the mag in hard. As an IDPA competitor, I LIKE that feature. I have no desire to send it off to get it "fixed". It's just fine like it is.

OK, if it is a malfunction and a danger, there seems to be a LOT of malfunctioning pistols out there. Not to disperage my precious M&P, I google Glock slam charge...

Anyone can google this, but you will see a couple of hits on this. Just so happens, when I googled and selected a link, it was to a defensive carry website and the first post was about a M&P 40. Followed by three or four people chimming in that their glocks do it and it's normal...

inserting mag/slide goes forward?

I was surprised, well not really, but within that single google hit, there are multiple people saying their gun does it, be it M&P, Glock, HK, Baretta, Bersa etc. I believe their are a couple of people that say that it isn't supposed to do it.

I really don't care one way or the other who is right, I don't have a problem with it, but I'd say eventually, Vector's G17 is going to do it because judging by this one link, there wasn't a single person in there that said there glock never did it.

Anyway, Vector, I hope you're not disappointed in your Glock when it starts to do this. Seems its not a matter of if, but rather when.

I tried my M&P 40c again, it took me 4 tries to get it to close. I could see after the first slam, the slide lock had slid down quite aways. I also tried to no avail on my SR9c, and it didn't give at all. Hmmm, come to think of it, no one in that link mentioned their Ruger would perform a slam charge, guess that makes Ruger the best!

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Rod
M&P 22A, 40c, 15A, 15-22

Ruger is one of the better guns out there.
Iy does not really matter what people say about the slide closing, they may like it or hate it. That is not the point. The point is, it is NOT supposed to do that. The gun is malfuctioning.

yeah, I got your point. It just appears Glock isn't immune to it, maybe you'll get lucky. Either way, you have a nice gun, enjoy it.

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Rod
M&P 22A, 40c, 15A, 15-22

The point is, just about EVERY semi-auto on the market will/can be made to "auto-forward" under certain conditions. I have two Glock pistols that will do it consistently during quick reloads. I have 2 Bersa pistols that will do it. Even my Para LDA will "auto-forward" if you insert the magazine with enough force.

The bottom line is, if it is your goal to buy a semi-auto pistol that will never "auto-forward", you're going to be looking long and hard because most of them will/can be made to do it. Instead of focusing so much on the condition itself with any pistol, I think time would be much more wisely spent training ourselves to get back into the fight after a reload, regardless of what action it is that causes the slide to go forward.

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

I have 226 SIGS in 9 and 40, XDM9, 1911's, Ruger SR 40c yadayada....my daily carry is a M and P 9c. They are great pistols. Honestly, most of the stuff out there right now is very reliable. If you have issues send yours back, SW will make it right; and so will virtually every manufacturer.

So there's been a lot of bashing a lot of guns here...I really don't care what anyone says, when my slide goes forward when I slam the mag in, it's NOT a malfunction, it's what I want and what I expect. So it's a good thing. What I'm concerned about is that no one has commented on the OP's statement about the slide going forward and how it would "make the guy in the next lane's day" if his finger was on the trigger. Why would the guy in the next lane care, unless you had the gun pointed at him when you inserted the magazine? If you did, you probably should not have been at a public range until you learned muzzle control. Your muzzle should have been pointed down range when you were inserting the magazine into the gun, and if it wasn't, you should correct that before your next range trip...

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Gary

S&W says its a malfunction and you are letting them give you a product that does not work correctly. They will keep putting out product that is malfunctioning as long as people like you let them.

They "say" that because their attorneys TELL them to say it. It's NOT a malfunction for many/most of us. Watching that "malfunction" in a match was one reason I looked at the M&P. The "malfunction" works quite well for myself and many others. I'd be disappointed if it DIDN'T work that way. I hope they DO continue to put out products with this "malfunction".

Now I wonder why their attorneys TELL them to say it. Is it because it is not safe or because its a mistake. I am thinking I am going to believe the people that make the gun than you. They are willing to fix the mistake. Oh, wait a minute, the gun was not designed to do that. Now if the gun was not designed to do that and it does, ummm, what is that called again? It kind of like the gas tank on the 79' Pinto. The gas tank was not designed to explode when it got hit from behind. Was that a cool feature too? Did YOU go out buy the 79' Pinto for that neat feature?

Like that post, even though I don't own 1911 ( I would like to)
I do own two Smiths, a 642 and MP 40C and they are both great guns.
There is still "just something" about a 1911.

Reply to engineer1911

Can you name any polymer semi-auto design that doesn't suffer from the same "malfunction", as you call it?

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

Well yes I can. The S&W Sigma for example does not suffer that malfunction and that is the cheapest gun they make, my G17, every Sig I have ever picked up. Walther polymer pistols HK, the entire line of SR and P series by Ruger, and so on.The M&P is the only one that does it.

The Sigma I have on my belt right now will "auto-forward", the other one I have in my safe will as well, though not as consistently. I have a both a Glock G22 and a G23 that will "auto-forward" as well, in addition to a Ruger P95 that I have. I have a couple of Bersa's that will auto-forward, a Para LDA on occasion, and two Taurus PT111 MP's that will do it from time to time. I've seen just about every brand/type/model of semi-auto you can think of come through one of my classes at one time or another and I can tell you that there are far more out there that WILL auto-forward, than there are those that won't.

The issue isn't that a gun may or may not auto-forward, because any semi-auto can do it at any time. The issue is how you respond to it when it happens, because it WILL eventually happen, whether you shoot a Glock, S&W, Ruger, SIG, etc. If this is something that throws you so far off of your game that you can't get your head back in the fight (which it certainly appears to do when reading through your various posts), then you might be better off to rid yourself of your semi-auto pistols and choose a good revolver instead.

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

I have never had any of my pistols' slides move forward and load a chamber without me intenionaly making it do so. Infact the only semi auto that even has an "auto foward" design feature is the Bersa. It does not matter anyhow I did not end up buying the M&P becaus e of this malfunction and would never buy any gun the had a malfunction like this much less a malfunction that the company knew was happening on a wide spread basis and they chose not to do anything about. They could put a recall on the pistol and thoose owners that choose to send theirs in could and those that did not want wouldn't. The fact that this does not happen just when the gun is worn with 250,000 rounds thru it, but when its is brand new out of the factory with round thru it. They are selling the gun knowing it is a bad design. They could have design the gun and made it seem like a feature but didn't because only 90% of them do it and they don't exactlly know why. Instead they are giving their loyal costumers a gun that is not working correctly. Do you see the problem in the ethics here. It's BULL. If yiou were a buisness owner and you sold a product to the public and your product did not work the way you said it was going to work, You would be held accountable. IT'S BAD BUISNESS, BOTTOM LINE.

If this is true it makes me sad.

What you seem to be missing here is, if S&W is selling guns with a "known defect", then so is Glock and many other manufacturers. That was the reason behind my previous post - most any semi-auto will auto-forward, even if they haven't had "250,000" rounds run through them.

This is kind of a stupid video, and the guy likes to throw a few curse words in now and then, but it demonstrates two different Glock pistols and a 1911 all auto-forwarding with nothing but a firm insertion of the magazine:

Slap Reloading - YouTube

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

Umm...not a valid comparison at all, but I think you knew that. The Pinto was a DEFECT that hurt people. The M&P works like any number of autos will work, it just does it easier and better.
Try to stick to the subject...

Thats great.The fact still stands that its not supposed to do it. What is so difficult to understand about that? In my experience, I did not slam in the magazine. I slid it up to the locking position and the slide slammed shut.I tried the same thing with the Glock 17 I had rented also, the slide stayed open. I Did the samething on my Sigma, the slide stayed open and I did it on my Colt 1911 and what do ya know the slide stayed open. I bought the Glock 17/G3 and I am happy with it. Maybe when I am ready to purchase another gun I will look at Smith and Wesson again. I do not want to buy a gun that malfunctions fresh off the GS shelf. I thought that I would get that with an M&P and after researching it i would have. Maybe I'll go with the Rock Island 1911 next time or maybe the CZ or the FNH. Maybe the Beretta, My prior service weapon. I do not want to deal with a company that says to me "Our gun is **** and we are going to take your hard earned money and seel it to you anyway because we don't care what one guy thinks, we care how many guys we can rip off and get away with it.

I am sticking to the subject Chief, its my thread. and it is a fair comparison because if i were not expecting the slide to slam shut and if I were a newbie to the gun world and had my finger on the trigger, the guy in the lane next to me would have been dead. It is a safety issue and it could kill people, Get it?

You seem to be one of the VERY few that have an issue with this so-called "malfunction". The rest of us LIKE the feature. I sure don't feel ripped off.

So...they need a make a completely idiot-proof gun? The "newbie" needs to demonstrate proper muzzle control. A newbie can screw up untold different ways and hurt someone. This feature is the LEAST of his concern if he's that careless with the muzzle and his trigger finger.

You can buy whatever you want, I don't really care. I'm simply pointing out the hypocrisy in your reasoning. You say you won't buy the M&P because it will auto-forward (perfectly reasonable decision on your part), but you'll buy a Glock even though as has been shown, they will auto-forward as well. So it seems you are holding one make/model to a different standard than the other. I've yet to see you call for a full-scale recall of all the Glock pistols because they will auto-forward, yet you've done just that with the S&W.

IMO, you have stated a valid reason why you don't want the M&P. But that reasoning loses some validity when you purchase another gun that suffers from the same "defect", as you call it. To each their own.

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NRA Pistol,PPITH,PPOTH&TASER

I want to know how to get this "feature" on all of my autos. I don't put a magazine into the gun to leave it unloaded. Anyone who can't keep their finger off the trigger while inserting a mag is a prime candidate for pulling it when they drop the slide.

Thats what I said, a newbie. If ya want this feature to be on all your guns i'm sure you can rig so it will do that. Or maybe you can just send them all to smith and wesson and tell them to "fix a problem", it should come back not working just the way you want it to.

someone seems a little uptight over a gun they dont own......

If you read the thread from the begining chief you would know why. But obviuosly you did not. So I dont know what to tell you.

You really say some ridiculous stuff... if anyone ever sounded like a troll, you sure do. Guess I can say what I want here too.. That really made sense, finger on the trigger AND aiming the gun at the guy in the next lane...

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Jack C