Went to my lgs this morning to buy A Ruger LCP for pocket carry and saw a deal on the Shield for $379 with 2 extra 8 round mags. I figure with the mags being almost $40 a piece 2 extra ones included pretty much made the Shield the same price as the LCP. Now to my question/issue; the slide stop on this Shield is freaking hard to release from the locked open position. My full size M&P 9 is butter smooth to release. Is this normal? Will it eventually smooth out or do I need to polish it up? The trigger is good on this gun but I'm not digging how hard that slide stop is to release.

Yes... It's normal to be very stiff, if trying to use the Slide Stop as a release. It may become easier with use... Mine did, but many here (including me) slingshot the slide, in order to optimize the momentum of the recoil spring.

The Shield is a tight gun and yes, the slide release is tuff to use. The weapon will loosen up a tad, but the slide release is still tuff. I adopted the overhand slide rack and stopped using the slide release.

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PC Shield 45
NRA Life Member

I will start an argument here, but semi autos are not designed to function this way. The proper method is to pull the slide all the way back, with the weak hand, and release it. The purpose of the slide release is to permit closing the slide with an empty gun, for cleaning etc.

I totally understand both sides of the slingshot argument. I guess I have just watched to much Tac Tv. I generally use the slide release to forward the slide on reloading, it's easy to do on my full size M&P 9 and on my Colt New Agent but it is hard as hell to release on this Shield.

bingo.......!

Same here.

I use it as a slide lock only on this pistol.

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MSP - Retired

Took it to the range this morning and ran 100 rounds through it. The slide stop realeases a lot easir with a round in the mag than it does with an empty mag or no mag in at all. I may polish up the slide stop a bit to see if that helps.

My Shield's slide stop is really hard to manipulate with my thumb too. I've had it since the middle of June of this year and it has loosened up a bit, but still way harder to operate than my 40fs and 40c. Let us know if polishing it helps or not, if it does I may give it a try.

With an empty mag inserted the slide stop should be very difficult to press. When the mag is empty, the mag follower is pressing up on the slide stop. This is how it's intended to work. It holds the slide back to alert the operator that they are out of cartridges. So, pressing it with an empty mag means you have to overcome the pressure of the mag spring as well as the friction of the slide stop notch.

Do not polish this piece. It will burnish itself with use. Any attempt to artificially speed this process could affect how it works. The contact area is very small. Any alteration of the angle could cause it to malfunction and not hold the slide back upon an empty mag. That is something you don't want.

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Freedom isn't free.