Update from this thread: New 9c on the way back to mother ship...S&W customer service rocks

It took about a month, but I got the 9c back from S&W today. Unfortunately it's still not fixed. The repair order says they polished the chamber (which they did). It's still too tight with some factory ammo. Polishing the chamber actually looks pretty ****** to me. It's not really a polish, but more like they took sandpaper to it and removed a lot of the black melonite.

Anyway, I immediately called them back and asked to send it back. I'd just prefer a new barrel at this point, as the "polish" job they did looks pretty ******. All of the ammo that won't fit in the 9C DOES fit fine into the chamber of both of my Shields, and my FS9. If they do some ****** "sanding" again, I'll probably put an aftermarket barrel in it. I even offered to just buy one from them..........they didn't bite. I'll ship it back tomorrow and post an update in another month.

Craig

Another good job from S&W, hurting their credibility some more. They just don't get it.

To bad, So Sad.

Shipped it back again today....I told them in the enclosed letter than it's the 2nd time coming back, and I don't trust the gun to carry. I asked for a new barrel....will see what comes of it. If it comes back with more "polishing" on the chamber, I may get rid of it and just stick to my trusty Shield.

I hate to hear this. I sent my M&P 9c back to S&W for repair because of "brass to face" -- 9 out of 10 empties ejected onto my head, face and chest. When I talked to S&W on their live chat, I was told that they actually did replace the barrel. Yesterday was the first chance I had to try it out. There was absolutely no improvement at all. It was still doing exactly the same thing. The CSR immediately sent me a return label and told me to emphasize that this was a second return for the same repair. FedEx came to the house to pick it up. Now I have to wait for another 3 weeks, hoping it gets repaired. By the way, the replacement barrel did not look new; its ramp had scuffing on the "polish" that looked like it could have been a repaired, return barrel from another customer. I've never had this problem with any other of my semi-auto pistols. If it isn't repaired this time, I will never buy another S&W of any kind.

5/13/16 Update. I finally got my M&P 9c back from the "Mutha" Ship for the second attempt to repair my first problem of BTF (brass-to-face). Enclosed with my pistol was a note that said they "fired 5 magazines with empties over the right shoulder. No repair needed." I called to confirm that they had indeed done nothing. The customer service technician said that "I'm not a repairman and I only know that they sent you a letter to explain this and I don't know the details." I had not received any letter. I plan to fire my pistol in a few days to see if it has improved. (Maybe they "broke it in", or something?) I'll post the results here. Hopefully, it will work fine but so far, I am very disappointed in their "customer service".

not happy to hear this from you two guys . I bought a m&p 45 kept having ammo hang up and not go into battery, plus the sights were way off called for warranty help and had to send it in. its going on three weeks now waiting for my gun to be returned and now wondering if its going to be fixed. this is my first s&w gun and by what I am hearing may be my last. I have only had the gun for one week before sending it in they have had the gun longer than I have , not feeling real good about how thing are going or amount of complaints I am hearing . maybe I should have bought another Kahr, I have a cw40 , 100% reliable never a issue what so ever and the more I shoot it the better it gets. also have a very reliable taurus 9 mm that has been outstanding out of the box. well we will see might have a gun coming up for sale soon

I guess we'll see what they do with mine. They received it again last Friday. It looked like they had taken a polishing tip with 150 grit sandpaper to the chamber....looked awful. Even after doing that, it still looked like the chamber surface areas were "uneven". I don't know if the case is getting cocked slightly sideways and wedging itself inside the chamber, but something's weird. Neither of my Shields or 9 full size have problems with the offending rounds. They seat just fine, and will freely "spin" around in the chamber. Guess we will see! Sorry to hear about your ejection issues.

I've only owned a handful of semi-auto's and believe it or not, the most reliable of all of them was the cheapest underdog of the bunch, a Bersa Thunder 380. It shot everything it was fed, never misfired in any way, was extremely accurate and easy to work on. Now, if I could just get it back from my daughter....

Sorry to hear that it didn't get fixed properly. My 9c had similar problems with extraction and that the slide lock lever would engage on a partially loaded magazine or was abnormally stiff & wouldn't budge with thumb pressure. The problems actually got worse the more I shot it. While I would have chalked the premature locking of the slide to me inadvertently pressing during firing, that fact that the lever seemed jammed clued me that there might be a greater problem. I seldom use the slide lock to release the slide, but it should still work. Mine took two trips back to fix the problem. The first time they polished the chamber. Mine looked like the job was performed better that what you (OP) described. The second time they replaced the barrel and the gun seems to work fine. Both of my M&P 9s were manufactured during the Hysteria of 2013, but my FS has always worked. As S&W usually test fires guns before sending them back, scuff marks on a new barrel might mean that they ran a couple of rounds thru it to check function. Nevertheless, keep pressing them to get it right. I agree that it's pretty frustrating to buy a new gun and have it not work. All of the companies have had QC issues as they have had to ramp up volume to keep up with demand.

What bothers me is that S&W claims to have test fired my 9c before returning it to me. If that is true, then they ignored the results. The marks on the ramp are not normal scuff marks. It looks like it was completely re-polished by a six year-old kid. I really hope I don't have to keep sending it back. From what I've read on different forums, this is not a new problem for this model. I think they should have figured out the cause and cure by now. Everything else about the pistol is fine. I had plans for buying more S&W pistols...not so sure right now.

do you have any pictures of these parts... can you post them if you do?

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Jack C

No. The pistol is on its way back to S&W -- again.

I had to send my M&P15 back three times for them to finally properly stake the gas keys. The first two times they claimed to have test fired it, which is BS. Had they really done so, it would've been obviously within the first couple of rounds that the issue still existed. I finally had to write them a letter for them to finally fix it on the third try. Such a waste of time for me, and a waste of money for them having to ship it both ways three times.

Brutal, just brutal. Right now, I have just about zero faith in S&W's repair service. I'm not sure who they have staffing this service center, but the 'net is awash in a sea of reports of guns that come back not even close to having the problem fixed. I have a pistol with them right now, and I sent it in basically just to see what was going to happen... I place the odds that it will be "fixed" adequately at probably around 10%. Has anyone else noticed that when you send in a gun for repair, it goes to TX instead of MA?

Regardless, it seems like these people are barely reading the enclosed notes with these guns. Then they "repair" it half-assed, "test" it half-assed, and just ship it back out. I saw someone else post what he thought was the reason so many of these poor QC guns are leaving the factory in the first place, and I think he's right on point. He said that half the guns go to people who barely shoot them and wouldn't know a "problem gun" anyway. Of the other half, a majority either fix it themselves, accept it as is, or just sell it away. Of the remaining small percentage, they send it in for repair... if they get it back still not fixed, almost all with either fix it themselves, accept it as is, or just sell it away. Rarely will someone return the same gun to be fixed repeatedly for the same problem.

I love it when people pull numbers out of the air as though it's fact..

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Jack C

Here are some numbers that are not pulled out of thin air. 100% of the last three Performance Center guns that I've owned have had to receive warranty work. I've also checked out a number of new guns at shops that have trigger and hammer drag marks from the rubbing on the frames or that have canted barrels or wonky cylinder gaps. Until I see some major turnaround in QC, I'm through buying new S&W guns.

Thank you... more for me..

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Jack C

Inevitably, whenever someone expresses their issues, there is always someone (or a group of someones) who get defensive, like we are speaking ill of your mother or something.

Buy all you want. Hopefully you don't pick up a $$$ performance center m&p that shoots 12+" groups like mine. Or a 327 that had the finish come off in spots before even getting it to the range. Or a 629 performance center that had wooden grips so poorly fitted that anyone with one barely functional eyeball could tell that it should have never left the factory.

I went to a gun show this morning and for the hell of it, I made a point to look at all th Performance Center wheel guns I saw. Out of the four I saw there, three of them had hammers that obviously had drag marks where they were hitting the frame. I'm just calling them like I see them.

Sorry to hear of your terrible experiences.... I pretty much own everything u have listed and not experienced any of that... but I think I may have one grip that wasn't fit perfectly... sorry if u take offense to my response, I don't intend to tweak u ... just see things differently than u.. I'm not one to jump on the trash S&W wagon.

Sent from my SM-G920P using Tapatalk

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Jack C

Fair enough. Perhaps I'm a little touchy because I was fed up with the whole "it's not the gun, it's you" thing with regards to the M&P9 accuracy problem. While it's certainly possible that some or maybe most of the people complaining about poor accuracy from their full size M&P 9mm guns are at least partially to blame, I've seen first hand that there is definitely an issue with some of these guns... despite what some apologists insist.

And from my experience, I've seen what I feel to be an unacceptable number of QC issues with new $1000+ performance center wheelguns... just MY personal impression and maybe it IS just my bad luck. I'm not one to "jump on the trash S&W wagon" just for the sake of bashing them any more than I am willing to pretend that some of the people on the wagon don't have legit beefs.

I apologize if I came off as thin-skinned... not your fault. Like you said, we just see things differently. Trust me... I REALLY want what I'm complaining about to NOT be true. I would love to get 110% behind an American company like S&W. When people were (are) on the boycott S&W thing over the stupid hammer locks, I definitely rolled my eyes hard on that one. This, however, is more of a QC issue; and that bothers me.

I just want a new barrel for the 9c.......my other M&P's have been nearly flawless, and I'm hoping they'll make this one just as reliable, but the chamber that came in mine is a good bit smaller than either of our Shields and the full size. I don't know if that's a good thing, or a bad one (except for the fact that the brass gets stuck in the chamber).

While a tighter chamber might be good on a target pistol, on a defensive gun, it's less than ideal if it is causing function issues... which it obviously is. Are you sure it's just undersized and there isn't a substantial burr? I'm wondering if this is what S&W thought was happening when they kind of polished the chamber. Perhaps they saw a burr and tried to grind / polish it out.

Worst case is you get a new barrel or get the chamber reamed to spec. Depending on your patience and tolerance for holding their feet to the fire, you could pay to have these things done yourself or you could keep sending it back until they make it right.

I have always had great CS service from S&W in the past. It makes you wonder if the service techs are actually wearing GLOCK name tags.

It's just too tight. I've used a light to look inside and it seems "smooth", with no burrs. It's just that some rounds will not fully seat. They just get tighter and tighter as you try to push them in. Honestly, I'll probably just keep sending it back until they get it right. I'm back to carrying my trusty Shield, and the Full size is by the bed, but the compact was really growing on me for carry. It seems to seat Federal HST just fine, it's many other factory loads that it tends to get angry with, and there's no way in hell I'm gonna jump through hoops to find a brand that works 100% of the time at the range and stick to just that load. It should eat about anything like my other M&P's, and that's just how I feel about it. I guess I'm now spoiled.

I agree, if gun does no digest everything I put in it then it does not stay around.

Odd. It's possible that it's chambered too short and the lands of the rifling are contacting the bullet. This could explain the reason why some fits and some doesn't... especially if empty brass fits fine.

You're correct in your assumption that there may be something up with the chamber length. I never tried any empty brass, as I was just seeing which brands/or even rounds of that brand would work or not work. Like I said, sometimes it may only be 2 out of 10 from a brand that may not fit...it's very inconsistent, but they literally start getting tight with about 1/4 inch left to go in, and you can force them all the way in, but it's tough getting them out at that point. And by tight, I mean hammer/screwdriver pounding tight.

When they "repaired" my 9c, the only thing they said they reported to have been done was to replace the barrel. The "new" replacement barrel had the worst looking ramp I had ever seen; it had been re-polished for some reason and done in a very sloppy way. Why would a "new" replacement barrel need to have been polished? My original barrel looked much better. I'm keeping my fingers crossed on this repair that I'm still waiting on because I really like the pistol.

Got fedex tracking this morning....will be delivered Friday. Will let you know if they gave me a new barrel on this 2nd trip back to the mother ship.

Craig

Got her back today. Invoice says "barrel replaced".....and new barrel is confirmed. The ammo that used to jam up fits just fine now. Glad to have it back in working order.

Great News. Congratulations

Thanks buddy! They had me worried for a while. Ran the gun through the ultrasonic, lubed her up good, and ready for some range time ASAP!

It seems that S&W just wants to sell to a customer one time, the way they treat them after the sale. When I spoke to the customer service rep before I returned my M&P 9c for the SECOND time for the ORIGINAL problem, she said to include a note emphasizing this. I did and they sent it back with no further repair, saying there was no problem with the gun. Hopefully, I will get a chance to try out my pistol tomorrow and see if it has healed itself. Otherwise, I will continue calling them. They probably hope I will just "go away". You would think that they know that we have forums like this. Regardless of the outcome, this is the last S&W that I will ever buy.

Im having problems myself second go around for me.
sorry to hear of your troubles.

I finally got to fire my M&P 9c after it came back from the "Mutha Ship" for a second repair for the first problem which was "brass-to-face". Even though they said that it didn't need repaired and did nothing additional to the first repair which was to replace the barrel (I figured it was an extractor or ejector problem) with a "new" one. The ramp looked like it was polished by an amateur. I was honestly expecting it to eject to my face just like the first time it was returned to me. However, I'm happy to report that it has been healed. Whatever they did the second time around - supposedly all they did was to fire four magazines of rounds through it - has fixed it. My pistol is now working properly and it is a keeper. I'm finally happy with this pistol.
This does not change my feelings for S&W. As old and as big as this company is, quality control should not be a problem. I will never buy another S&W unless I test-fire it first.
On a second note, the design and feel of the M&P 9c is fantastic. The accuracy for this short barrel is great. Even though dry-firing makes the trigger feel heavy, it feels perfect at the range and the reset is like that of a hammer-fired semi-auto. I've been using my standard 12-round and full-size 17-round magazines with excellent results.

When you find a gun shop that allows test fires let us know. That way I can test a dozen pistols and buy the most accurate.

I agree on the Kahr's. I have a CW40, a CW45 and a K40 which have all been outstanding since day one. Not so much so on a PM9 and a P380. They were problem childs. All companies that make anything can have problems.

As far as M&P's go I have an M&P40 that is outstanding. On the other hand I have an M&P45c that developed some minor problems. Sent it to S&W for repair. They addressed all my concerns and went above and beyond in doing so. My one experience with their service & repair has been outstanding.

Try different ammo. My 9c does that with Federal, but not with White Box or Aguila. I'm going to try Speer Lawman 124.

I tried Federal, White Box and Remington FMJ and they all ejected the same. Fortunately, after the repair and its second trip back for the first repair when it got healed for no apparent reason, it now fires all three brands consistently in a good way and not to my face. It seems that the ammo was not the problem. Now the pistol is perfect and I hope it stays healed.

Another update on my M&P 9c ejection problem which is "sorta" fixed. Like I said earlier, it now ejects perfectly for me. My daughter and I took our pistols to the range and when she fired it, it ejected about every third one into her face. This tells me that although a weaker wrist is part of the problem, there is still a problem with S&W's quality. So, after reading all of the reviews on the APEX Failure Resistant Extractor, I am going to install it on this pistol. I had to do it to my 3rd Gen Glock 17 and it works.
It's a shame that there is so much information on this S&W M&P ejection problem which goes back for years and it still exists. I love this pistol and I will keep it forever, but it is my last S&W.
As far as my daughter's "limp wristing", she has been shooting the Springfield XD9 and Bersa Thunder 380 for thousands of rounds with never an ejection problem. Shame on S&W for no fixing this.

I just got back from the range after installing my new APEX Failure Resistant Extractor. The good news is that there are no new problems and no failures of any kind regarding firing or ejecting. The bad news is that it still ejects every 3rd or 4th empty at my head or face. The new extractor made no difference at all. I invested almost $50 for the extractor and a 1/16" roll-pin punch (easy install with this punch recommended by Apex Tactical) for no improvement. The quality of the new extractor is much better than the original extractor but all I got from it was the warm and fuzzy feeling of having a more expensive pistol now. It's a good thing I always wear a ball cap with a bill and safety glasses when firing because of the brass coming at me. Again, the trigger feel and pull, as well as the accuracy of the pistol are great. I just hate the anticipation of brass coming at my face and head.
I'm done with Smith & Wesson products of any kind.