New SW22 Victory Won't Rack

[Notsospeedy]

I purchased a SW 22 Victory on 11/1/21 from Midway USA. I cleaned the barrel and trigger assembly thoroughly and took it to the range on 11/12 two days after retrieving the gun from my FFL.

When loading the both magazines that came with the gun, I noticed that two different brands of bullets did not slide into and down the mag easily and/or did not advance to the loading position at the top of the magazine easily (sometimes with bullet no 2 or 3, sometimes with 8-10). I insured that a bullet was in the loading position, inserted the magazine into the gun and fired the first round. Several subsequent rounds either failed to feed-failed to fire and/or failed to extract-eject. I believe some of these issues are the result of the new tight magazines.

At one point I could not rerack the slide (pull it more than 3/8 inch back) and field stripped the gun thinking that there might be an empty casing blocking the mechanism. There was none and I must have inadvertently cocked the hammer because the next round did fire. The following round did not and I was again unable to rack the slide. I unloaded the firearm and took it home.

After talking with customer service, it was suggested that the extractor might be malfunctioning and the representative is sending out a new one. After again removing the barrel/slide from the grip/trigger assembly to examine the extractor, I noticed that the hammer was in the vertical “fired” position. I manually cocked it back, reassembled the gun and was able to rack, fire and eject a snap cap. I tried to rerack the gun and ran into the same problem—only being able to pull it back 3/8 inch. Again, disassembling it, the hammer was in the vertical position. I manually recocked it and fired it multiple times without the barrel/slide installed and it fired correctly.

Bottom line, it appears that the hammer spring is so strong that it is preventing the normal blowback operation or hand racking (short of a vice grips!) from reracking the gun. I’m guessing that this is not normal and would appreciate any suggestions prior to my sending the gun back to SW for warranty work.

[2ffat]

It's a new gun. I would have SW repair or replace it.

[Slicktop]

Seems like you could return it to Midway.

[glenwolde]

I've run into an occasional failure-to-fully-cycle with new mainsprings when using standard velocity ammo. They broke in eventually, or faster with a carton of high velocity ammo run through them first.