What Was The Worst New Firearm You've Ever Bought?

[Targets Guy]

I'd have to say the Model 60-15. I hate the sight and I still have trouble getting the sight set. I have mellowed towards it over the years and do like it better but it remains the worst of my new gun purchases.

 

[dben002]

As best as memory serves me...it was late 70's or early 80's..purchased a Charter Arms 38 special........what a piece of junk that handgun was............but it was my first purchase and not knowing better I bought it.......we learn from our mistakes...I hope.....

 

[Vulcan Bob]

Mine was a stainless steel AMT Hardballer in .45ACP, it was a FTF & FTE jam-o-matic from the get go. Did the whole jamming 1911 thing with no results. Was back to the factory with no good results three times. Finally a local gunsmith with lots of polishing of rails and such got it sorta working. Turned out to be the grade of stainless steel used for the slide and frame would "gall" with each other and impede the function. Amt never made it good that I know of.

 

[LVSteve]

For me it would have to be a Saiga in 7.62x39 with a 20" barrel. It had the heavy gauge receiver so with the longer than normal AK barrel I thought it would shoot well. Trouble was the trigger was awful and 922r was in full swing so a pistol grip conversion with a decent trigger was expensive. Couple that with it being drastically overgassed and you might imagine my disappointment. Traded it with a little cash for a nice WASR-10/63 to a store where they made fake RPKs based on the Saiga receiver.

 

[500SNW]

A tie between a Tec-9, which would only hit a target after firing at it 20 times so that the law of averages took over

At least your TEC-9 fired. Mine would only go off after you racked the bolt and pulled the trigger 20 times. 95% of the time, all it did was dent the primers.The TEC-9 was the only gun I've ever owned which truly sucked. But hey...I was a dumb college kid at the time and firepower was the in thing.

 

[TomkinsSP]

Being older, I like older guns. I find the older guns to have been tested, tweaked, possibly repaired or possibly just better made in the first place. I have to be able to feel it, spin the cylinder , play with the action, dry fire it (I carry caps just for that purpose) to be interested. If the seller says no, I walk. I have bought guns that did not work right when I bought them, but I knew that when I bought them, and I only have one I haven't been able to fix (yet, its missing a part).

 

[ISCS Yoda]

Easy for me to answer. A Kel-Tec P-9. I was delighted to get this small 9mm and I figured what could be bad, the store owner's son literally carried one IWB. If he trusts it with his son........?

It wouldn't fire two rounds in a row. Everything would jam every time, any kind of ammo. I sent it back to Kel-Tec and their documents that came back to me said they rebuilt it. COOL! I took it to the range. First round - BANG! Second.....oops.......Okay, maybe it got two rounds down range....I forget.....

What a piece of garbage...........

 

[Photog]

Ruger RSM in .416 Rigby. One of the first they released. Would not feed any factory or hand loaded ammo. Called Ruger to ask about that and the nice lady told me it was due to the use of an aftermarket magazine. When I questioned her on that, since it is an integral magazine, her reply was, and I remember it clearly, " There are aftermarket magazines made for every Ruger firearm manufactured." Still looking for that spare magazine for my Ruger #1, or my Ruger GP100! I got it fixed by a gunsmith, and promptly sold it. Pretty poor quality for a gun that was the better part of $2K.

 

[CATI1835]

The Remington R51, version 1. Could not get a single round through it without a problem. It locked up on round 8. It went back to Remington. They realized very quickly this was a problem design and stopped selling them and recalled every one. To their credit, the refunded me the purchase price, shipping and transfer fee.

Fast forward 18 months. The R51 version 2 came out and I purchased one, (I really like the design.) 1200 rounds through it so far and not a single failure. Really, not one failure. Its in my EDC rotation. So, a happy ending to a bad start.

 

[johnsonl]

Ruger .44 carbine. Took it home, stripped it down and found that the receiver was chewed up inside. Off by a foot at 25 yards. Got rid of it.

 

[Farmer17]

Davis .32 acp chrome plated derringer, I saw a stack of em' at a gun store in about 1995 brand new for under 45 bucks. Both barrels shot to different places at different times and could not reliably hit a paper plate at 20 feet. With that being, said it was perfectly reliable and there wasn't much to go wrong so I had confidence in it out to 20 feet, and it was much smaller than the current polymer .380s of today. I carried it a bit and always thought if I needed to throw it away I wasn't out much money.

 

[Lonestar57]

Two back in the 80's:
Kassner (Hi Power clone); trigger pin kept shooting out.
The Best 25acp (Colt 25 clone); when it did feed it shot 4" right of point of aim at 5-yards.
No more clones for me since......

 

[Dieseltech56]

Ruger SP-101 2 1/2. Traded in a Glock 27 for it. Back then I wasn't much into shooting handguns but I always had one in the truck just in case. The Ruger never got shot for about 5 years. Then last year I get this bug up my *** to shoot it. Come to find out it's shooting 12" to the left at 25 yards. With fixed sights what could you do? I took a hard look at the gun and it had a noticeably canted barrel.

Late last year I shipped it back to Ruger and surprisingly they sent me a brand new one free of charge. The new one drills the bullseye and it goes everywhere with me.

 

[mtgianni]

Tie for me, Tauras 9mm Milleniam? 3:" auto. It grouped OK but the slide was loose as a goose and it had so many rough edges cleaning it took 4 times as long as anything else.
2nd was a Ruger P-89. First shots SA were all over, DA sent me back to the manual to see if I had missed a safety. Nope just a 15 lb pull DA trigger. I finely got it to group 5" at 25 yards. Best day of owner ship was the day i sold it, second best the day i bought it.

 

[MyDads38]

I can recall 3 handguns that didn't meet my standards: 1) AMT Hardballer 45 acp. Same issues as Vulcan Bob. Took to a gunsmith, who did what he could. He told me when I picked it up "best thing you could do is sell it or trade it". Which I did promptly.

2nd was a Dan Wesson 357 Mag. Came with the 2 1/2" and 4" barrels. Bought a 10" to use in IHMSA Silhouette competition. Barrel shroud was so canted you couldn't see the front sight in the rear!! Sent back to DW and they sent a replacement-still canted. Got tired of the issues and traded it off for a Ruger Super Blackhawk w/7 1/2" barrel. Was good from then on!

3rd was a purchase a few years ago. Bought a brand new Marlin Model 60 with synthetic stock. Took to range and thought the safety was still on. Don't have a trigger pull gauge, but I'd guess 15+ lbs. It was a STRUGGLE to get the gun to fire! That was the only range trip and fired 25 rounds. Sold it a year later at a $20 loss :-(

 

[Bakebfr480]

A S&W M&P 15/22 ..........biggest piece of garbage I ever bought!

 

[DocB]

A brand new Colt Combat Commander in 1979. Kept it for 2 weeks. After that, every new Ruger revolver from 22 through 45 purchased from the 1970's through last year. Such garbage. The only one I'm still stuck with is the 22 Bearcat I bought last year. I just haven't felt like wasting the time to unload it, so it just sits in its box. Won't even cock half the time because all the internal parts are messed up. I'm a gunsmith, but just can't get motivated to open up a new Ruger.

 

[Sevens]

Re: post #19 about the Helwan pistol--

The term for what you describe would be "self loading repeater", as a single action semiauto simply meams you must cock the hammer for first shot.

 

[Richard M]

Grendel P-10. Even after 300 rounds breakthrough, it would still only shoot 2 or 3 rounds before jamming or stove piping. It now rests in a collector's glass top coffee table with some other odd guns and collectibles.

 

[GKC]

The worst revolver I've ever owned was a Taurus Total Titanium .44 Special (this was in the early 80s.) It wouldn't fire a full cylinder of ammo without misfiring, locking up, or malfunctioning in other ways. As for the worst semiauto, it was a Kimber 1911...in fact, I bought three of them, and none of the three would fire 50 rounds without issues. Kimber's CS was as bad as Taurus' CS, except more arrogant.

I do have to qualify my comments...I assume by "worst" the question is regarding function. If it includes aesthetics, I'd have to include the three Hi-Points I bought...one in .45, 9mm, and .380. They did work, but man they are butt-ugly and crudely engineered guns. They do work, though, so Kimber should take a lesson...beauty isn't enough when it comes to a gun!