380 ez just wondering

[pakettle]

K! Gents, Run this up the flag pole. As the mag. sits in the grip, the top round is compressed by the bottom of the slide. When next to the last rd. is fired, the slide, still compressing the last round onto the follower, commences to retract. As the bottom of the breech face[ the area that pushes the rd. into the chamber] passes back over that last rd. the downward pressure on the back of the rim forces the round down and flips it upright.The" Tiddily Winks" effect. The rd. sitting upright on the follower causes the "nub" on the follower to not activate the slide catch and therefore does not hold the slide back, result---Stove Pipe on unfired rd. How to fix? Simply grind more of an angle on that bottom of the breech face that pushes the rds so as not to catch the case rim on the way back. Now maybe I'll be able to go back to sleep until another idea pops up. Anxious to hear how S&W finally figures what to do. Quick

They figured it out by sending me new springs and followers so far so good!

 

[D.L.Quick]

Pakettle, Please keep us informed of your progress with the new springs and followers. Is there any difference in the appearance of the two compared to the first set? Quick

 

[christak]

Well, I got a notice from FedEx just now indicating that they have my EZ and it will be delivered on Tuesday. Not getting my hopes up, but we'll see what S&W has to say about it. Replacing the followers and springs didn't help prior to my returning the gun. Hopefully they found and fixed something or, as a minimum, send new magazines that they tested it with...since they told me not to send in my magazines with the gun.

 

[SJK2]

Well, I got a notice from FedEx just now indicating that they have my EZ and it will be delivered on Tuesday. Not getting my hopes up, but we'll see what S&W has to say about it. Replacing the followers and springs didn't help prior to my returning the gun. Hopefully they found and fixed something or, as a minimum, send new magazines that they tested it with...since they told me not to send in my magazines with the gun.

Waiting to hear your followup......

 

[MikeAEZ]

Well, I got a notice from FedEx just now indicating that they have my EZ and it will be delivered on Tuesday. Not getting my hopes up, but we'll see what S&W has to say about it. Replacing the followers and springs didn't help prior to my returning the gun. Hopefully they found and fixed something or, as a minimum, send new magazines that they tested it with...since they told me not to send in my magazines with the gun.

I sent mine in with the magazine. It came back with a form that said the magazine spring was replaced, and no other parts of the gun had been replaced. Curious what yours shows.

 

[SJK2]

Get out your calipers guys, check out the opening at the feed lips on the EZ 380 and any 9mm mag you might have. The ones I checked show 9mm to be tighter than the EZ mag. The EZ mags are surely a little looser than a mag. that holds a larger rd. Could be allowing the rd. to jump out sooner from not being held tight enough at the feed lips. Just looking at all the angles. Quick

I think this statement has merit to be looked at........

 

[christak]

Ok, my gun arrived early so I was able to pick it up from FedEx just before they closed at 2pm today. Long story short is that S&W found nothing wrong with my handgun, but sent two new magazines to me along with my gun. Honestly, I'm not really surprised they found nothing wrong with the gun. I was pretty sure the gun wasn't the problem.

I visually compared the 2 new magazines to my other 5 magazines and don't see any obvious differences other than a yellow line marked on the followers of the new magazines.

I won't get to the range for a few days, but I don't really expect my issue to be resolved...We'll see. I do plan to have my gunsmith buddy at my range look over the new magazines before I use them and then maybe again afterwards. Not sure what we'll learn, if anything. So the saga continues...

 

[SJK2]

christak,

Waiting to hear how range time goes........

 

[pakettle]

Pakettle, Please keep us informed of your progress with the new springs and followers. Is there any difference in the appearance of the two compared to the first set? Quick

Raining today,so went to local indoor range.
I now have 600 rounds through gun with the new springs and followers. So far no problems,using Blazer Brass 115 grain ammo.
Those new springs were slightly longer and had some yellow paint on them!

 

[christak]

Raining today,so went to local indoor range.
I now have 600 rounds through gun with the new springs and followers. So far no problems,using Blazer Brass 115 grain ammo.
Those new springs were slightly longer and had some yellow paint on them!

How many rounds do you typically shoot per range session with your EZ?

 

[SJK2]

Raining today,so went to local indoor range.
I now have 600 rounds through gun with the new springs and followers. So far no problems,using Blazer Brass 115 grain ammo.
Those new springs were slightly longer and had some yellow paint on them!

Is not Blazer Brass 115 grain ammo 9mm ammo.??

 

[christak]

Is not Blazer Brass 115 grain ammo 9mm ammo.??

I'm sure he means 95gr...I have a case of it.

 

[Gene L]

Well, here is my report. I'll try and lay out what I did.

S&W sent me back the mag I had sent with new springs, and springs for the other three. All of the springs had yellow paint near the ends. They were roughly two links longer than the old springs. When I replaced them, it was obvious that they were much stiffer. One, in fact, was so stiff that it was almost impossible to load the last round. I loaded them up on a Thursday and put them in the safe. Went to the range on Friday.

First ammo type was Federal American Eagle 90 grain. Loaded all mags up. Stovepipe on last round 3 out of 4 magazines, stovepipe on next to last round on one. Not a good start. Loaded them all up again. Stovepiped on last round on only one magazine, rest were fine. Isolated this mag.

Loaded 4 mags again, all fired fine except noted isolated mag which stovepiped last round.

Did it again, same result with the isolated mag.

Down to 13 bullets, loaded one with 8 and one with 5. All fired. Did not use the isolated mag.

Switched to Magtech, had a box of 50. Loaded all four mags.
Isolated mag stovepiped next to last round. Of the others, one stovepiped last round with only 5 loaded in magazine. One mag failed to lock slide back after last round fired. The above mentioned isolated mag also failed to lock slide back after last round fired.

Switched to Fiocchi 90 grain.
One stovepipe in first three mags (not counting bad mag). The bad isolated mag failed to lock slide back after last round. On a subsequent loading it "stovepipe-ejected" the last live round. All the rest were fine.

So of the 200 rounds I fired, what did I learn?

I have a very consistent live stovepipe on last round with one mag. Maybe it's the follower or the feed lips- not sure. I did note with this magazine it was extremely hard to load the last bullet. In any case, I am taking this mag out of the rotation.

Of all the others, nearly all the live round stovepipes seemed to be the very first time I used the magazines with the new springs.

The failures to lock back are a little odd. Most occurred with the bad mag. One occurred with one of the others. I would think this might be a function of the recoil spring.

Next time I will do more testing. I feel the gun is stovepiping less when I factor out the bad magazine.

One last comment. I was explaining the issue to the range safety officer. He knew of the problem with the EZ and said that when loading the magazine, make sure to slingshot the slide- don't just release the slide lock lever. He claims this cures the problem. I tend to use a mix of slingshotting and slide release. I wasn't paying attention to this but will be careful to only slingshot next time.

I don't know how slingshotting would affect the next to last round stovepiping. First or second round, yes.

Am I missing something here?

 

[MikeAEZ]

I don't know how slingshotting would affect the next to last round stovepiping. First or second round, yes.

Am I missing something here?

I don't know either. I just reported what he said.

 

[D.L.Quick]

It appears to me that S&W has not put much effort into trying to correct this problem. Several of you guys have shot up a lot cash in trying to fix it. I think S&W should be paying for some of the ammo that has been expended by those doing their R&D for them or come up with a fix and have a recall. Quick

 

[christak]

It appears to me that S&W has not put much effort into trying to correct this problem. Several of you guys have shot up a lot cash in trying to fix it. I think S&W should be paying for some of the ammo that has been expended by those doing their R&D for them or come up with a fix and have a recall. Quick

...and likely to "shoot up" another 250 rounds tomorrow morning... This will put me over 3000 rounds and I don't think I've had more than about 400 consecutive rounds without an issue (and that only happened once over a couple of range sessions fairly early on). Other than that stretch, I've had issues 15 to 25% of the time. Really wish S&W would fix this problem. I'll test the 2 new magazines they sent me in the morning. Not expecting any improvement, but sure would like to be proven wrong!

 

[D.L.Quick]

Mine came from Buds with the yellow painted springs to begin with. Still had same problem everyone else has. This weather has kept me from getting out, but first decent day I'll try again. Then I think I'll just sit back and wait. I have a couple of ideas to try but if I go ahead and then they recall I'll be SOL. Quick

 

[christak]

Ok, went to the range today and fired 300 rounds total, first 150 Speer Lawman, then 50 Sig Elite Ball, and finally 100 Blazer Brass. I loaded the two new magazines to less than full capacity (nominally 4 rounds each) to increase the number of potential last round failures. The result was 76 opportunities to have a last round issue. Of those 76, I had one live round get caught in the ejection port. (The failure occurred on the 3rd magazine of Speer ammo.) So, one new magazine worked flawlessly 38 times and the other failed once in 38 tries. That is quite an improvement over what I had been experiencing (but still not perfect). I contacted S&W after my range trip and requested they replace the other 3 of my original 5 magazines. They provided a shipping label and I will return 3 of magazines to them. I am still wary about "depending" on my EZ, but I EDC other "extremely reliable" guns.

If I had it to do over, knowing what I know now, I would not buy my EZ again. YMMV

 

[MurphyPr]

I recently bought the 380 ez, and experienced numerous stovepipes and FTFs (not always on the last round) the first two or three times using each magazine. The last 3 times through each magazine I experienced a single last round FTF. (One magazine performed perfectly, one had 1 failure in 3 uses). I'm thinking in my case the mags just need a breaking in period.

I did notify S&W of the issue after the initial experience, just to go on record. I told them not to take action yet but if the problem persisted after a few hundred rounds I would follow up.

Jury's still out, but I'm hopeful the problem will work itself out with continued use (seems to be the case so far). It's a fun gun to shoot.

 

[britbike1]

Thanks to all

Thanks to all who responded to my questions. I like the gun but I'm going to have to wait on it until some more definite solutions show up for this issue. Compared to going to the moon and back 6 times this shouldn't be that difficult but it seems to be.