I have to agree that the forums and internet are blowing this out of proportion. I bought a 40 shield 3 months ago, After reading about the problems some people were having with them while others were saying its only a tiny problem, but I just love the features of the weapon so I took a chance. Since I bought I fire 100 rounds every weekend because frankly I got too use to a 9mm in the army and need the practice with a larger round in a smaller frame. I've only used the two magazines that came with it, a 6 round flat bottom, and the 7 round extended grip, using them off and on to see which one I like better for shooting before I buy a few extras.
I have loaded my weapon in multiple different ways, I loaded multiple magazines with the slide locked black and then chambered, out of paranoia that just shoving the magazine in there with the slide forward would cause this mysterious mag drop problem. Then after I became more comfortable with the internal workings of the weapon I began chambering a round, removing the magazine adding another round and then reinserting the magazine under the assumption this would cause a mag drop. It did not. The weapon still fired as intended and this is now how I carry my Shield 40 every day.
To date the only issues I have had with my Shield 40.
- pinched my thumb loading the 7rnd mag, these springs are strong when you first get them. Loading them full and letting them sit for a week helps loosen them up.
- I lost 10% of my brass because the ejection port throws those things a good 20 feet on occasion, which is a sign of a good ejection system and less chance of a spent round getting stuck.
- 2 failure to feeds in where the magazine would lock block as if the magazine was empty, but it was not. This was not a fault of the weapon but a fault of one particular kind of ammo I was trying. Never experienced this issue with any other types of ammo.
I can see this issue going both ways. It might be user error, it might not, it seems plausible that earlier Shield 40's might have had an issue with the mag release lever, possibly a loose or slightly warped frame that would allow the magazine to jar loose upon firing, could be the magazines themselves that were produced during early stages of the Shield 40, and these weapons will still be floating around there at gun shows and some gun dealers that don't check guns they purchase. The statistics show that the number of Shield 9's and 40's that S&W has sold compared to the view yet very vocal complaints about issues, shows us that this is a very very small percentage of the Shield 40's and is most logically due to a short term manufacturer error over a very small number of these particular handguns and this issue shouldn't be the first impression people get of the Shield 40, which is actually a very compact, slim, reliable weapon for conceal and carry.
If you do have a Shield 40 with mechanical issues you have my sympathy, but one flaw on a small number of guns should not represent that the entire company makes bad firearms. If a company didn't occasionally put out a weapon with some small issues I would be worried because that would suggest to me that they are not trying to produce new and improved models but just keep selling the same old thing, and we would still all be shooting 6 round revolvers if it wasn't for innovation and experimenting. If you really hate the weapon you purchased, sell or trade it to someone else and get something else, its not the end of the world, yet.