SW Shield Slide Cracked

[Mcwsky09]

Does the serial number on the spent case envelope match the serial number on the gun?

If a manufacturing defect then it is pretty likely that all the slides produced in the same shift have the same problem.

A cousin of mine works at a company that makes reflective road signs and such like and often arrives for the start of morning shift to find that the 3rd shift made some error in setup of the equipment and ran an entire batch of product wrong. And in one case when they ran out of material to finish someone spent the night carving things into a very expensive table surface used in the process and design not to mar the surface of the product.

 

[hoc9sw]

The serial number on the envelope must match the gun. It is provided for those states which require that a spent casing be filed with the gun registration.

That is a reason that you should keep the casing with the gun's receipt and notes. If / when you sell it, if the buyer is from a state that requires that original casing, it makes things much easier.

I had a buyer for an older gun who backed out, as they would have to pay a fee to create that "official" casing. Just as well. I like that gun, and the $$ crisis passed.

 

[droshi]

Does the serial number on the spent case envelope match the serial number on the gun?

If a manufacturing defect then it is pretty likely that all the slides produced in the same shift have the same problem.

A cousin of mine works at a company that makes reflective road signs and such like and often arrives for the start of morning shift to find that the 3rd shift made some error in setup of the equipment and ran an entire batch of product wrong. And in one case when they ran out of material to finish someone spent the night carving things into a very expensive table surface used in the process and design not to mar the surface of the product.

Yes they match

very interesting dilemma. i'll be watching to see how this gets resolved. it does look strange for a "new" gun to look like that, even with the defects.

I've purchased a lot of guns, I've never even seen a heavily used gun look anything like this on the inside. Then again I usually stick with better rated firearms, with Kel-Tec being the cheapest in terms of build quality. Even still, it just looks like incorrect machining.

I guess it could happen just about anywhere, but I do agree that it leaving the factory points to a problem in the QC process.

I'm not sure distributors/dealers are much to blame here, I can't imagine any of them would field strip and inspect firearms before sending them or selling them.

I find this pretty disturbing and it's not even my gun!
If it was mine I'm pretty confident I'd be pretty disgusted!

I haven't yet decided what to do after getting this worked out with S&W. Anyone want to buy a brand new shield?

I am kicking myself a bit for not going with the Walter PPS which I almost bought instead. But overall it's been a good learning experience.

 

[Jiman]

"I'm not sure distributors/dealers are much to blame here, I can't imagine any of them would field strip and inspect firearms before sending them or selling them."

Some online retailers don't even allow their employees to open the boxes because magazines and other accessories have gone missing.

 

[M&Pmeister]

You just never know who where done what when...

I once bought a pistol that, after I brought it home and looked closer, appear to have a rear sight that have been removed and replaced. Whomever did it went so far as to touch up the blemished spot (from hitting with punch?) with black paint. The rest of the gun look brand new.

Needless to say, I was rather perturbed. Mfr's CS wouldn't be of much help because there was no way I could prove I didn't cause the blemish.

Whatever firearm you buy, look it over thoroughly at the time of purchase or transfer... inside and out.

In your case, somebody might have had this bad slide and done a switcharoo with a brand new boxed Shield. The S/N is not on the slide, so no way to tell if that was the one originally packed into the box by the mfr. The wear marks on the slides would suggest this is not a brand new slide with one round test fire.

 

[emory]

It is my opinion that the product did not leave S&W in that condition. The machine used to produce the slide has a number of sensors that measure the forces in the fixture and cutting piece while the part is being cut. A fracture of this magnitude would most likely cause the machine to stop and report a fault to the operator. Even if it didn't, the operator visually inspects every part before it moves to the next process and would have caught a defect this obvious. The surface treatment is done next, so this defect would have to pass a second set of eyes un-noticed. Imagine the next person who gets this defective part installing the striker and spring into the slide and never seeing this crack??

Though I cannot tell by the photos, if the fracture surface has no surface treatment then the defect did not occur at the machining center. If the defect occured afterward, then it was induced by loading. We can all debate if the material is too thin in that location, but even thin material requires a load to fracture.

There are a number of sight pusher designs that clamp the slide at the lower milled channels/rails and use a screw to apply a lateral load to the sight base. The Shield slide has a much thinner cross section than the other M&Ps and the factory rear sight is notoriously tight. This fracture is consistant with that load case.

I'm not saying that is what happened. I am simply pointing out a load case associated with this failure mode.

Also, as others have pointed out, the slide is heavily used.

 

[Bud33]

It looks like we have about beat this dead horse to death! That being said, I have two comments.

I have sent 450 rounds down range from me New Shield and it doesn't show that much ware.

After retiring from the Navy, I spent 10 years as a Quality Control Engineer at a company that manufactured two way radios. It was agreed that there would be about 1% of our product that would get past QC. This was, at that time, pretty much an industry standard. That being said - - - considering the thousands of weapons that shipped from S&W I wouldn be to quick to fault S&W or their QC department.

 

[turbo38gn]

I lilke Emories theory, good explanation about the site pusher... but for the life of me.. I don't see any wear anywhere that a few have said they see. Please direct me to it. I look at the slide rail guide and see virtually nothing.. The barrel looks perfect as well.. not a mark on the gun

 

[droshi]

It is my opinion that the product did not leave S&W in that condition. The machine used to produce the slide has a number of sensors that measure the forces in the fixture and cutting piece while the part is being cut. A fracture of this magnitude would most likely cause the machine to stop and report a fault to the operator. Even if it didn't, the operator visually inspects every part before it moves to the next process and would have caught a defect this obvious. The surface treatment is done next, so this defect would have to pass a second set of eyes un-noticed. Imagine the next person who gets this defective part installing the striker and spring into the slide and never seeing this crack??

Though I cannot tell by the photos, if the fracture surface has no surface treatment then the defect did not occur at the machining center. If the defect occured afterward, then it was induced by loading. We can all debate if the material is too thin in that location, but even thin material requires a load to fracture.

There are a number of sight pusher designs that clamp the slide at the lower milled channels/rails and use a screw to apply a lateral load to the sight base. The Shield slide has a much thinner cross section than the other M&Ps and the factory rear sight is notoriously tight. This fracture is consistant with that load case.

I'm not saying that is what happened. I am simply pointing out a load case associated with this failure mode.

Also, as others have pointed out, the slide is heavily used.

The metal that is left in that channel is black coated. I believe that the slide was probably fine when it left milling visually. But after firing (an unknown number of rounds I guess?) it must have had the problem. I can't see how any number of rounds should do that to a slide in proper spec, so I wouldn't see why just 1-2 test fire rounds wouldn't produce the failure.

So another theory coming out is that someone along the supply chain swapped out the slide? I can't really see why someone would risk their job to repair a firearm that S&W would repair for free...

The other mystery is that the rails on the frame itself look just as worn as parts of the internal on the slide. Maybe the new coating S&W is using doesn't last as long?

 

[sherrill15]

I would return the whole gun. I wouldn't trust it after seeing something like that. I had a new Kel Tech that was broken right out of the box. They wanted to replace the slide, I asked them to replace the whole gun and they did.

 

[M&Pmeister]

So another theory coming out is that someone along the supply chain swapped out the slide? I can't really see why someone would risk their job to repair a firearm that S&W would repair for free...

I knew I missed a 'W'. Should've said:

"You just never know who where done what when why..."

 

[ken158]

If you just made the purchase - take it back and exchange as defective. Let the dealer worry about it and you come out owning what you paid for and no drama.

 

[TTSH]

After retiring from the Navy, I spent 10 years as a Quality Control Engineer at a company that manufactured two way radios. It was agreed that there would be about 1% of our product that would get past QC. This was, at that time, pretty much an industry standard. That being said - - - considering the thousands of weapons that shipped from S&W I wouldn't be too quick to fault S&W or their QC department.

I'm an S&W fanboy from way back, but some of these threads on serious QC problems, assorting failures and occasional Kabooms have really got me bothered. Does anyone have any idea about the percentage of brand new guns that end up going back to S&W for some kind of warranty work? I guess the general consensus is that we tend to see the worst of the worst reported here simply because folks with no complaints don't start threads about how they have had no problems. Still, there have been some disturbing threads lately and I'd really like to get a feel for what a repeat S&W buyer (like myself) should reasonably expect in terms of a QC failure rate.

 

[droshi]

If you just made the purchase - take it back and exchange as defective. Let the dealer worry about it and you come out owning what you paid for and no drama.

It was purchased online. My experience is that once you receive it and choose not to refuse the firearm at your FFL, good luck getting it replaced by the supplier.

Most of the time the manufacturer will make it right, so I never considered this really much of a downside to online purchases. Of course, the one in a million chance to get a firearm like this that deserves a full replacement, and I get it...oh well.

 

[turbo38gn]

I'm an S&W fanboy from way back, but some of these threads on serious QC problems, assorting failures and occasional Kabooms have really got me bothered. Does anyone have any idea about the percentage of brand new guns that end up going back to S&W for some kind of warranty work? I guess the general consensus is that we tend to see the worst of the worst reported here simply because folks with no complaints don't start threads about how they have had no problems. Still, there have been some disturbing threads lately and I'd really like to get a feel for what a repeat S&W buyer (like myself) should reasonably expect in terms of a QC failure rate.

T,

How many S&W guns have you purchased....? If you haven't had any problems... don't think you ever will. I have purchased about 50 new S&W's in the last 4 yrs... pretty much zero problems. I have at least 10 M&P's.... zero problems.....

 

[Rastoff]

I had thought that Melonite was more of a hardening process to the steel, and that afterwards they coat it with black nitride or something?

Melonite is the process that turns it black. The color is a by product of the process.

This further reiterates my utter disbelief that anyone would just take their gun from the box and run rounds through it without first inspecting, cleaning, and lubing it.

I completely agree that we should all clean a new gun before shooting it. However, in this case, I think the gun would operate fine. The stresses involved in shooting wouldn't put much, if any, pressure on this crack/void.

It is a glaring problem though. This is not some small defect. I have no idea how something this bad could have made it through the assembly process without being noticed. I mean, how oblivious would a worker have to be to not see this as they assembled the slide?

 

[TTSH]

T,

How many S&W guns have you purchased....? If you haven't had any problems... don't think you ever will. I have purchased about 50 new S&W's in the last 4 yrs... pretty much zero problems. I have at least 10 M&P's.... zero problems.....

The answer is more than I care to admit on-line. But the issue for me is this: only about 1 in 5 of my "bought brand spanking new" guns are shooters. The percentage is higher for my "bought used & abused" guns, but no matter. The point is that the majority of my S&W collection is still "unfired-in-box."

While I have never had any problems with my S&W "shooters" (most of which are quite old now) that I couldn't remedy myself, I am starting to get really, really concerned about the unfired portion of my collection, especially the more recently acquired ones. Hence my question.

Perhaps the day has gone by when you could buy a gun for your collection and just put it in the safe unfired. I'm beginning to think that they all need to be proven out with a substantial number of rounds before you can feel assured that you didn't buy a lemon that got past QC. Such is life in these modern times.

 

[skip4309]

After reading more posts it is possible this slide was switched out. Maybe someone was going to replace the sights...got it too tight in the vise and stress cracked the slide...then either returned it/exchanged it or something we will never know. A fracture of that nature occurring from shooting probably would have severely damage the frame too which looks to be in great shape. IDK?

 

[Alangaq]

Seems to me that they had a cutter on their mill that went south and damaged a couple of slides (likely quite a few more) and they made it all the way thru plating, assembly and function check. It happens, and it isn't as infrequent as one might think. The only thing about this scenario that surprises me, is how many of you are surprised it could happen… It would seem that QA and QC at S&W is for all intense and purposes nonexistent, and has been for several years now. In what I believe to be an effort to crank out as much product as possible, they have apparently defaulted to using the customer at the primary QC for their products which results in QA feedback from the CS department to implement preventative measures on the production line. Cost savings gone amok in my opinion.

Also don't forget the human factors here… We aren't talking about the highly skilled craftsman and artists of long ago hand fitting individual pieces together, but a much younger generation of CNC operators tasked with cranking out as much volume as possible. You think there is no way for a machine operator to miss a single defective cutter on CNC gang mill that is whacking out perhaps as many as a dozen slides at a time? Or that the person running them thru the plating tanks dozens at a time is going to catch it? Or even the person throwing in the striker, springs and what not… heck, they are likely doing a hundred or more a day! I can totally see this kind of quality escapement happening and am not the least bit surprised. And that is based off the assumption (and hope) that it was an escapement and got missed.. there is always the possibility that it DIDN'T get missed, but simply got thrown together because someone didn't care or wasn't worried about it…

In regards to the apparent wear that so many are concerned about, I don't see that either. The plating on my Shield is some pretty soft stuff, and I had far more wear than the OP on my pistol before I ever fired a single round, just from racking the slide with dummy rounds, disassembly and reassembly, and then a bunch of dry fire drills.

In short, I would be willing to bet that things are exactly as they seem (aren't they usually?) and that this is a brand new, factory test fired pistol that left the factory with a defect that was never detected prior to shipment. Not a big conspiracy… just a big QC escapement.

 

[Rastoff]

A fracture of that nature occurring from shooting probably would have severely damage the frame too which looks to be in great shape. IDK?

You are correct. This is a defect in manufacturing, not from shooting.

It would seem that QA and QC at S&W is for all intense and purposes nonexistent, and has been for several years now.

It all depends on how S&W does their quality control. There are different views on how it should be done.

One method is to select a small percentage, usually 6.25%, of the finished products and do a thorough examination. Another is to forgo that and have every employee responsible for catching stuff like this if they see it.

I can see it slipping through if they only sample a small amount of finished products. I can see it getting passed the milling process and Melonite process. Those are largely done as a hands off type of thing. However, for this to get passed the slide assembly is hard to believe. This isn't some small blemish, it's a huge crack/void. No, someone was assembling this blind that day.