What was the WORST handgun you bought?

[monet61]

This thing. Came with a bunch of gun parts, rifle stocks and stuff like that. It shoots .22 shorts reliably but it's so flimsy and loose I don't like it. Can't bring myself to sell it or even give it away as I think at some point it will fall apart.
It's called a Gerstenberger.

 

[minconrevo]

Leaving out the normal run of the mill junkers, I was most let down by a AMT Hardballer bought back in the day, never did get that one to work and a S&W 59 that was a jam-O-matic regardless of mags and ammo.

My worst would have to be a tie, from a time way back in history.

A Rohm .22 Short 5 shot; wouldn't hit a 2 foot diameter stump from 10 feet.

Another the AMT Hardballer that never did run, no mater trips back to the factory (gone for 6 months once). I sold off the Hardballer, after I spent some bucks to have S&W K-frame sights professionally installed, in an effort to cut my losses. A couple years later, I saw the thing for sale in a dealer's gun case a whole state away.

Unless someone spent the bucks to have the frame hard chromed or Accu-railed it still won't work, where ever it is.

 

[Gun-runner]

S&W 915. About as accurate as a rock but made a great club or hammer.

 

[ibthumper]

NIB Colt 45 combat commander pre 70 series. Could not get this hunk of iron to shoot to save my life. After much money to make it work, Sold It.

 

[sipowicz]

1966 PPK. I really wanted to love it since I'm a huge Bond fan and the fact that it was a pre 68, but it jammed like crazy on ball ammo..

 

[MackTech]

Most all my turds were Taurus's. First was a new polished stainless DAO model 85 that the fireing pin return spring broke and you could only shoot it up in the air so the firing pin would fall back and not jam up the cylinder. Only had about 20 rounds through it when it happened. Got it repaired and has been a good shooter for the last 15 years. I then had a Taurus 92 beretta clone that was super reliable but super inaccurate, sold it. Then I had a Taurus 686 6" barrel Smith clone. It was super accurate , but one day while shooting the cylinder locked up and wouldnt turn or open. Cant send a gun back loaded so I hammered the cylinder open and got the live rounds out and got it repaired. Sold it. All the other Taurus guns I have had were great. ( however I dont have any of them anymore). My last dud was a SiG Skeeter, sold it. Also sold a Davis 22 mag derreinger that may or may not go off when the trigger was pulled. On the other hand I had a Jennings chrome plated 22 auto that was super accurate and reliable. Also had a Lama Mini-Max that was a great shooter. I just threw thoses 2 in because Jennings and Lama get a bad rap most of the time.

 

[Kavinsky]

Probably the interarms PPK, only had the thing for about 3 months but the finish was really rough like it would cut your hand if you werent carefull while taking it appart. there was also some sort of odd wear marks on the frame from shooting it, almost like galing although it might have been from break in.

Functioned fine with ball ammo, didnt try hollowpoints but overal a rough and ugly gun, would have gladly taken your pre '68 sipow over it and gotten the feeding ramp polished, cleaned or switched out the mags to fix it, although what ammo were you using? walthers seem to really like winchester ammo.




next would be a beretta 85, functioned fine, looked okay, no jammings, trigger was great, but it has sharp serrations on the trigger that bite into your trigger finger


anyways I was cleaning under the grips and I pulled on something by accident under the right side grip and the trigger assembly unraveled on me, had to take it to a gunsmith to get the two spring one piece trigger spring back into it after failing to do it myself.

got it back, shot it for a 100 rounds and then had the thing break on me whilst practicing a safe one in the chamber, none in the magazine mag change with snap caps down in the basement where the trigger when I put my finger on it with the mag out just snapped on me and broke the spring (trigger goes slack from the mag disconnect on the 85 to begin with but it went a 100% slack all the time from it that time)

anyways it just got it back from the gunsmith this saturday with a new trigger spring, took it shooting with a 100 rounds and its functioning fine but I'm still thinking about getting rid of it and buying a German Walther PP in .380 with the trade in money.

although I think I might be to blame for it breaking since I did try to get it back together myself before giving it to the gunsmith to put it back together in the first place, meaning I could have caused a stress fracture on the spring, causing the breakage.

I really must go to the beretta forums and see what I can dig up about that since the gunsmith said that was the second one that came in with a broken spring like that but I also dont know the circumstances of the other breakage and he did say that however the 92 does not have the funky trigger spring the 85 has and it is a brand new italian made 85 by the way.



in the time it was at the gunsmith (a year, dont ask) I did buy a model 49 pre dash cop trade in to replace it and havent had any issues with that and that beretta is the first and only gun I have ever had that happen on period.

 

[ol' geeser]

Once bought a NIB 4" Model 58...at 20 yds. I could not keep it on a full sheet of posterboard off bags....after 200 rds. or so, I took it back to the LGS were it was purchased and traded it for a NIB 200th year anniversery Mini14...this was done one the day my youngest son was born....later gave it to him as he and it both were made "in the 200th year of American Liberty".

 

[wbraswell]

Bought a Colt .22 LR Official Police that was badly refinished, at least once. It was so polished you can barely make out the lettering on the barrel and there's a big spot on the frame where the blue didn't stick. It shoots all over the place. What was I thinking?

 

[haggis]

Insofar as function, all three .380 PPK's I have owned. All pre-S&W. Would not reliably feed even ball ammo. My daughter-in-law saw the last one I had, an Interarms stainless model, and said she would like to buy it. I told her that I'd give it to her, but that it wouldn't feed reliably, and I'd have to fix that first. It took about two months, off and on, before I figured how to make it feed right. The solution was a smooth, straight feed ramp, smoothed magazine feed lips, radiusing the chamber entrance, and polishing the inside top half of the chamber back to the chamfered barrel hood. The sharp feed angle of the cartridge requires that the top of the chamber be absolutely smooth for reliable feeding. My DIL has had the gun for a few years now, and has experienced no failures to feed even with hollow points, as long as she keeps a stiff wrist. I've also done the "fix" to a couple of friends' guns, and it has worked for them.

Too soon old, too late smart...

Buck

 

[G.T. Smith]

The worst gun I have ever owned/shot/seen/threw, was an RG .22LR revolver. I truly do believe that the gun threw as much lead backwards as forwards and could not hit anything over 1 foot away, and even that was iffy. REALLY short barrel and tiny little grips. I traded a 12 pack of beer for it and sold it for 7 bucks to a friend of the original seller.
Another was a .22 bolt action rifle that had been in a fire. You can't really blame that gun for that though.
Peace,
Gordon

 

[625smith]

It was a Colt Anaconda 6" in 45 Colt. I bought it in the early 1990's because S&W didn't offer a full lug 625 in 45 Colt. It would only fire 2 rounds out of a full cylinder of factory rounds. Upon closer inspection I discovered that the firing pin only protruded .020 through the frame with the hammer down. I didn't send it back to Colt I fixed it by having a small amount of the face of the hammer machined off. In 1993 S&W kindly released the 625-5 5" Classic. I sent the Anaconda packing!

 

[chief38]

That's easy. The worst gun I've ever owned was a Bauer .25 acp (poor copy of the Baby Browning). The thing never worked right, and the Factory could never fix it. I wound up selling it to a guy who worked in a Gun Store - he said he knew how to fix them. What ever............. Now I own a real beautiful .25acp Colt Pocket Pistol from the twenty's.

Chief38

 

[Gasman1972]

I had a Lorcin .380. It literally blew apart at an indoor range one day. The guy in the booth next to me peeped around the corner and said "Was that your gun?" With a "Your gun is a piece of ****" look on his face.

 

[Daimler1989]

Back in 1989 I decided to buy a 1911 in 9mm, because I had a Colt Combat Government 45 ACP I really loved - and in Germany the offers on the market for 9mm pistols were huge and I had tried many European made pistols like HK P7, HK P9S, FN High Power etc. just to realise the advantages of the 1911 concept regarding handling and functionality. Unfortunately there was no Colt 9mm available, so I bought a Randall Service 9mm. Bad decision. Didn't feed, didn't eject, didn't fire, dropped the magazine, didn't drop the hammer. Not each time, but every 20 rounds something happend or better said didn't happen. One year later I gave it (for half of the price I had paid) to the gunsmith where I bought a brand new Steyr GB, which I still own.

 

[VaRecon]

Sigma 380. I joked that I didn't have to keep up with the brass, since the slide caught it just about every round.