Why is the MP 15-22 picky about it's ammo

[97catintenn]

is the hammer pin and firing pin the same thing?

 

[tomcatt51]

is the hammer pin and firing pin the same thing?

No, he's talking about the pin the hammer sits on / pivots on. You can see how it and the triggers' pin sit down in the frame rather than being flush with the outside of the frame. Not good (IMHO) on a polymer frame. "Best" would be a longer pin using all the available bearing surface. Longer pins would have been nice but it seems S&W cheaped out and used standard AR-15 pins. One more thing to change...

 

[RuskieShooter]

Not sure how you can keep a pin in place in plastic.

With these:

Magento Commerce

-Ruskie

 

[Jhm4040]

First shots

Took my new 15-22 to the range for the first time today, and put 100 rounds of cheap ammo thru it. Everything cycled and shot perfectly--and accurate.
John

 

[Shooting Padre]

Good to hear that S&W took care of you.

My 15-22 has chewed through everything I've thrown at it.

The only issues with ammo I have experienced was with a particular bulk box of Rem GB.

Other boxes of Rem GB have been GTG for the most part, so I'm chalking it up to my being unlucky w/ that particular bulk box.

For me, the 15-22 has eaten everything right out of the box except Remington GB, and that only with duds. In fact, it is the only auto .22 that didn't have any ammo issues. I had nightmares with my M&P22 until around 2500 rounds, then it was fine. Maybe your 15-22 just needs to be used a lot. .22s can be picky or not, it's the guns personality.

 

[Kevin8503]

This question is like asking what's the meaning of life...

Some people feed it junk and have no issues. Some people feed it the good stuff and still can't get it to shoot reliably.

I'm happy to say mine has eaten everything so far. I didn't have to have a "break-in" period. My first thousand rounds or so were just Rem GB 525 packs (which S&W specifically says is junk in the owner's manual). I've shot through it:

-Remington GB
-Federal Auto Match
-American Eagle HP
-Remington Yellow Jackets
-CCI Mini Mags

I've got about 2,000 rounds through now, and I'm happy to say I've never had a FTF or FTE. Looking at some of the posts around here, I do consider myself lucky. However, at the same time I'm rather OCD about cleaning my firearms after every range trip. I do a pretty detailed field strip cleaning everytime, and probably every fourth or fifth trip I will do more of a full teardown and cleaning (the 15-22 I'll remove the trigger group and clean out everything; my Glock 19 gets completely torn apart). I like to think my firearm cleaning habits help contribute to the consistency.

Now if only I could get myself to wax my Jeep that often...

 

[photoracer]

Problem solved.

A lose hammer pin that holds the hammer and spring in place so the hammer hits squarely onto the firing pin. Hammer pin had worked lose and hammer was cocked off sided just enough to cause a fail to fire.

Cant wait to get it back from S&W and burn up some various brands of ammo.

I guess I am the only one that has had this happen to, hopefully this thread will be of help to the next guy who might encounter this problem.

There is a permanent cure for the hammer pin working loose from one side. Its called the KNS non-rotating hammer and trigger pin set, M&P 15-22 model.
This problem has happened to a few others on here also. Just not easy to do any kind of search without knowing what the problem is. I ended up putting the KNS pins on all my 15-22s and ARs.

 

[86mcss]

glad you had the problem fixed. my 15-22 eats any ammo i put in it with no problem what so ever.

 

[Rob1]

I am not sure if this thread is still "live" but for what it's worth. I took my MOE version out the box, quick wipe down of internals and light oil, then on to firing point and WHAM 400 rounds of Winchester Subsonic. NO problems. Had 1fail to fire due to not fully cocked hammer. Did this on purpose to discover if I could shoot subs at all. Only major difference I could suggest is that I have moderator fitted. So that may have helped some. After that. It eats anything I put through it.

 

[stavman11]

I have probobly 5k rounds thru mine... Most with a slide fire

It eats everything.. and always has.... Now i did have the older Fireing pin Break... But S&W fixed and gave it a once over for me.... That was about 1500rds ago or so

Even the dreaded old Golden Bullets shot great.. heck i actualy Like em since they are a 40gr bullet I have 3 of the Bucket-O-Bullets but they say New and Improved..

I even had some OLD OLD OLD winchesters that shot great..


I also had the Pins walk on my trigger when I put the Timney in... so got the KNS Pins... in the interum I put some scotch tape on the face and that solved it till the KNS arrived.. So thats a quick fix for ya

 

[johnfjr]

This March my MP15-22 will be a year old with more than 15,000 rounds to date!! How do I know this beacuse I keep a record for each gun I own. Before going to the range I record how many rounds and brand of ammo. I alos keep record of FTF/FTE....6 out of 15,000 rds, not bad. It will eat everything accept for Thunderbolt from my records. I have also realized that different ammo will react differently dgoing down range. The best ammo to date CCI Standard, but I will use anything I can get my hands on, I shot once to twice a week indoors due to the snow : (.

 

[78Staff]

Ran mine today for the first time... Had a few FTR's with Winchester M22's, maybe 5 out of 150 or so. I also ran 100 MiniMags through it initially, hated to do it as it was all the MiniMags I had but read it was a good "break in" round for a new 15-22, if there is such a thing. There were also 3 different shooters all shooting it for the first time, so that may have played into things too. Don't think there will be any issues by all reports it eats most anything, figure just a case of new gun/new mags, etc. Hope not anyway as I have 3K rounds of it lol.

Also ran the Mad Dog 50 round drum, it was fun but heavier holding on target. Not as heavy as an AR of course, but definitely a noticeable difference from the 25 rounders. My friends didn't know I had bought it so I got to use the old "Say hello to my little friend..." line on them lol.