I purchased two back in early 2020, and I would be lying if I said either one was good right out of the box.
The first one I bought was the black finished model, purchased brand new from an online retailer. The gun arrived and had a very poor finish, notably three completely bare spots where the finish was not applied at all along the front of the grip and the trigger guard. I personally found this unacceptable on a brand new, $700+ pocket sized pistol, and reached out to Walther to see what could be done. They told me they don't refinish guns.
So, at this particular time they were offering a no questions asked full refund return on any guns you weren't happy with - and I took advantage of that and sent this ugly gun back to them for my refund.
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I then took my refund cash, turned around, and bought the stainless steel model instead. No finish for them to F-up this time, so I figured it was a safe purchase.
Well, that model had its fair share of problems as well, but I was at least able to fix them all myself.
Problem #1, Walther must have failed to degrease the steel prior to applying the red safety paint (that little red dot under the safety/decocker lever), because the paint on mine flaked right off after simply wiping it down with a paper towel. I didn't even apply any gun cleaner yet, I was just wiping it off after bringing the brand new gun home, and the red paint was gone!
I repainted the safety dot myself using Rust-Oleum High Performance Enamel 'Safety Red' (that's actually what it's called) color paint, which has held up beautifully after 3 years. Personally I'm proud of this little red dot of paint, I put a lot of work in getting it perfect. Lol
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I figured the crummy red factory paint on the sights would flake off next, and went ahead and redid those as well.
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Problem #2, the gun was having light primer strikes on double action. I replaced the factory hammer spring with a standard weight hammer spring made by Wolff Gunsprings, and now some 3,000 rounds later I have never had another light primer strike in DA again.
Problem #3, the slide was locking back on a loaded mag. The slide lock was popping up under the recoil impulse just enough to catch on the breech face of the pistol and lock it back, even though there is still ammo in the magazine. I resolved this by grinding a 45 degree angle cut on the corner of the slide lock, so that it deflects off the breech face if it rises up slightly, rather than locking up the whole gun. It rises much higher when actually being pushed up by the mag follower, so this does not impact the natural function of the gun.
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Problem #4, after finally resolving the previous 3 problems, and having a gun that was running to my performance standard, a measly ~200 rounds in and the trigger bar snaps in half at the range and completely disables the gun!!
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I called Walther expecting a new one to be sent under warranty, but they instead wanted me to pack up the gun and ship it out to them. I didn't want to deal with all that for a part that is easy enough to fix yourself, so I just purchased a new one outside of the warranty service. Once that finally arrived to me, I installed it myself.
At last, after all that fuss, I now have a truly reliable gun that cycles any ammo I feed it. I have since put some 3,000+ rounds through the gun, and it has run flawless (knock on wood). But, I shouldn't have to fuss this much with a brand new, $700+ pocket pistol! Walther's customer service has not been anything to write home about either, both times I called them (crappy finish on the black gun, and broken trigger bar on the stainless) they didn't help me at all. I can't say I'm impressed.
Regardless, I now enjoy my stainless Walther PPK, and I carry it in the summer time in a pocket holster. Saying you're willing to bet your life on a gun is the highest compliment you can give it, but it took a lot of work for it to reach that point. Hard to say if it's really worth that or not... but darn, it sure is a cool gun!
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