Walther P99 issue

[seikdel]

Hey Folks, I've got a P99AS in 9x19 and I'm having a minor issue with it. I've had occasional FTEs before, mostly with steel casing Tul ammo. I figured, "No problem, the gun isn't perfect, I'll just avoid Tul." Yesterday I took it to the range with a box of PMC ammo, and I had 40% of the rounds from that box FTE. When I switched back to winchester and remington, I had 1 FTE in 7 magazines, and I think that was one of my JHP rounds that I carry regularly. The extractor tends to nick the rim just a little bit, and I think the extractor couldn't grab that little nicked bit.

All this leads up to my question: Is my extractor wonked out? Should I call Walther or potentially send the pistol in? Or is this just par for the course with this gun?

 

[chrome_austex]

No, that's unusual. I'd see about getting that extractor looked at. Even 1 FTE in 7 magazines would be unusual for mine, let alone 40%.

Have you cleaned the extractor? I usually find a bunch of crud and carbon under the claw when I'm doing routine cleaning, but its never built up on mine to a point where it has caused any malfunctions.. Is the extractor spring nicely firm?

I've had zero FTEs with any ammo after thousands of rounds, and only one failure to chamber (post break-in period). Admittedly, I don't feed mine steel cased ammo and tend to stick to cleaner brass plinking FMJs.

 

[seikdel]

Yes I've cleaned the extractor. I'll get ahold of Walther and see what they say. Thanks =)

 

[ATLDave]

Is it possible the steel-cased ammo left a bunch of sticky laquer on the inside of the chamber, effective gluing the expanded/just-fired brass into the chamber? Have you given it a very thorough chamber cleaning since shooting the Tul?

 

[seikdel]

Yes, multiple times. I haven't shot Tul for probably 6 months, and I've had hundreds of rounds of brass and probably a half dozen cleanings since.

 

[JShirley]

I wonder if the steel damaged the extractor...

 

[seikdel]

Just contacted S&W and they're sending me a box for shipping it in. Hopefully this is just a glitch that they can correct and I'll be merrily on my way in a couple months.
On a related note, has anyone shot Aguila, particularly through a P99? I'm looking at doing a bulk order and the price is right.

 

[JShirley]

We shot about 2K of Aguila at Gunsite, a couple of months ago. It went bang, but was dirty and not as accurate as PMC.

J

 

[fastbolt]

Yeah, let the folks back at the importer (Walther America part of S&W) examine it and correct whatever problem may exist. FWIW, one of our folks had a P99 9mm AS that was exhibiting some occasional failures-to-extract. Since I'm a SW99/P99 armorer I checked it for them. I found the extractor was in good shape (in that situation), but the spring seemed a bit weakened. I replaced the spring and it restored normal functioning.

I had a SW99 9mm (full-size) do the same thing one time, and which also required a new extractor spring to correct the problem.

 

[Dogguy]

Can't help with the P99 problem. As to ammo, I think I've read that Tula cases have a plastic coating rather than lacquer. The plastic coating supposedly doesn't leave residue like the lacquer does. As for Aguila ammo, I've shot quite a bit of it in .45 ACP but no 9mm. I liked it. I never noticed it being particularly dirty or inaccurate but it did seem to me to be a little hotter than other range ammo I've used.