Firing pin question (K-9)

[mity2]

So I have fairly new K-9 - produced sometime early 2009.
I shot 200rds through this gun this past weekend, with zero issue.

Today, after giving it a good cleaning, and lubing, I inserted the full mag, and release the slide(this is my CCW), and to my amazement, it failed to return to battery. I thought it needed the little push to go back to battery, but it wouldn't budge forword at all

Puzzled, upon inspection, this is what I saw...

http://i40.tinypic.com/igi5tu.jpg

As you can see, the reason why slide didn't return to battery, is because rim of case failed to slide in to extractor, due to clealy visible protruding tip of striker..
basicaly rim got jammed up against protruding pin.

Now, I dissassemble the lide completely just now, and realise that there are no striker return spring(free float pin I think is what its it called - Sort of like how AR's firing pin is) that forces pin back.
striker can moves freely within given space provided by striker pin spacer(kahr Parts# 21?) Back and forse. But I think whats happening is that since firing pin assembly is not friction free - as FPBS(Parts #7 - called striker block) is pressed up against boby of striker.

SO whats you guys think? Is my gun safe to shoot - Or is i even safe to slingshot the slide on full mag to load the chamber, as if pin is not retracting back in to slide, there for it could fire out of battery(or shoot on its own like open bolt gun? isn't?

[jmstallard]

I'm still a Kahr n00b, but I'll give it a shot.

According to the exploded diagram, there is no striker return spring. When the slide travels forward, the lower lip of the striker engages the cocking cam. It's this cocking cam which causes the striker to recede back into slide. I'm cycling mine and I can see the striker protruding up until the point when the cocking cam engages, which happens just as the slide begins to strip a round from the magazine.

What happens when you perform the pencil test? Manually cycle the *empty* weapon, aim up, insert a pencil (or back end of pen) into the *empty* barrel, and pull the trigger. If the pencil does NOT move, that tells me that your cocking cam is not engaging your striker.

What happens if you lock the slide open and push on the exposed striker? It should offer a little bit of resistance, then you'll hear/feel a click just as you push it back inside the hole. This, I believe, is the striker block engaging. There's almost no friction in mine, but even if there were, the cocking cam should still be engaging the striker. You would need an enormous amount of friction on your firing pin to prevent the cocking cam (powered by the recoil spring) from retracting the striker.

Here are a two things I would do if I were in your situation:

1. Make sure the cocking cam spring is returning the cocking cam to the full upright position where it can engage the striker.

2. Check the cocking cam and striker lip for damage that would prevent engagement.

[ripley16]

The striker should have retracted. How it didn't is a mystery as it's a pretty failsafe mechanism. If this occured while performing a normal loading then you should call Kahr for a RA and send it in.

[jocko]

Here is what I think you need to do. THROUGHLY CLEAN THIS GUN AND THE UPPER SLIDE STRIKER CHANNEL.

Take the slide off the gun and on the bottom of the slide there is a little hole up front by the breech face. That is a clean out hole for that striker channel. IMO something is in that striker channel that caused this to happen. Get some spray cleaner of what ever you use. I can recommend going to napa and buying their black can of non cholorinated high pressure brake cleaner made by 3M. Part # 08880. This stuff is super. the most powerful spray cleaner I have ever used. It will not harm anything either. Insert that nozzle in that hole and spray away, fluids will come out both ends, now with your thumb pull back on that striker which will open up that front area even more and put that nozzle right up next to the breech face firing pin hole and spray away. fluids now will even come out the clean out hole. Just sptray away, . do not oil that area.

ripley 16 is dead right, the striker should retract..

If you go to the kahr tech section and hit on the sticky called the kahr lube diagram... It will show a nice photo of the botom of the slide. #9 is that hole I was referring to. spray away, .

#8 is the firing pin safety. . pull back on the striker part #7 and that little part #8 should automatically pop up a tad. that locks that firing pin/striker back out of the way. you should now be able to "try" to push that striker forward and it should not move either. But touch that little part #8 and it should release that striker. test this out, I think in your manual it even tells one to test this out every time one cleans that gun to.

I don't think anything is wrong with your K9 except something got in that striker channel. Now that it is clean, you should be able to test all this stuff out.

Check that cocking cam which is about the only part you see in the back of the grip area. A drop of oil on each side of that cam should be enough also. You should be able to give that cocking cam alittle flip back and forth to see that it is not binding either. That cocking cam has a return spring that one cannot see and that should never give one problem, but if that spring for some reason is bad/broken, then that cocking cam when you give it a flip will just not return. easy to check out, as I stated.

Pleae get back to us with what you find also...

[mity2]

According to the exploded diagram, there is no striker return spring. When the slide travels forward, the lower lip of the striker engages the cocking cam. It's this cocking cam which causes the striker to recede back into slide. I'm cycling mine and I can see the striker protruding up until the point when the cocking cam engages, which happens just as the slide begins to strip a round from the magazine.
It seems to do that(cocking cam engages, begin semi-cocking process) just as barrel begin to lock on this weapon...


What happens when you perform the pencil test? Manually cycle the *empty* weapon, aim up, insert a pencil (or back end of pen) into the *empty* barrel, and pull the trigger. If the pencil does NOT move, that tells me that your cocking cam is not engaging your striker.
I used chopsticks from chinese last night.
Chopstick shot out with noteble force(tells me that gun is cycling - slide returns to battery, after cocking cam **** striker partialy, then pulling trigger would complete the cocking, then release the striker, just as secondary cam is disengaging striker block safety)


What happens if you lock the slide open and push on the exposed striker? It should offer a little bit of resistance, then you'll hear/feel a click just as you push it back inside the hole. This, I believe, is the striker block engaging. There's almost no friction in mine, but even if there were, the cocking cam should still be engaging the striker. You would need an enormous amount of friction on your firing pin to prevent the cocking cam (powered by the recoil spring) from retracting the striker.
I'm little confused as to what your saying.
Do you mean with slide locked open, on table upside down, striker can push backwords(compressing the striker spring). But i can't push it forword, because striker block is endaging.
Press the striker block, then yes, it moves forword easily. pull it back, you'll hear a click as striker block engages.



Here are a two things I would do if I were in your situation:

1. Make sure the cocking cam spring is returning the cocking cam to the full upright position where it can engage the striker.

Needless to say, with above test/observation, I know that cocking cam is full upright position


2. Check the cocking cam and striker lip for damage that would prevent engagement.
Again, since it functions as it should, I think we can disregard any possible damage. But I'm going to check to make sure




The striker should have retracted. How it didn't is a mystery as it's a pretty failsafe mechanism. If this occured while performing a normal loading then you should call Kahr for a RA and send it in.

I'm heading out to the range here shortly to check just that. At this moment, I'm afraid to release the slide as i wonder if triker fails to retract back in to recess on time, it could strike the primer and go off like gun that shoots from open bolt


Here is what I think you need to do. THROUGHLY CLEAN THIS GUN AND THE UPPER SLIDE STRIKER CHANNEL.

Take the slide off the gun and on the bottom of the slide there is a little hole up front by the breech face. That is a clean out hole for that striker channel. IMO something is in that striker channel that caused this to happen. Get some spray cleaner of what ever you use. I can recommend going to napa and buying their black can of non cholorinated high pressure brake cleaner made by 3M. Part # 08880. This stuff is super. the most powerful spray cleaner I have ever used. It will not harm anything either. Insert that nozzle in that hole and spray away, fluids will come out both ends, now with your thumb pull back on that striker which will open up that front area even more and put that nozzle right up next to the breech face firing pin hole and spray away. fluids now will even come out the clean out hole. Just sptray away, . do not oil that area.

ripley 16 is dead right, the striker should retract..

If you go to the kahr tech section and hit on the sticky called the kahr lube diagram... It will show a nice photo of the botom of the slide. #9 is that hole I was referring to. spray away, .

#8 is the firing pin safety. . pull back on the striker part #7 and that little part #8 should automatically pop up a tad. that locks that firing pin/striker back out of the way. you should now be able to "try" to push that striker forward and it should not move either. But touch that little part #8 and it should release that striker. test this out, I think in your manual it even tells one to test this out every time one cleans that gun to.


I don't think anything is wrong with your K9 except something got in that striker channel. Now that it is clean, you should be able to test all this stuff out.

Check that cocking cam which is about the only part you see in the back of the grip area. A drop of oil on each side of that cam should be enough also. You should be able to give that cocking cam alittle flip back and forth to see that it is not binding either. That cocking cam has a return spring that one cannot see and that should never give one problem, but if that spring for some reason is bad/broken, then that cocking cam when you give it a flip will just not return. easy to check out, as I stated.

Pleae get back to us with what you find also...

I dissassembled the slide completely following sticky by Cappy above this section. There were some copper fouling , but i didn't feel it was any more then any other striker weapon I own(if not less).
I have blow out the all the holes, using cleaner in can, and compressd air. I then lightly coated the all the moving serface with light viscosity oil(I was using Weapon shield - which is pretty thick. It could have prevented the stryker from moving easily
So like I said, I'm off to range to see if there is going to be any issues.
Wish me luck!

[Bawanna]

For sure good luck. Keep it pointed down range when you let er fly the first few times. I would not use any oil at all in that striker channel or the striker itself. Just a magnet for stuff. Use the cleanout hole (a new thing for me, thanks again Jocko) each time you clean and it should stay nice and clean in there.

[jocko]

For sure good luck. Keep it pointed down range when you let er fly the first few times. I would not use any oil at all in that striker channel or the striker itself. Just a magnet for stuff. Use the cleanout hole (a new thing for me, thanks again Jocko) each time you clean and it should stay nice and clean in there.

agree, the striker channel IMO should remain clean and DRY...every thing inside that striker channel is either stainless or nickel plated, it won't rust.

[jmstallard]

I'm skeptical of the clogged striker channel theory. Mity responded that the pencil/chopstick test was successful. Doesn't that rule out a striker channel obstruction? Of course, that would also rule out my theory of an impeded cocking cam.

While hand-cycling my CW9, I noticed that the cocking cam doesn't retract the striker until JUST before the round is stripped. I don't have a snap cap, or I'd experiment with this and see if there's any way the round could have been stripped too early and rose into the breach before the striker engaged the cocking cam. I suspect that the striker was exposed NOT because of a malfunction in the firing system, but because the slide was never allowed to cycle forward enough to engage the cocking cam.

I will, of course, gladly change my theory in light of conflicting evidence.

[ripley16]

I tried to duplicate this event, moving the slide slowly and carefully...but could not. maybe had I pushed a round further forward, as jmstallard suggests, as that scenario sounds very plausable. Each time I caught a round while the pin is protruding the round chambered and the pin retracted, never remaining trapped by the striker. A very curious affair.:confused:

[jocko]

I guess were just gonna have to wait until he gets back from his next shooting session to see what traspired. It is hard to duplicate something that indeed might never show itself again. If he did all the things we have asked of him to check and do and it works out ok, he just has to put this behind him and move on, if it did not solve the issue, then a call to kahr is in order.

I'm betting all will be OK..

[Bawanna]

I find myself wondering if the oil he had put on the striker was thick enough or picked up something just to slow that striker from pulling pack for a nano second while in free float mode? I don't think the guns set around long enough for the oil to thicken or congeal but sometimes it don't take much of a piece of debris to slow things down. I agree on the curious state of affairs comment. I'm unable to dupicate it either.
Waiting for a range report to see what happens.

[mity2]

Alright guys, here is what happened at the range.

I fed through 100 rds, and weapon ran fine.

It seems that if I pull the hammer on empty chember, and duplicate the cycle(Pull the slide back while trigger is fully pulled, and release the slide back to battery), pin remain protruded once every 4 or 5 rounds.

I even made sure that pin is protruding by manualy deactivated the striker block, and pushed striker forword, so that pin is protruding, and release the slide loaded magazine.

Nope, gun ran fine.
no FTRB or fire out of battery or from open slide.

I chambered 2 (one in tube, one in mag) at the time to try to reploduce what happened last night, but i was unable to replicate that, unless I ride the slide as I release it.

Thats the good news.

I do, however, believe it is dragging the striker bit tho. See the pic of spent cases below..
http://i40.tinypic.com/2u3z5a1.jpg

You can clearly tell that round is being chambered little ahead before pin fully retract back in to recess as cocking cam start to semi **** the striker.
Despite of that round did not go off.

So likely this has been going on from day one. But noone ever noticed it.
Gun was cleaned out completely today. But I did coat striker lightly with thin oil.
So I'm going to go ahead, and dissaemble the weapon, and remove oil completely from striker and striker recess, and see. hoping to make out to range this Sunday.

So at this moment I consider this issue on hold. I'm still carrying the weapon, as it seems to cycle fine.
But if I remove round out of tube(for cleaning or whatever), I'm gonna be sure to tap the striker notch to be sure.

[Bawanna]

Let the rest of the guys gals here correct me if I'm wrong but I've seen lots of pictures of spent Kahr brass with that same smear, little extra drag mark. I recall some saying that it was completely normal although it don't seem like it should be to me.
Chime in folks.

[jocko]

Alright guys, here is what happened at the range.

I fed through 100 rds, and weapon ran fine.

It seems that if I pull the hammer on empty chember, and duplicate the cycle(Pull the slide back while trigger is fully pulled, and release the slide back to battery), pin remain protruded once every 4 or 5 rounds.

I even made sure that pin is protruding by manualy deactivated the striker block, and pushed striker forword, so that pin is protruding, and release the slide loaded magazine.

Nope, gun ran fine.
no FTRB or fire out of battery or from open slide.

I chambered 2 (one in tube, one in mag) at the time to try to reploduce what happened last night, but i was unable to replicate that, unless I ride the slide as I release it.

Thats the good news.

I do, however, believe it is dragging the striker bit tho. See the pic of spent cases below..
http://i40.tinypic.com/2u3z5a1.jpg

You can clearly tell that round is being chambered little ahead before pin fully retract back in to recess as cocking cam start to semi **** the striker.
Despite of that round did not go off.

So likely this has been going on from day one. But noone ever noticed it.
Gun was cleaned out completely today. But I did coat striker lightly with thin oil.
So I'm going to go ahead, and dissaemble the weapon, and remove oil completely from striker and striker recess, and see. hoping to make out to range this Sunday.

So at this moment I consider this issue on hold. I'm still carrying the weapon, as it seems to cycle fine.
But if I remove round out of tube(for cleaning or whatever), I'm gonna be sure to tap the striker notch to be sure.

have a kahr manual it will show that same primer mark, kahr will tell you that is OK as u are right,in what it is doing.

U have to let up on the trigger to reset the strike block or the firing pin (striker) will stick out a tad. My K9, I just checked will do exactly what you described if I do what you did also.Course I think ur putting the gun in a situation that #1 will do no harm anyhow and also not a normal thing that one would do either. Until that striker is pulled back a tad by the cocking cam and the striker block comes into play that striker is basically free playing and there is no momentum to do anything. Not to unsure that most all strikers work that way.

the fact that the gun worked 100 rounds with no issues is a big plus and personally I feel you have the thing under control.

I think that primer indent is done after the round is fired, not while it is loading a new round. easy to test out, just feed a round up from the magazine and then eject the casig, It will look perfect. Page 20 of the owners manual shows your exact primer indent. It is OK..

[coclimber]

On page 23 of my PM9 Owers Manual is the section called, "Primer indent and distorted spent cases".
In that section is a diagram showing the same asymetric indent as your photo. Text says, "... You may notice that the primer indent appears distorted or elongaged. This is normal for the striker system design of the Kahr pistol. You may also notice that the spent case becomes slightly deformed into the shape of a 'D' instead of an 'O' shape. This is considered normal for the Kahr pistol...."

[jlottmc]

My P45 does the same thing, I think that it comes on exit. Of course I bought mine used, with no bow or manual, it's done it from day one, and also ran 100% from day one. I wouldn't worry about that.