Quest for the Perfect AOM 130 - Part I

[fteter]

Like the title says, I'm on a quest for the perfect AOM 130. Mine was given as a Christmas present and I've been working with it ever since. Stripped, cleaned and lightly lubricated. A little boiled linseed oil applied to the stock. Rubbed some molly paste into the bolt. Cycled the bolt about 300 times. Ordered a sling and oiler, along with some additional 15 round mags - both KCI and some generic mags from keep shooting.com. And, because my 61-year-old eyes are not what they used to be, switched out the flip peep sight for a red dot sight with a dove tail mount. So I had high hopes for the first trip to the range today.

But, sadly, those hopes were dashed. Constant failure-to-feed issues, regardless of whether I used the factory mag, the KCI mags, or the keepshooting mags. And I'm talking about one shot followed by a jam. Sometimes two or three consecutive jams. So I plan to contact AO when their offices open tomorrow. It's back to the factory for some warranty work on this rifle as soon as I return it to it's out-of-the-box configuration. Can't say I'm really surprised, considering the many negative reviews I've read regarding quality control on the AOM 130. I was hoping my prep work would make things better, but thing did not work out that way.

I'll post follow-ups on my quest for the perfect AOM 130 as things change.

[Bawanna]

I've had no experience with the newer AOM 130's. Hasn't been a lot of discussion about them here.
Maybe this will get some started.
Hopefully they will figure out the issue and get it back to running good.

Do look forward to a positive report.

[fteter]

I've had no experience with the newer AOM 130's. Hasn't been a lot of discussion about them here.
Maybe this will get some started.
Hopefully they will figure out the issue and get it back to running good.

Do look forward to a positive report.

Let's hope. In the meantime, getting this thing shipped back to Kahr has been an extremely frustrating experience. Both UPS and FedEx are proving to be extremely difficult to work with in shipping a rifle back to the manufacturer. A sign of the times, I suppose.

[yqtszhj]

Let's hope. In the meantime, getting this thing shipped back to Kahr has been an extremely frustrating experience. Both UPS and FedEx are proving to be extremely difficult to work with in shipping a rifle back to the manufacturer. A sign of the times, I suppose.

Well, I generally won't tell them what it is other than saying "speciality power tools" or something like that. Then send it second day air so it doesn't sit around. A rifle should be easier than a handgun. As long as I'm obeying the law I wouldn't think that there would be an issue.

Just a thought.

[Bawanna]

I think it's required to go second day air.
The easiest way to ship is to take it to your dealer and let them ship it. Dealer to dealer is easier (and cheaper to them) than private folks.

If you bought it at a local dealer they might even ship it for you for free. One more reason to support local shops.

Also might be worth calling for a call tag if you haven't already tried. They may or may not send you one, I have no idea.

[fteter]

Well, I generally won't tell them what it is other than saying "speciality power tools" or something like that. Then send it second day air so it doesn't sit around. A rifle should be easier than a handgun. As long as I'm obeying the law I wouldn't think that there would be an issue.

Just a thought.

Good thought, but shipping to "Kahr Arms - Service Dept." kind of gives it away. At least the UPS people seemed to pick up on it.

[Bobshouse]

I think 2 day shipping is required on a handgun, no requirement on a long gun. Would still be nice if Kahr would pick up shipping.

[gb6491]

Let's hope. In the meantime, getting this thing shipped back to Kahr has been an extremely frustrating experience. Both UPS and FedEx are proving to be extremely difficult to work with in shipping a rifle back to the manufacturer. A sign of the times, I suppose.
fteter,
Are you going to a hub/shipping center/customer center or to one of the UPS stores or Kinko FedEx Stores?
I've found UPS stores won't accept firearms. The Kinko FedEx store here has shipped for me before, but only after getting the manager involved. I've had no issues at all with FedEx or UPS hub/shipping centers/customer centers local to me.
Regards,
Greg

[yqtszhj]

Good thought, but shipping to "Kahr Arms - Service Dept." kind of gives it away. At least the UPS people seemed to pick up on it.

I think their return labels say "KAI" which I guess is Kahr Arms Inc. That may work.... anyway bawanna recommending a local shop or Greg's recommendation are good ones too.

[fteter]

So I finally took the easiest path. Took it back to the LGS where I made the original purchase. I supplied the box and the packing material, and they agreed to ship it back to Kahr at no cost to me: no shipping costs, no fees, no nothing.

[fteter]

So, continuing this little saga, I asked Kahr for an update on fixing my rifle. They indicating a 10 to 12 week turnaround time...seems they're overwhelmed with returns. They received my rifle on March 5, so I'm figuring they'll ship it back sometime in the first part of June. :(

[Bawanna]

Well to put it mildly that sucks really really bad. Wish I had a magic button to push to cut that time down to a week or so but alas, I'm powerless.

I feel your pain though, patience is far from my strong suit.

[fteter]

AN UPDATE: Today, about 10 weeks after shipping the AO130 back to Kahr, I finally received a phone call. Nice guy working in the repair shop. The upshot: "we shot 2 mags worth of rounds through the rifle and checked the headspace. Other than a rough looking barrel band screw, which we're replacing, we can't find anything wrong with the rifle and we're sending it back to you." I asked them to try firing a few mags rapid fire to see if they can find anything when it warms up. And they agreed to do that. But I suspect I'm gonna have to find a good gunsmith.

This story just keeps getting better and better.

[CCHGN]

Johnny come lately here, but I'm curious, when you say jam, what kind of jam?

[fteter]

CCHGN, better late than never. Glad to have ya here.

Failures to feed in a few cases. Many, many cases of the bolt failing to go into battery - far enough to lock, just not far enough for the firing pin to hit the primer. Between the two, not a single shot without an issue.

[CCHGN]

CCHGN, better late than never. Glad to have ya here.

Failures to feed in a few cases. Many, many cases of the bolt failing to go into battery - far enough to lock, just not far enough for the firing pin to hit the primer. Between the two, not a single shot without an issue.

OK, FTF, meaning the bolt recoils, but fails to pick up a round, or it picks up the round but doesn't shove it into the chamber? IF the bolt locks, isn't that in battery? Can't wait to see what it is, but imo, it doesn;t sound like just one thing, but several, like bad head space and/or bad mags and/or the feeding ramp is off and/or the recoil spring is too weak and/or the extractor is not right. Did you send your mags to them or are they using their own?

[fteter]

OK, FTF, meaning the bolt recoils, but fails to pick up a round, or it picks up the round but doesn't shove it into the chamber? IF the bolt locks, isn't that in battery? Can't wait to see what it is, but imo, it doesn;t sound like just one thing, but several, like bad head space and/or bad mags and/or the feeding ramp is off and/or the recoil spring is too weak and/or the extractor is not right. Did you send your mags to them or are they using their own?

Sent in my mag, the one that came with the rifle.

When it’s a FTF, it’s a matter of the round failing to get fully into position. That’s the less frequent of the two issues. With the failure to go into battery, the bolt engages just enough to lock, but the firing pin does not hit the primer. And it literally takes a whack with a rubber mallet to disengage the bolt. And the bolt does pass when checked with GO and NO-GO gauges. Weird.

[CCHGN]

Sent in my mag, the one that came with the rifle.

When it’s a FTF, it’s a matter of the round failing to get fully into position. That’s the less frequent of the two issues. With the failure to go into battery, the bolt engages just enough to lock, but the firing pin does not hit the primer. And it literally takes a whack with a rubber mallet to disengage the bolt. And the bolt does pass when checked with GO and NO-GO gauges. Weird.


Did you tell them that( about the mallet)? The go -no go tests the head space of the face of the bolt, to the chamber. The tabs on the bolt, fitting into the receiver is something else. Sounds like the bolt is not fitting into the receiver properly. Combine that with the FTF, I'd suspect a bolt/receiver mate up issue.

[gb6491]

Sent in my mag, the one that came with the rifle.

When it’s a FTF, it’s a matter of the round failing to get fully into position. That’s the less frequent of the two issues. With the failure to go into battery, the bolt engages just enough to lock, but the firing pin does not hit the primer. And it literally takes a whack with a rubber mallet to disengage the bolt. And the bolt does pass when checked with GO and NO-GO gauges. Weird.
Reading that you need to use a mallet to open the action on a unfired round, I wonder if you are having an issue with your rifle's free bore/leade and whatever ammo you are using or possibly just a problem with the ammo you are using. Is this problem occurring with a variety of ammo?
Regards,
Greg

[fteter]

Reading that you need to use a mallet to open the action on a unfired round, I wonder if you are having an issue with your rifle's free bore/leade and whatever ammo you are using or possibly just a problem with the ammo you are using. Is this problem occurring with a variety of ammo?
Regards,
Greg

Possibility Greg...good thought. I tried several different brands with no luck. But the Kahr people tested with Hornady Critical Defense and assert that it ran fine. So I’ll be trying some of the same when the rifle gets back to me. We’ll see how it goes,

[fteter]

Did you tell them that( about the mallet)? The go -no go tests the head space of the face of the bolt, to the chamber. The tabs on the bolt, fitting into the receiver is something else. Sounds like the bolt is not fitting into the receiver properly. Combine that with the FTF, I'd suspect a bolt/receiver mate up issue.

Yeah, told them about the mallet. They checked head space for me - passed both no and no-go, so they didn't bother to check field.

I'm really hoping that the issue turns out to be the rifle being persnickety about ammo during the break-in period. Stay tuned...I'll update after the rifle comes back and I take it to the range.

[fteter]

I know have the rifle back in my possession. I won't have time to get it to the range for another week or so. In the meantime, I'm cycling snap caps and have purchased some Hornady Critical Defense rounds.

In cycling the snap caps, I've noted that the I need to pull that bolt back hard and fast - any waffling results in a FTF. Leads me to think that maybe higher grain rounds might do better in this rifle. It's also leading me to think about a stronger recoil spring.

Anyway, I plan to keep cycling snap caps until I get to the range. Will update after the range trip.

[7shot]

Fedex will ship firearms, just make sure your take it to a hub and not a place that just picks up Fedex packages. That's how i shipped my Sig back for repairs after they sent me a shipping label.

[fteter]

Well, it's been quite a while and I've been through a lot with the AO-130. After lots of trial and error, fussing, and several range trips, I finally have the rifle running reliably. Rather than walk readers through the whole process, I'll just sum up what I've learned.

1. Sending the rifle back to AutoOrdnance/Kahr was an exercise in futility. Really not worth the time. The rile was just as bad after the factory trip as it was when I sent it.
2. In my case, the rifle ran much better after many, many dry-fire cycles. I bought some cheap snap-caps and ran through around 1,200 cycles. I started noticing a difference right around 1,000.
3. The rifle is very persnickety about the ammo it will eat. I've had the best results with Hornady Critical Home Defense FTX HP. Aguila ammo was far and away the worst. It's really takes trial and error to find ammo that works well.
4. The AO-130 runs much better when wet. A quick wipe down with RemOil just before heading to the range improved things quite a bit.
5. The supplied magazine is just this side of junk. I scored some KCI mags that run very, very well.
6. This was really the finishing touch - the mag well in the receiver is a bit too large for the mags. I broke down my rifle and squeezed the sides of the mag well in a padded vise grip - a little squeeze and a check, followed by a little more squeeze and another check. Now my mags fit tightly and I haven't had a FTF since the tweak, other than when using the OEM mag - over 500 rounds.

I'm pretty happy with the rifle now, although I do wish I could find some inexpensive ammo it would eat reliably. But it was definitely a long process to get here. Hope sharing my experience helps someone else out there.

[tpelle]

Aguila ammo is really bad -mLots of failures in my WWII Inland carbine as well. I figure if we ever go to war with Mexico we'll have to spot them the ammo just to make it a fair fight.

[fteter]

Aguila ammo is really bad -mLots of failures in my WWII Inland carbine as well. I figure if we ever go to war with Mexico we'll have to spot them the ammo just to make it a fair fight.

I've had good luck with the stuff in other calibers. Not so much in .30 carbine.

[fteter]

I wanted to update as I discovering things with this rifle. I've thrown another several hundred rounds downrange since my last post, trying out different ammo brands. My results:

1. Privi Partisan You'll find good stories about the AO-130 and Privi Partisan all over the internet. But that was not the case for me. Failure To Eject over 90% over 150 rounds. Just as bad as the Aguila stuff.
2. Hornady Critical Defense FTX As I mentioned earlier in this thread, I've gotten perfect performance with this stuff. Not a single failure anything over 250 rounds. Goes bang every time I pull the trigger. Just wish the stuff wasn't so darned expensive.
3. Tula Ammo Tried some of this stuff only because it was all my LGS had in stock when I went shopping for ammo. And I was ever surprised. I've run over 200 rounds of this stuff without a glitch. If not for my concern over running high volumes of steel case ammo through this rifle, this would definitely win as my go-to for plinking.

So I'm still on the hunt for a brass-cased round that runs well and doesn't cost $1 every time I pull the trigger. And I'd appreciate any suggestions.

I'll keep sharing as I get more results. Although I'm sharing in the hopes this will help others, keep in mind that your mileage may vary.

[fteter]

Another update: another few hundred rounds thrown down range. The gun is still not quite as reliable as I'd like. And still very persnickety about ammo.

Last week, I came across another AO-130 owner. He talked about having similar problems to mine until he replaced the recoil spring with a spring from Wolff. In his words: "It's like shooting a different and much smoother gun". So I ordered one, which I'll install this weekend. After I get it out to the range, I'll come back with a report.

[gb6491]

Man I hope that works out for you! This is a good thread you've kept running here, thanks.
Regards,
Greg

[fteter]

Man I hope that works out for you! This is a good thread you've kept running here, thanks.
Regards,
Greg

Thanks for the good thoughts! I'm hoping this thread will help others who own or are considering the AO-130.

[fteter]

Time for another update. As mentioned earlier, I've installed the Wolff recoil spring. After installation, I ran about 300 dry fire cycles with snap caps just to break in the spring. Results are markedly improved, but still not quite to the point that I'd like. My latest findings from this morning, firing several hundred rounds:

- I'm encountering a failure to feed or a failure to eject roughly 6 out of every 100 rounds. Failures are evenly split between FTF and FTE.
- Changing the recoil spring definitely changed the whole experience: runs smoother with higher reliability (improved reliability from 75% to around 94%).
- After replacing the spring, the rifle does a much better job of eating Aquila ammo. It's gone from just refusing to cycle the stuff to running fine 95 times out of 100. Ditto for PPU, which is now up to working well 96 times out of 100. Roughly the same results for Fiochii.
- Unfortunately, changing the spring also seems to have changed the rifle's taste for Tula. It's now failing around 10% of the time.
- The one ammo brand that consistently runs without any issues whatsoever is Hornady Critical Defense. But it's tough to justify plinking with that stuff considering the high cost per round.

Now let's talk magazines: I've been using KCI 15 and 30 round mags, plus a few generic 15 and 30 round mags from keepshooting.com. It's been my experience that the 30 round mags from both brands are flat-out unreliable. They're better if I only load 25 rounds rather than 50, but they still fail 10 to 50 percent of the time. I won't be buying any more 30 rounders. The KCI 15 rounders are OK, but not great. Ditto for the generic 15 rounders for keepshooting.com. I plan to pick up some USGI mags and try those out in the hopes of getting better results.

So bottom line to this long-winded post (sorry about that) is that the Wolff recoil spring really helped, especially with the Aguila and PPU ammo. I'm pretty happy with the $11 investment. The rifle continues to be picky about ammo though - loves Hornady Critical Defense above anything else I've found. Everything else runs at between 90% and 96% reliability - just poor enough to take the fun out of shooting the rifle.

I'll update again after I obtain some USGI mags. But if I continue get acceptable results only with Hornady Critical Defense ammo, I'll likely sell the gun - just can't afford to shoot it at nearly $1 per round.

[fteter]

It's been a few months, so time for another update.

I've thrown another 500 rounds downrange. The results:
- The USGI mags didn't make a bit of difference. Performance is exactly the same as the KCI mags.
- Both the USGI and KCI mags run flawlessly with Hornady Critical Defense. Not so flawless with any other kind of ammo.
- Just for grins, I tried some ammo with different grains. Word to the wise - just don't bother with anything less than 110 grains unless you really enjoy working with a rifle that won't cycle consistently.

The bottom line is that the rifle is only reliable with Hornady Critical Defense ammo. It's not the mags or the springs. It's simply an idiosyncrasy of my particular rifle. So it's a very expensive rifle to shoot, which is really disappointing. Had I known this would be the case, I'd have passed on buying the thing in the first place. But, because I don't feel right about pushing my problems off on somebody else, I'm stuck with this lemon. It's now likely to be a safe queen or a wall hanger.

Apologies to anyone out there who works for the company, but I won't be buying anything more from AutoOrdnance/Kahr. What I will be doing is sharing my experience when possible in the hopes that somebody else can avoid sinking their hard-earned money on a gun like mine. I'm out.