Kahr CW45 and Hornady FPD 230gr +P

[KahrFromAR]

Hi everyone, long time listener first time caller.

I recently finally broke down and bought myself a Kahr to replace my Bersa 380 as my carry pistol. I read about the break-in period so on the day I bought I also bought 100 rnds and went to work. Gun worked perfect. A couple days later, I bought another hundred rounds and went to shoot it and the slide release pin kept popping out. No big deal, I've read it's not all that rare of an occurrence. Kahr said they would send me a new spring.

I went and shot it again a few days later and the slide kept locking back on a full magazine and found Hornady FPD +P wouldn't chamber in my gun. I had to pull and pull on the slide to get it back open and eject the round. I read these were also problems others had had. I attributed the slide locking back to the spring needing replaced. I took the barrel out while cleaning and tried putting the round in the removed barrel and it got stuck about 1/16th of an inch from going in all the way and I would have to pull it out. I tried the same thing with Hydroshocks and they chambered fine and fell right out. My 1911 Colt fired the Hornady's just fine, as did my dad's Kimber. My question is, is it unreasonable for me to expect Kahr to fix this? I feel like after I spend $500 on a gun it should shoot just about anything labeled .45acp. I'm really trying to give this little gun a chance, I want to like it. But it's making it really hard to.

Oh, and I have about 260 rounds through it at this point.

Thanks for any input!

[RogerP9fan]

Welcome to the forum and thanks for sharing your experiences. I really can't advise because I'm getting my new CW45 next week, perhaps other than to say...mabe it's picky with certain types of SD ammo? Hope my Speer Gold Dot 230g work in it.
We'll see what others have to say about that and the slide stop issue.
Best of luck, thanks again for your posting.

[edinero]

My CW45 had to go back to Kahr Factory for repair, I felt the same way about the pistol ebb it did not work out the box. There are other SD ammo like Corbon that works great in our CW45 so try that route of ammo. Any stovepipes? Are you going to install that new spring? Basically that slide stop spring holds the entire pistol together, so it could make a diff when shooting.

[cw45fan]

My question is, is it unreasonable for me to expect Kahr to fix this? I feel like after I spend $500 on a gun it should shoot just about anything labeled .45acp.

I'd clean out the chamber/barrel really really good with solvent and a proper wire brush to make sure a little fouling isn't causing the Hornadys to fully feed. Otherwise, if the tolerance is a tiny bit tight I might try polishing the chamber carefully a little bit (maybe with some 1000 grit paper on a dowel) to see if that works... Or... you can go through the routine of complaining and sending it in and waiting for its return... or... you could simply adjust your ammo preference a little and settle for a different load that works well. My experience has been that some autos (of just about any brand) don't like certain ammo (especially with .45's) and, for me, it's generally easier to adjust my ammo preference than to go through a major gun alteration process... But it's your call...

[jlottmc]

Those hornady's might be a little long in the over all length area. It may be that that ammo is too long for your chamber, which may have been cut a hair short. It's kind of funny when you think about it, such a small difference can make such a big difference. I would check the OAL on a random sample of rounds, then check the Hornady. It may be that there is a bur or something else in the chamber, or it may very well be cut a hair short. Check those, and if you feel the need, call Kahr.

[Ljutic]

I have the same exact problem with my CW45 and Hornady TAP FPD 200g +P. They run a couple of hairs longer than others and it does make a difference. I can drop one in the chamber and the case head extends past the barrel hood. If I drop in a 230 grain FMJ or a Federal EFMJ 200g +P the case head sits flush with the end of the barrel hood. Trying to extract a live round chambered from slide lock, TAP is very difficult as it's wedged in the chamber. The other two extract easily.

I run the Fed. EFMJ as my defense load in the CW45 so I'm not overly bothered. I'm going to try the TAP again with a P45 and see if it will work. Ideally I would like to run the 200g TAP in my G21, 1911 Officer's Model, and P45 for the sake of ammo simplicity. I hope it will work, but if not I will adjust.

[Longitude Zero]

Kahrs, and a few others tend to be a bit finicky about out of tolerance ammo. If it were me, switch to something else you are comfortable with and the gun gubbles up.

[gb6491]

I was just reading a similar discussion in regards to an XDm on another forum. It might be of interest to some here: http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=595706
Regards,
Greg

[phred]

I had some issues with +P 230gr Gold Dots. I think the slide was simply cycling too fast to reliably feed the next round in the magazine. My hand wasn't overly fond of the +P stuff either. I switched to standard pressue 230gr GD's and the CW45 just eats them up, problem free.

[DaveInSC]

I've had the same problem with this load, and any other whose bullet doesn't taper down immediately in front of the case mouth. If there's any full diameter bullet ahead of the mouth, it won't fully seat in the chamber. Even round nose bullets can have this problem. The rifling starts immediately in front of the chamber on my pistol.
Some of my reloads that feed fine in my other pistols have needed to have the bullet seated a little deeper to get the rounds to chamber in the CW45, and I haven't been able to get SWCs to feed at all.

[joeyvco]

One would think they ( Kahr ) would supply a list of ammo to use based on their specs. Kahr knows what the specs of their bores & throat depths, etc. are, I would think it could be cross referenced to the ammo manufacturers specs. I also have Hornady's & upon reading this notice they are a smidge longer than my Remingtons. They run fine in my Colt 1911, I will have to see about in my CW 45. Would rather find out in a non SHTF situation than if it did, & I happened to grab the wrong box of ammo out of my cabinet to do a emergency reload ! I do have a few hundred rounds thru my CW 45 & it has been flawless with other ammo.

[RogerP9fan]

I had some issues with +P 230gr Gold Dots. I think the slide was simply cycling too fast to reliably feed the next round in the magazine. My hand wasn't overly fond of the +P stuff either. I switched to standard pressue 230gr GD's and the CW45 just eats them up, problem free.
Glad to hear it as that's my carry and HD load.
I agree with the comments above as well, although in fairness, it might be difficult for Kahr to keep up with all the varying ammo specs out there.

[sonofodin]

I've got some Hornaday 185 grain XTPs that I haven't shot yet. I also have a box of WWB 230Gr JHP. Any experience with either loads y'all?

Are these reliable? I'm sick of playing guessing games with what my Kahr will eat. So, any ammo that dosent feed in the Kahr gets send over to my Colt.

The Hornaday 185's are actually a touch tight, but they do dry-feed without much fuss. the WWB 230GR JHP's dry-cycle with less fuss than the Hornadays. I think if it will be rack-able through a dry sequence without the force of firing, than it will work just fine with the force of firing.

[DaveInSC]

The loads that have given me trouble have all failed to fully seat in the chamber when just dry-cycling the slide. If you can get them to feed that way, it's a good bet they'll feed when fired.

[Lulu]

Hornady FPD +P will not work in most of the Kahr 45's, not just the cw45. Kahr only reccomends brass cased, american made & factory new ammo.

[KahrFromAR]

Thanks for all the replies guys. I called and spoke to a fella named Jay and after I told him about the slide locking back and pin not staying in, I told him about the Hornady ammo and he told me that that isn't unusual. They are sending me a replacement spring in the mail. I adjusted it a little on my own and went and shot it today but it still locked back every now and again. Hoping with the new spring all will be well so I can start carrying this thing. I'm at about 400 rounds through it so far.