Yet another P238 range report

[Pawpaw]

Tonight I met baldeagle and his wife at the range and we put the first 100 rounds through my new P238. For the curious, it's the two-tone with night sights: http://www.sigsauer.com/Products/ShowCa ... ductid=265

We had a few FTE's where the case mouth was literally crushed against the top of the barrel hood. Even the brass that did eject had marks on the case mouth.

The FTE's only happened on the last round in the mag. It did fail to chamber one round, but that only happened once.

While handling the pistol before the range trip, I noticed that it took a bit of effort to get the slide back that last little bit so it would lock. Without the recoil spring in place, it easily goes all the way back. With the spring in place, it doesn't.

I'm 99% sure the recoil spring is stacking. I plan to call Sig tomorrow to see what I can learn. If push comes to shove, I'll order a new spring or two and cut this one down. Of course, I'll do a little at a time. Springs are pretty hard to put back together once you cut them!

This issue aside, I like this little pistol! It is accurate and easy to control. In fact, recoil is almost identical to my P239 in 9mm. I think it's a combination of the lighter weight and the two-fingered hold. With this one, your pinky finger just swings in the breeze.

[TLynnHughes]

Just Fyi Pawpaw, one of the things that Sig sent me free of charge when I called them with my issues was a replacement recoil spring. So, you're probably right. I hope your experience with Sig is as pleasant as mine was.

T.

[Pawpaw]

That's good to know. Thanks!

I hope so too. My P239 is 14 or 15 years old and has never given me one bit of trouble.

[Divided Attention]

Anxious to hear what the results are after you clean and grease it... from all I have read that seems to make a difference. Welcome to the Sig family I sure have enjoyed mine so far - can't wait to put some more rounds through it on Saturday! Hopefully she will behave herself - I got her some extra magazines and everything!

[Pawpaw]

I just got off the phone with Customer Service.

After patiently listening to my description, he agreed that spring stacking is most likely the issue and will send me a new one.

If I have the opportunity, I may still try cutting this one down to see if I can make it function. I doubt it will be this weekend. I'm having dental surgery (again) tomorrow, so I probably won't feel much like messing with it for a while.

Also, they offered a pretty good deal on a laser, magazine, & pocket holster for the P238. What can I say? I'm a sucker for gun stuff, so I bought it.

[Pawpaw]

The replacement spring arrived yesterday, along with the stuff I ordered (except the extra magazine ).

I was surprised how long the new spring was. It was almost half-again longer than the original. It fit just fine, so it just needs to take a "set".

By hand, the slide works much better with the new spring. It now easily goes all the way back to just past the slide lock. The old spring was definitely stacking.

Today I braved the wind and went outside and put another 100 rounds through the pistol. I would like to report that it functioned flawlessly, but it just ain't so.

I had 3 or 4 failures to feed, a couple of FTRBs, and a couple of FTEs. One spent casing spun completely around and tried to back into the chamber. On the plus side, none of the brass that properly ejected showed any signs of having hit the ejection port on the way out.

I was going to fire 150 rounds, but I was so aggravated with the pistol I quit at 100. It is very irritating when a brand new pistol (or any device) simply refuses to work right.

Now that I've had time to sit down and think about it, I realize I haven't given this pistol a fair chance. I've been through the same thing with my 1911s and each of them stopped having failures before they reached the magical 500 round break-in mark. I need to give this pistol the same chance.

I'm now at the 200 round point. I'll keep going and post the results here.

[TLynnHughes]

If you have the patience and you like the gun well enough, stick with it. We've put about 250 through mine and gets better and better. Yesterday, I had one failure to feed and it was pretty much my fault. Three different people shot it and we put about 50 rounds through it and that one FTE was the ONLY problem it had. It can sure be frustrating and disappointing and more than once, I thought about pawning it. But I'm glad that I liked it well enough to persevere.

Hang on if you can!

T.

[Pawpaw]

My spare magazine arrived this week. I loaded it up and let it sit until I got a chance to shoot some more today.

The follower on this new mag is radically different from the one that came with the pistol. I knew Sig had made some changes to the P238 magazines and pretty much expected this new mag to fix the problems I've been seeing. On the first 3 or 4 mags I used nothing but this new one before I started loading up the original mag. Both of them performed equally well.

In fact, this time out my P238 worked almost flawlessly through 150 rounds of WWB. During the last 50 rounds I had 2 failures to extract... one with each magazine.

To say I'm pleased would be an understatement. You see, I decided not to clean the pistol after my last outing. By the time I got to that last 50 rounds, the pistol had shot 200 rounds and was getting pretty dirty. Right now, it's one funky little mouse gun! I'll clean & lube it tonight so it's ready for my next session.

As a side note, the trigger pull seems to have lightened up quite a bit. I don't have a gauge, but I'd guess it's about 6 pounds right now. That's light enough for a pocket gun.