Found solution to FTF and failure to return to battery on CW 380

[East River Guide]

Very insightful. Thank you.

[Higgy Baby]

Good news... I wonder ....does Kahr have a rep on this forum? If not, perhaps someone could shoot them a link to this fix.


And thanks for the info on Tapatalk......I thought it was just an app designed to frustrate old men so they would throw away their cell phones.

[Bobshouse]

Thanks for linking this thread muggsy....tagged!

[alsheppard]

I am calling this a 100% fix for the FTF, extraction and out of battery stuff that was affecting my CW380. I have a couple hundred more rounds through it with ZERO failures of any kind.

here is a recap for those that don't care to wade through my previous babbling and in case I forgot to mention anything previously. The Fiocchi ammo would not run at all, probably 90% failure. The Remington was better but still had 10 maybe 20% failure. Because the problem was obviously ammo related I began measuring all the differences between all the 380 ammo I could get my hands on. The biggest thing I noticed was the Fiocchi rim was .015" thicker than all the other ammo, (I originally blamed the issue with short battery on the funny ring Fiocchi has rolled in the middle of their brass.....oops) I began to hand cycle the different rounds through the gun and realized the problem was really with all ammo and it occurred when the round was trying to slide up under the extractor, so I turned my attention to it and it's components. I then noticed that even when you forced the slide closed on a Fiocchi the extractor stuck out farther than on other brands of ammo (this is when I started measuring rim thickness) the extractor was not able to get a hold on the brass because it was too thick, this defiantly explained why the gun would not extract Fiocchi ammo LOL! Because the extractor was so tight to the breech face the round didn't have enough room to tip up behind it out of the mag creating a binding situation which explains the difficulty getting it into battery. By removing the .015" off of the extractor pin that allowed the extractor .015" more clearance between it and the breech face giving even the chubby Fiocchi the room it needs to tip up and allow the gun to complete it's cycle trouble free. Hope this info is able to help someone else out!

I used the search box for "return to battery and found this thread. I could not of hoped to find a better post than this. I am having the exact same problems with my CW380 including the Fiocchi business. I read this whole thread yesterday then ordered a new extractor, rods and spring from Kahr. When they get here I am going to follow your instructions and grind the post on the extractor. Sounds like an easy fix. Thanks for sharing. You have to be pretty pistol wise to see stuff like that.

[Laneman]

I had this exact same problem on my CW9. I found another member here who fixed his, so I did the same repair to mine and it worked perfectly. It is a different repair than what you did. I ground some length off of the pin that is part of the extractor spring group. There are two pins, one in front of the spring and one to the rear of the spring. We ground some material off of the rear pin. I think we all effectively did the same thing but in different ways. We reduced some pressure from the extractor spring, which allows the slide to close easier. My CW9 now goes fully into battery, even when slowly closed by hand. No failures of any kind ever since.

Here is a quote from his repair

• "KP9093A. Extractor spring measured 64 OZ. Shortened rear extractor pin 0.045" .
  Extractor tension is now 32Oz. and pistol feeds perfectly. no problems after 500 + rounds".

[alsheppard]

I used the search box for "return to battery and found this thread. I could not of hoped to find a better post than this. I am having the exact same problems with my CW380 including the Fiocchi business. I read this whole thread yesterday then ordered a new extractor, rods and spring from Kahr. When they get here I am going to follow your instructions and grind the post on the extractor. Sounds like an easy fix. Thanks for sharing. You have to be pretty pistol wise to see stuff like that.

Well, I did grind .015" off the front of the extractor pin on my CW380. I reassembled it and put 115 rounds through it with zero malfunctions. I'll go back out to the range next week for further testing. I'm going to take a box of fiocchi ammo I abandoned in the cupboard and see how it runs. It seems the fix described by Mr. tigman is a winner.

[SGT5711]

When I first received my P380, it shot Fiocchi with no problem, but I started getting light strikes and FTRB. I eventually sent it back to Kahr, and they replaced the frame because they said mine was cracked. Since I received it back, mine has been nearly perfect, but it won't feed Fiocchi at all now.

[CPTKILLER]

Interesting.

[tigman250]

I spent the time to document this fix hoping it would help others. I just dug this thread up to update it to say I have also repaired a friends CW 380 and its worked beautifully on that firearm as well. It's wonderful that so many are finding it helpful!! Hope Kahr is reading, .005" more clearance is all they need for these little fellas to feed reliably.

[Macc]

Thanks to you Tigman250,
I apparently may have the similar issue.
http://www.kahrtalk.com/showthread.p...sh-out-the-box

[Macc]

Tigman,
Is there a better way you could show the surface that you machined down?
I saw the one photo, but I'd like to be certain.
Thanks again for your efforts and skills.

[gb6491]

Tigman,
Is there a better way you could show the surface that you machined down?
I saw the one photo, but I'd like to be certain.
Thanks again for your efforts and skills.

If you'll excuse me interjecting my 2 cents worth here: after noticing that Fiocchi rims were thicker, I did what tigman suggested when I was rebuilding my PM380. Here's a photo showing the area that I addressed:

Regards,
Greg

[ODGreenThumb]

Thanks for the illustration. I'm looking for something similar for polishing.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Macc]

Thanks Greg, for the extra photo/illustration.That clears it up for me.

[topgun1953]

Greg, did you just file and create a flat spot on the round pin, or did you try to keep it rounded. I filed mine flat. Relative to the slot in the slide, my leading edge of the extractor is now a little bit beyond it, into the ejection port. In otherwords, the edge from which your horizontal blue arrow extends, protrudes slightly beyond the slot in the slide (or into the ejection port).. That's a measure of now much I've removed. I haven't used it enough to see if it makes a difference. I didn't have a major FTF problem before, but I've got a new barrel and slide (Kahr replaced them when they replaced my broken striker) and I am experiencing some...