[Jeager106]

Sure they do.

By jeager106 at 2011-05-08

By jeager106 at 2011-05-08

Pistol is fairly new, 2 years old. I had it loaded with Remington +P defense ammo and it was time to change to fresh ammo.
I thought I would chrono the old Remmie stuff before I changed to a different brand of ammo.
Two guys at the gun club had told me months ago to beware because the H&K USP .45 is known to fire unlocked and out of battery.
No of course I did not believe that.
Shot #1 clocked 956 f.p.s. over the P 35 screens, #2 clocked 876. There will never be a #3. The gun litterally exploded, the slide never retracted, the case wall is still inside the barrel minuse the entire case head. This indicates to me the case head was completely unsupported by the bolt face.
The gun was torn FORWARD out of my right had. Pieces were found by club members up to 50 feet from my shooting station.
My right hand, the one I'm lucky to still have, is flame cut in two places just below the knuckle, it's almost black but dark blue works too, and sore as the dickens as I can hardly use it at all.
The left index finger is also flame cut. The gases or blast blew the plastic cover from my chrono.
I'm wondering how many things H&K will blame this incident on to avoid taking responsibility for building a pistol that will fire unlocked.
Since this happened I was told of a member of another shooting club who also had the same model gun explode for no obvious reason.
I'm in the process of trying to track that fellow down to compare notes and understand what H&K did for him if anything.
Your thoughts/opnions deeply appreciated.

 

[itstime]

Daaang. Glad to hear you are OK. That is a huge failure. I'm interested in what HK does for you. Keep me posted. They aren't very helpful when I call them.

 

[kirgi08]

:holysheep:

 

[Foxtrotx1]

But...Hk...the standards...the quality...the logo! Have fun with HK. I've been told you never need the CS so why worry about it's quality.

I'd still buy an HK, all guns do this.

 

[Jeager106]

Daaang. Glad to hear you are OK. That is a huge failure. I'm interested in what HK does for you. Keep me posted. They aren't very helpful when I call them.

My experience wit H&K in the recent past has been dismal at the very best.
One tech asked me if I ever so much as loaded an H&K pistol with a relaod, if so just loading the pistol with a relaod voids any warranty!
Send an HK pistol in for work of any kind, like instaling nite sites and such and kiss your pistol good-bye for 3 months.
They are fantastically rehearsed at blaming anything on everything that's your fault thus you end up paying for warranty work anyway.
Glock and Kimber are the two best customer service administrations in the business.
Glock is great at installing the 3.5 pound trigger, reurn time is normally 10 days or less.
Kimber, well nothing goes wrong with a Kimber. It's without a doubt the best facctory produced 1911 on the market.
The worse? Without a doubt Springfield.
I bought a nearly $1500.00 TRP which Springfeild advertises as "all critical mating surfaces are hand polished and hand fit.
Mine shot 6 6o 8 inch groups with all manner of expensive factory ammo. It also shot ten inches high.
I called and compained, The tech said to shoot at least 600 rounds of factory match ammo through the peice to break it in.
"Why", said I, "should a hand polished, hand fitted gun need a 600 round break in?" No response to that question. It's been two months since I've seen that TRP. I was told if the owner so much as polishes the bore or feed ramp the warranty is useless.
Glock/Kimber. The best there are. My Kimber Eclipse easily out groups my Colt Gold Cup Trophy.
I am however looking hard at Smith's new 1911's as they are almost as pretty as a Kimber.
G-23 and G-27, both highly modified by Glock are my "go to" carry pistols. Never a failure of any kind with either.
I also have a Springfeild Loaded. Junk. I can't even sell it as the word is apparently out to avoid the Loaded version at all cost.
Shameful isn't it? But that's why Glock leads the feild in pistol sales.

 

[TSAX]

:holysheep:

:wow: :shocked:





:50cal:

 

[Jeager106]

But...Hk...the standards...the quality...the logo! Have fun with HK. I've been told you never need the CS so why worry about it's quality.

I'd still buy an HK, all guns do this.

Dear sir:
Please explain to me, a mere novice by your standards I'm sure, what you mean when you said "all guns do this"?
Do what? Violently explode when fired out of battery?
Sometimes do not go into battery?
It may be of some interest to note that I saw one other H&K USP full size in .45 auto using Winchester White Box practice ammo that experienced a catastrophic failure because the H&K pistol fired ever so slightly out of battery.
That particular pistol was repairable, was repaired, made "as new"
by H&K and H&K charged the owner $140 bucks for rebuilding the weapon to as new condition.
That owner was however afraid to fire that H&K and he sold it for a niminal sum and I bought it, still have it, it works fine, as good as any H&K USP.
So if you would be so kind to take the time to explain what you meant to say with the remark "all guns do this".
I've been shoting over 50 years and this is the first and I hope last experience of this kind I or anyone will ever have.
Thank you for your kind consideration.
Sincerely,
jeager 106

 

[HKdrudge]

My buddies exploded like that six months ago. HK fixed it for him.

 

[deeHKman]

There are a couple guys that will be around and share some info. Great you are not hurt much worse. The .45 being a low pressure rd if a .40 with much higher pressure's would have been even worse. HKPro has some very smart guys i would post there also. I've had HK's since early 90's and this is the first i've seen or even heard of this KB, good luck

 

[HKLovingIT]

I've seen some kabooms before, HK and different brands, in .40 S&W.


Let me ask one question, and please don't get offended, you're saying that you think it fired out of battery. What I'd like to ask, is if this was old +P carry ammo, is it possible you had a round with setback that created an over pressure, rather than it was out of battery?

Glad you did not get hurt.

Edit - Allegedly it can't fire out of battery, but hey, stuff breaks...

 

[H&K 4 LIFE]

First, I am sorry this happened and I am glad you are ok. However, I do not think the pistol fired out of battery.

I cannot get the hammer on my USP to drop unless the barrel is properly locked with the breech face. Even with the slide a few millimeters out of battery the barrel is still in full lock-up with the slide, and with the slide anything more then those few millimeters out of battery the hammer simply will not drop.

It appears as if the round suffered full case head separation, something symptomatic of an overcharged round. If the pistol fired out of battery I would expect to see the case bulge or rupture to some degree, but not the case head separating entirely from the cartridge. It is possible the crimp on the old ammo was compromised which caused the bullet to set-back in the case, thus raising pressures to unsafe levels. This is entirely feasible and not difficult to accomplish with a +P round that is already loaded past standard pressure.

In addition, I find it strange that enough USP's in your area have suffered from a KB that it is a known factor to you and your shooting friends. In being a member of HKPRO for going on 4 years, I have seen very few instances reported of KB's with USP's and HK handguns in general, and all that were reported were directly attributed to poorly reloaded ammo.

I would call Remington with the ammo lot number and seek compensation. Also HK customer service has improved greatly in recent times so do not be afraid to contact them, you will ultimately be forced to anyway if you wish to repair the pistol.

Best of luck to you.

 

[grecco]

But...Hk...the standards...the quality...the logo! Have fun with HK. I've been told you never need the CS so why worry about it's quality.

I'd still buy an HK, all guns do this.

Thankfully you were not injured,
All things mechanical will eventually fail.
Please keep us posted.

 

[De Angelo]

I think it was case rupture and not firing out of battery..keep us posted

 

[WoodenPlank]

When I still owned my USP 9mm, I purposefully tried (with a triple-checked empty gun) to make the hammer fall OOB, and could never get it to happen. I agree with the other posts, this was an ammo issue of some kind.

 

[pitt1011]

Glad you're okay. My guess is an ammo problem also. This kind of failure does occur in every kind of firearm. If you don't believe me, check out the below website. It documents plenty of similar failures across a broad range of makes and models.

http://www.thegunzone.com/

Bullet setback could have been an issue. The more a round is cycled such as clearing it from the chamber or loading/unloading from a magazine can cause the round to move back into the case. I've seen it with .223 rounds in an AR. As the bullet sits further back in the case, it creates more pressure in the casing when fired and it fails causing a big explosion. The problem would have been amplified by the +P rounds.

Also, HK CS was good when I had a question about my HK45c. Never can say I had a problem with them. I can't say the same for Glock CS.

Good luck with getting everything resolved.

 

[South Fla]

I am wondering if the channel that the firing pin rides in was clean or something had gotten in the channel and it caused the firing pin to stay forward, and hence, fire the gun out of battery.

 

[HKLovingIT]

I am wondering if the channel that the firing pin rides in was clean or something had gotten in the channel and it caused the firing pin to stay forward, and hence, fire the gun out of battery.

Well there are two safeties in the pistol that come to mind, the firing pin safety like you mention, but also there is a disconnect that should keep the trigger from working if it is out of battery so even if the FP was stuck forward the trigger should not have worked if it was out of battery. Of course I suppose if you have the FP stuck forward and drop the slide on a round maybe it might fire.

 

[Jeager106]

I am not the least offended by anything anyone says.
Even if what is said is not helpful or even might be demeaning in some way; I still do not take offense.
So please, anyone/everyone, post what you feel, it's just fine with me.
I'm very experienced with pistols/guns in general, have NEVER had a catastrophic failure until this happened.
I'm former Leiutenant of S.W.A.T. senior Lt. on my department, wrote deadly force policy, put on 3 "dog & pony" shows with Master Ayoob who is a dear friend and quite the showman.:upeyes::upeyes:
Do I KNOW the gun fired out of battery?
NO! I do not. I truely don't know what happened to cause such a dramatic failure.
About the ammo? I don't know. It was 10 rounds left of a box of 20 or 25 +P defense loads, possibly 230 grain.
I do not think there was any bullet set back into the casing.
I was merely "getting rid" of old ammo by shooting it up then I was to reload with fresh defensive ammo.
Unfortuneatly I'm now crippled, went down "in the line" with broken back #2.
This did me in. I spent 9 months in physical therapy because the docs ( anyone hear a duck call?) said I'd never regain use of the left leg.
9 months, 5 days a week, 3 to 5 hours a day of grueling torture I walk unaided now but I simply can not fight anymore. Ergo the CCW.
No one is going to beat me like I was beaten by my last felony suspect, 6-3, 245, 23 years old, stoned on crack.
I was 48, 170, stonned on adrenilin, and I took him. Got 'em!
Then he kicks out the back window of my marked unit and runs, I chase, tackle, blow both knees out on the cement curb. I got 'em again but this time I beat HIS brains out!
22.5 years, all gone. I did the only thing I knew to do. Got B.V.R. to pay my way through engineering school, got hired my GM as a logistics manager, they paid for degree #2, Human Resources Managment, got into financial trouble big time so they mass fired each and every manager world wide.
Now I grub, horse trade, swap and deal.
Interesting story what? Got thousands of them.
So I don't really know what happened to the H&K, I love them dearly, they are truely fine guns.
Time might tell, as I will contact them soon and send the gn back. Fixable? Maybe, but that's a guess.
Please continue with your posts.
I appreciate you guys more than you could know.
Thanks,
jeager

 

[Foxtrotx1]

Dear sir:
Please explain to me, a mere novice by your standards I'm sure, what you mean when you said "all guns do this"?
Do what? Violently explode when fired out of battery?
Sometimes do not go into battery?
It may be of some interest to note that I saw one other H&K USP full size in .45 auto using Winchester White Box practice ammo that experienced a catastrophic failure because the H&K pistol fired ever so slightly out of battery.
That particular pistol was repairable, was repaired, made "as new"
by H&K and H&K charged the owner $140 bucks for rebuilding the weapon to as new condition.
That owner was however afraid to fire that H&K and he sold it for a niminal sum and I bought it, still have it, it works fine, as good as any H&K USP.
So if you would be so kind to take the time to explain what you meant to say with the remark "all guns do this".
I've been shoting over 50 years and this is the first and I hope last experience of this kind I or anyone will ever have.
Thank you for your kind consideration.
Sincerely,
jeager 106

All guns have the potential to violently explode if something goes wrong.

 

[SIGShooter]

My experience wit H&K in the recent past has been dismal at the very best.
One tech asked me if I ever so much as loaded an H&K pistol with a relaod, if so just loading the pistol with a relaod voids any warranty!
Send an HK pistol in for work of any kind, like instaling nite sites and such and kiss your pistol good-bye for 3 months.
They are fantastically rehearsed at blaming anything on everything that's your fault thus you end up paying for warranty work anyway.
Glock and Kimber are the two best customer service administrations in the business.
Glock is great at installing the 3.5 pound trigger, reurn time is normally 10 days or less.
Kimber, well nothing goes wrong with a Kimber. It's without a doubt the best facctory produced 1911 on the market.
The worse? Without a doubt Springfield.
I bought a nearly $1500.00 TRP which Springfeild advertises as "all critical mating surfaces are hand polished and hand fit.
Mine shot 6 6o 8 inch groups with all manner of expensive factory ammo. It also shot ten inches high.
I called and compained, The tech said to shoot at least 600 rounds of factory match ammo through the peice to break it in.
"Why", said I, "should a hand polished, hand fitted gun need a 600 round break in?" No response to that question. It's been two months since I've seen that TRP. I was told if the owner so much as polishes the bore or feed ramp the warranty is useless.
Glock/Kimber. The best there are. My Kimber Eclipse easily out groups my Colt Gold Cup Trophy.
I am however looking hard at Smith's new 1911's as they are almost as pretty as a Kimber.
G-23 and G-27, both highly modified by Glock are my "go to" carry pistols. Never a failure of any kind with either.
I also have a Springfeild Loaded. Junk. I can't even sell it as the word is apparently out to avoid the Loaded version at all cost.
Shameful isn't it? But that's why Glock leads the feild in pistol sales.

Total horse ****!!!

The only times I have ever used H&K CS was when I needed Night Sights and when I screwed up my P7M8 by disassembling it.

It took them 5 days to repair/replace and fix my **** up! Not only that but I never got charged for the parts that I broke.

Some of you people REEEEAAAAALLLLLLLLLLY stretch out the whole "We hate you" banter quite a bit.

Maybe you got bad CS because they just didn't like your attitude.