I got an AP5 and mags are really hard to fit in. I mean all mags, MKE, Korean, German, etc.  
Also, once they’re in, there’s a lot of play back and forth, and side to side.
Is there a trick to get them to fit better and reduce play?  Or is that a common thing?

It's fairly common for them to not fit as nicely as in an HK SP5, but they should function flawlessly. If not, then contact Century and/or your vendor and get an RMA so they can fix it.

If it's tight at initial insertion, that could get slightly better as the finish wears off inside the magazine well at that area, but it just depends on what exactly is causing it.
If you do have malformed geometry there, then it's not really going to get better. I've bought 3 and they've been fine, but MKE does put out a bad one on occasion.

I have 2 korean mags that are tight.
Decently tight.  
My mke mag fits fine.

The mag catch portion that snaps into the side of the mag pivots slightly up and down in its allocated space. Either the space is a hair too big or the mag catch is slightly too small. I also have an SP5 and mags are also difficult to fit but not nearly as bad. And the mags sit firm and don’t move much when snapped in

Both MKE magazines and HK magazines fit fine in my AP5.

I get perfect reliability with the HK mags but a rare failure to feed issue with hollow points using the MKE magazines. Frequency however is decreasing so it may be an artifact of the feed lips smoothing with use.

Are you trying to insert mags on a closed bolt? It's normal on a MP5 for that to be difficult which is why you typically see experienced users lock the bolt open before switching mags.

Mag wobble is also pretty common on the MKE guns, however it shouldn't cause any issues.

I'll go so far as to say. Never insert a mag on a closed bolt.

While MKE doesn't come anywhere close to HK when it comes to Quality Control. With that said my AP5-P and AP5 mags fit as well as my friend's SP5. When comparing the same magazine. It is normal to have some front to back movement even on a closed bolt.

I’ve been inserting mags on closed bolts and I don’t see any problems with the authentic HK. I Measured the magazine catch and compared it with an authentic HK magazine catch and it is undersized. Thankfully, the hole for the magazine catch in the receiver is very close to the same dimensions of the HK. So I ordered an HK magazine catch

What’s the issue with inserting mags on a closed bolt?

HK's training division always advised not to do it and here's why:

If you have a magazine with more than 30 rounds loaded into it (which is easily doable) then the mag will stop short of the magazine catch during insertion, thereby leaving the magazine free to fall out of the weapon as soon as you release it.

There are 3 ways to deal with the situation at that point. You either have to manually open the bolt and lock it open, and then attempt to load that mag, or you have to reduce the number of rounds in the magazine to 30 or less and then re-attempt. Or you can replace the entire magazine, of course, abandoning that one.

That's why HK's training division always recommended two things:
Ensure you never load more than 30 rounds in a magazine, and always execute reloads starting with the bolt locked open.

Any 30-round capacity 9mm MP5 mag will readily accept 31 rounds, and usually no malfunction will occur upon loading that 31 round mag with the bolt locked open, and then chambering a round.

If a mag has 32 or 33 rounds then it's way more likely to malfunction during feeding, because of the increased friction present in that top round in the mag.

If you just load 9mm MP5 mags until you can't anymore, you'll easily stop at 32 or 33 rounds. If you stop when you notice the slightest bit of resistance, and then remove one round, you'll usually either have 30 or 31 left in there. That's why I always count when loading mags for duty use and ensure I'm loading 30. I also always reload my MP5s with the bolt locked to the rear, as HK recommends.

On my MP5/40 I'll use the bolt release, but HK actually didn't recommend using it, since you might subsequently switch to using a 9mm MP5 (which doesn't have a bolt release lever).

Good call.

That'll likely get your weapon squared away.

Please let us know.

Habits of training. The best way to avoid creating bad habits, is to avoid them all together.

That's an exaggeration. It's a numbers game, far more clones than factory HK Mp5s are bought so it seems like there are more issues. HK fanboys are less likely to post their issues. Most issues are new users unfamiliar with the platform and/or teething issues.

ROTFLMAO!  

And I have Two Excellent MKE, AP5-P & an AP5.

I dont have any gun ego tied up in my MKE AP5 so here some honest takes...

I have 10 MKE mags for it and they all wobble to a degree I found concerning when I first got it, but Ive never had a mag related failure. They work fine.

I had real weak ejection until I replaced the ejector spring with an HK replacement.

My hammer broke in fucking half while shooting. Upon taking the fcg apart to replace it, I can tell the hammer is a cheap casting. It was absolute dogshit quality. I bought a US made billet hammer and the trigger pull improved significantly.

I love my AP5 and think it was a great buy. I think the original handguard sucks and replaced it with a US made wide grip. I've put about $150 in aftermarket parts on it, and a $200 stamp. All in I have a pretty sweet range toy for under $1500.

Kalahn, man that sucks.  I haven't had any issues with mine.

Dude I'm just happy I hadn't seen some of the more serious issues I've seen online.

If I were you though I'd spend the few bucks to replace your hammer.

He's my cast and broken hammer:

Attached File

I've owned 3 MKE "MP5" style pistols, all in close succession to each other (2017). All 3 of them had substantial Q.C. problems. Out of the 3, two were returned to Zenith as defective, and I kept the "best of the worst".

The one I kept has canted sights, which required maximum windage adjustment to the right in order to zero, but it did zero. It has the common magazine wobble, about 1/4" of fore-aft movement as measured at the base of a 30 round magazine. It also has a somewhat misshapen magazine well; the sides are not parallel, and the corners of the magazine well were sharply pinched, then rounded-over with a grinder, so they're paper-thin.

It does work really well, so there's that. However, there will be no more Turkish (revenge?) firearms for me.

Stahl, did you not warranty them?

Kalahn, email century that pic they will send you a hammer.

I thought about it, but what are they going to send me? More cast shit?

I bought a quality US made billet machined hammer. It wasn't expensive so whatever. I don't care.

The first two defective MKE pistols went back to Zenith, at which point Zenith made it very clear that they wanted nothing else to do with me. Atlantic Firearms (who I purchased from originally) sent me the third, and final (their stated condition) MKE as a gesture of good will, since I really wanted a "double push pin MP5". The pistol I ended up with had to do, and I suppose it's good enough. It was "hand picked" by Atlantic Firearms, due to all of my previous grief, so it was the best they could do, for which I am grateful.

For a double push pin MP5, MKE and POF were the only options. MKE had a better reputation than POF at that time, so that's what I bought. I didn't really care how much it would cost, or how unpleasant the process would be to obtain one, I just wanted one. Not for nefarious purposes, mind you; for authenticity to the original design.

If the H&K SP5 were made with a double push pin receiver, like the MKE, I would dump this cockeyed MKE and buy the H&K in a heartbeat, even if the H&K cost $4k.

Where did you get the hammer?

https://hkparts.net/all-parts/hkp-90-series-hammer-for-trigger-pack/

Caveat: the hole for the pin that attaches the strut is slightly different, I really should have bought a matching strut at the same time.

I had to use some WECSOG to get everything to fit.

The point of my post is just to say I love my AP5, it was a great bargain. I have it SBR'd and with an A2 stock it's become my favorite range toy. But when you buy the bargain priced gun, you might have some issues to work though.

I ended up getting my HK magazine catch today and I installed it. The MKE magazine catch was seriously out of spec and now the mags insert much better. It looks like the magazine well is slightly enlarged and there is a bit of wobble so I use a pair of pliers on the front, forward facing wall of the magazine well and bent it slightly inward and now the mags are tight, which is good. As for my only MKE magazine, that one is very difficult to get in, all the rest fit fine.

Originally I bought an AP5-P. The mag was a little loose front to back, but it fed ammo perfectly. A year later I bought an AP5, & that mag was snug. Not too tight, but snug. I simply swapped mags with guns, & now both are a perfect fit. Not loose, or snug. But I realize not everyone has 2 guns to swap mags with. GARY.

I've got two of the older ATI imported MKE guns, one full size the other a K model. No problems with mag fitment in either one and the wobble is perhaps a fraction less than what I see with my HK SP89. The MKE mags, purchased within the past year, seem to fit slightly tighter than my old German HK mags.

Regarding the broken hammer thing, easy fix:
First - Buy a non-pinned hammer strut.
Second - Buy an old surplus full auto hammer and simply grind away the FA notch.
Third - Reply to this thread thanking me.

Clicker, what's the benefit of FA hammer?

Not Clicker, but a F.A. hammer would most likely be H&K German from a G3, especially if it is a hammer that doesn't have a strut pin hole.

You should have bought a real HK... Would have saved you all this headache.

That is my understanding as well.

The posts I've seen about broken hammers (plus the one I repaired for my buddy) appear to be cast hammers with pinned struts. These broke at the strut pin hole. The non-strutted hammers eliminate this weak spot and I suspect a German FA hammer is simply a stronger part based on tens of thousands of rounds I've fired through my personal machine guns. Maybe it's just me but damn I struggle to install a hammer with a pinned strut.

First i have seen with broken hammers.
Maybe a bad batch that had some flaws?

One of my AP5's had a really gritty trigger.
I played around with german parts and i ended up with a really smooth trigger when i was done.

You will need to grind off the lower sear catch, just copy the profile of the mke hammer.

I also like the non pinned hammer, it's much easier to remove and reinstall.

For mag fitment, both were somewhat loose fitting.
I installed a hk mag catch and it tightened it up quite a bit.

The hk one fit the reciever much tighter.

The other issue i had on both of them was the paddle release.
Gritty AF!

I tried to explain how to change that out on another thread, but there is a cylinder/insert that serves as the piviot.

Not the easiest thing to drive out, but replacing both friction parts in there would clean it up.

For mine i filed and polished the surfaces until it was smooth.

Hardened surfaces, so it wasn't easy.
Doing it again i would have just replaced the entire mag catch and pladdle parts in one go...

Other issues i had was with ejection, i just tossed german parts until it started working.

In the end i think it was mainly the extractor spring.
But i also tossed a german extractor with the copper colored spring there while i was at it.

No issues with either one since then.

LOL. I did buy an SP5 but for that price I don’t want to “bling” it out like I can with a sub $1,100 gun.  If I mess up the finish on a AP5 I’m not going to cry

My recently bought AP5 has been a joy to own ...

* thread protector didn't' survive the journey from Atlantic Arms to my FFL.  It literally slips right off without turning it.
* the hammer would not reset after firing. Century wanted me to pay shipping both ways to repair totaling $173 through FEDEX.  I bought a complete new trigger box assembly online for $189.
* had to buy six braces before I found one that would fit the out of spec receiver.

The gun is for sale for $1250 shipped (including an aluminum back plate SBTactical brace) if anyone wants it.  Less than 120 rounds fired.

Ditto.

I have several "real" HK94, SP5.  Wanted a range toy.

I'm selling the AP5 and just using a real HK for range use.  Who cares. It is just money.