So I got my POF-5 MP5 pistol in from Copper Custom Armament a couple weeks ago. I spent about two weeks getting my arm brace setup waiting on parts, and it turned out the POF is out of spec, so my PCS end plate had to be slightly modified. Not a big deal and I took care of it in 5 minutes, just odd that the HK contract gun is that far out of spec in the rear. But this weekend I had the chance to get it out to the range finally to see how she will function.

I took this out of the box, put the mag in and started shooting. No cleaning or other prep involved. Lots of cycling the action and dry firing in those weeks before I shot it, but no cleaning.  Others have said theirs seemed well greased up from the boat ride from Pakistan, but mine did not. About the same as I would see on any other new gun, and I always run a gun before I clean it unless I see a reason not to, it’s just something I like to do.

I get up to the line, insert mag, drop the bolt, drop the safety and take a shot at a steel silhouette from about 60-70 yards. Pow, Ring, …excellent. Sights are right on from the factory even out this far. So far, so good. Time for shot two. Pull trigger, nothing but mush. Failure to eject, the bolt is not closed. The empty case is sitting in the action. Not stove piped, it didn’t make it that far. The case just dropped limp into the action. Oh well, lock the bolt back, dump it out and I am ready to go. Pow, Pow, Mush. Failure to eject. This time in my effort to clear the brass out it actually drops down into the trigger pack blocking the hammer. So I have to take the pistol down to get the brass out of the lower. Not good. Oh well, put it back together and get back on the line. Pow, mush, repeat. At one point the brass managed to lodge itself into the trigger pack without any action from me. I got a click on two consecutive rounds with no primer impact evident, so I took it down and there was a piece of brass blocking the hammer again.

...

In my first magazine I was unable to fire more than 3 shots without a failure to eject.  None even seem to make a significant effort to eject, just drop straight down off the bolt face. For the first mag it really was a jam-o-matic.  But I am not one to get too down on it so fast so I go back to load up my mag (only the one mag for now, makes this process take a while) and get back on the line.

The second mag is much smoother, but still far from good. I didn’t count exactly, but I believe I had 5-6 failures in my second mag. Again, every one of them is just a very limp failure to eject.  Spirits are rising. Seems like this may only a break in period thing. Perhaps I should have oiled it up beforehand? The world will never know. After the second mag I decide it’s time to let some others shoot it and I will just stand by to help clear any jams if needed.

I let my Wife take the second spot in shooting the new gun, only fair since it’s her money that buys it. Things are going much better now. She has a single failure to eject. As I stand behind her I notice that the bass is ejecting pretty week. Some land less than a foot away from where she is standing. So ejection is weak, that is obvious enough, but getting better.

I have four other friends with us, so as others are shooting some of my other guns I am loading up the mag for the next shooters. Each of the next four shooters runs flawlessly. 120 consecutive problem free rounds. Things are really looking up. I notice that ejection is getting stronger and stronger as it’s shot more.  Now that everyone has shot it though we put it aside and focus on some other guns for a while and come back to the MP5 towards the end of the day.

Since I had only shot it when it was problematic I wanted a little more trigger time with it. So I load up another mag and go for it. One failure to eject. Not happy with that I decide to run one more mag before I go, this one is flawless. The rain is moving in though and it is time to go, so that is all I can do for today.  279 rounds fired with 2 failures in the last 217 rounds and uncounted numbers in the first 62.

Now, that takes care of the bad, not for the good. The accuracy is fantastic. I was eyeballing the distance, but I normally shoot in a 50 yard range, and I would say this was half more on top of that. Standing as far back as I could I had no problems at all hitting the steel target every time. Follow-ups were quick and very easy to keep on target. Even the most inexperienced shooter (her third time ever shooting) had absolutely no problems ringing the steel at 50+ yards.

Everyone thoroughly enjoys the gun, praised its accuracy, controllability and overall feel. The fit on my gun is decent (the aforementioned modification needed to get an end cap on) but the finish is quite good. Only a couple spots on the entire gun have any factory blemish, with one of those being the trigger. Sights and cocking tube are nice and straight.

Overall at this point I am cautiously optimistic. I do believe the ejection issue will work itself out, otherwise it goes back in for warranty repair, so that’s not a huge deal to me. I love the accuracy and feel of the gun. With the arm brace it’s just the right length, but I did remove my side folding adapter because I felt it made the LOP just too long. It was right up there with my SCAR with the stock fully extended. That is just too much for a sub gun.

I got it all nice and cleaned and oiled after coming back from the range and plan to take it back out again this coming weekend. I will run it for at least a few hundred more rounds to see how it does. If it performs well I can really see this being a very good, bordering on ideal for me, home defense pistol and it may end up taking over that roll for me, as long as I can get a few hundred problem free rounds to build my confidence in it.

I will write up a second report once I have that chance to get it out and run it, and will get some pictures of the setup for the arm brace that I put together when I have it out on the range.

Man, this 2000 character limit is kinda killer for these long posts.

Thanks for the post. It might have some grit that it just needs to work out. Not like replacement parts aren't common though.

What kind of ammo where you using?

Try a few boxes of Winchester RA9124N, it's hotter NATO spec 9mm. My MKE eats it up all day, I noticed with regular cheap 115gr stuff the ejection is really weak.

Ammunition was a mix of Freedom Munitions New 115gr, Tula BrassMaxx 115gr and Surplus Ammo 115 gr reman. The next trip will be the same(mostly Freedom Munitions, low on the others) and two kinds of Winchester.

I was checking the brass as it happened. The most jams occurred with the Tula ammo, but that is also what I had the most of that day, so I can't be positive it's related. I will do a more thorough job of recording the type of ammo with each jam, should there be any.

The magazine is a genuine HK mag, so that is not likely the issue.

I had intended to go to the range this weekend, but my POF is stuck in my safe with an electronic lock that doesn't want to take my code anymore. I submitted the paperwork for the override code, but it will take several days to get it, so the weekend shoot is off. Hopefully next weekend.