Nice little gun. Put about 50 rds through her, FMJ, Speer GD and Win HPs. No failures to fire or eject. Won't strip the 1st round reliably if "slingshotted" (I know this isn't supposed to work at this stage, but I tried it anyway). Plenty accurate for social encounters, seem like it will be reliable too.
Now the questions. Got a fair amt. of wear on the recoil spring guide. the spring took the finish off (not surprised), but also made some "rings" around the guide, deep enough to feel with your thumb (kind of weird). Anybody else see this? Also, I had some skin removed from the top of the 1st knuckle of my thumb.
Not sure if it's the back edge of the raised panel on the side of the grip, or just the back of the grip itself. Not really a problem, but I thought of either smoothing the edge of that raised panel, or putting a bit of something padded in that area. Whadaya think?

I put a Hogue Hand-all Jr on mine and improved the grip dramatically.  The guide rod, I am not sure what is going on there.

That loading the first round thing, the butt of your other hand will finish that off.

As for your recoil spring guide rod question.My CW9 guide rod was really chewed up after 100rds.So i ordered a stainless steel guide rod and it was worth every penny.You can order one from Kahr or get one cheaper here http://guiderod.com/  $25 shipping included.

After over 300rds SS rod is marked slightly but still smooth.You can contact Kahr service through email and request another factory guide rod and they will send you one for free (at least they did for me) but it will do the same thing but they included a new recoil spring.

The wear on the factory rod will not affect the reliability of your CW9 and it will smooth out after a few hundred rds. or you can smooth it out with some fine sandpaper.The rings you are feeling is the bluing wearing off the guide rod fine sandpaper will fix that.Thats what i did with my first factory guide rod and it works fine.

Fenderman