The True Story of the Beretta M9 Pistol:

“You’re not a SEAL ‘till you have eaten Italian steel…”
Anonymous

Thus begins the sordid tale of the M9 that is oft repeated in gun shops and firearms related web-boards the nation over. Anyone who asks questions about the Beretta M9/92 pistol long enough will inevitably hear about how a bunch of SEAL team members were killed/maimed/deformed by the slides of the M9 pistol breaking in half and flying back at the shooter, decapitating many brave men . Or maybe you will hear about how the frames on the M9/92 pistols can shatter like plate glass if you shoot more than 1,000 rounds through them. I am sure there is somebody out there blaming the Titanic on a Beretta M9/92…

As any experienced firearms enthusiast knows, rumors run WILD in the gun world. There are more silly fads and idiotic rumors in the gun culture than there are among pre-teen girls. Sometimes the bull flows so freely that a fellow needs hip waders and a lifejacket to keep from drowning in it. Some stories, however, are true or have at least SOME grain of truth to them. The trick is being able to wade through the baloney to find the truth. With this in mind, I decided to set out in search of actual proof of the M9/92 horror stories that so many recite so freely.

The Saga Begins

In the early 1980’s the Military began looking for a new sidearm to replace the inventory of over 25 different pistols and revolvers then in service with the military, and the more than 100 different types of ammunition for those sidearms. Chief among the inventory of pistols to be replaced was the venerable old 1911 handgun that had been in service for 70 years. According to a Comptroller General’s report (PLRD-82-42) dated 3-8-82, the military had 417,448 .45 caliber pistols in inventory. The plan began to run into opposition when it was announced that the new sidearm would be chambered in the NATO standard 9mm cartridge. Many saw the move to a smaller caliber as a step in the wrong direction. Still others questioned the need for the adoption of a new pistol at all. According to PLRD-82-42, the General Accounting Office actually recommended purchasing more .38 caliber revolvers or converting the existing 1911 pistols to fire the 9mm round as a less expensive alternative to adopting a new weapon.

The Army eventually made headway and in November of 1983 placed a Formal Request for Test Samples (FRTS) to several commercial arms makers in the US and around the world. Eight makers submitted a sample lot of 30 pistols by the deadline of January of 1984, and by August of the same year the testing was completed. (NSIAD-88-46) Of the eight makers who submitted test samples, 4 were technically unacceptable and 2 removed themselves from competition. The two surviving companies were SACO (importing Sig-Sauer pistols at the time) and Beretta. (NSIAD-88-46) After a controversial bidding process (some allege Beretta was tipped off about SACO’s bid so they could lower the per unit cost on their candidate by $1.00 and win the contract) the Army signed a contract with Beretta for 315,930 pistols. This number was later increased to 321,260 pistols. The new pistols would bear the military name of M9. (NSIAD-88-46)

The Problems Arise

The M9 pistol program ran into trouble when in September of 1987 the slide of a civilian model Beretta 92SB pistol fractured at the junction where the locking block mates into the slide. The broken half of the slide flew back at the shooter (A member of the Navy Special Warfare Group) injuring him. (NSIAD-88-213) In January and February of 1988 respectively, 2 more military model M9 handguns exhibited the same problem, injuring 2 more shooters from the Navy Special Warfare Group.

All three shooters suffered facial lacerations. One suffered a broken tooth and the other two required stitches. (NSIAD-88-213)

The Army was doing unrelated barrel testing on current production civilian model 92SB pistols and military model M9 pistols and ran into the same slide separation issue. They fired 3 M9 pistols 10,000 times and inspected the weapons with the MPI process for evidence of slide cracks. They discovered that one of the weapons had a cracked slide. The Army then decided to fire all of the weapons until the slides failed. Failure occoured at round number 23,310 on one weapon, 30,083 on another, and 30,545 on the last weapon. (NSIAD-88-213)

Examination of the NSWG slides and the Army slides showed a low metal toughness as the cause of the problems with slide separation. The Army then began to investigate the production process of the slides. (NSIAD-88-213) At the time the frames of the M9 pistols were produced in the US, while the slides were produced in Italy. There are reportedly documents from the Picatinny Arsenal that report a metallurgical study blaming the use of Tellurium in the manufacturing process for the low metal toughness of the Italian slides, but I have been unable to independently verify this information.

After April of 1988, however, all slides for the M9/92 pistols were produced in the US. (NSIAD-88-213) As a part of the contract requirements, the Beretta Corporation had to build a plant inside the United States to produce the M9. It naturally took some time for the US plant (located in Accokeek MD.) to get into full production swing, so the Italian plant made the slides for a time.

Several GAO reports and testimony from GAO staff before Congressional Sub-Committees (NSIAD-88-213, NSIAD-88-46, NSIAD-89-59 are a few…) report the total number of slide failures at 14. Three occurred in the field with the NSWG and the other 11 occurred in the test lab. Only 3 injuries resulted from the slide separation problem. The Beretta Corporation changed the design of the M9 pistol so that even if a slide fractured, the broken half could not come back and hit the shooter causing injury.

Of the 14 slide separations reported, only 4 took place at round counts under 10,000. (NSIAD-88-213)  No further slide fractures were reported after the change to the US manufactured slides.

The Beretta Corporation initially blamed the slide failures on the use of ammunition. They questioned both the use of non-NATO ammunition and the use of M882 ammunition. They suspected that both types of ammunition caused excessive pressure buildup inside the weapon causing barrel ringing issues during the initial testing of the M9 weapon and the slide separations experienced by the military. The Army determined that both barrel ringing and slide separation were caused by low metal hardness and not by any specific pressure level in the ammunition used. (NSIAD-89-59)

I have obtained documentation from a reliable source that demonstrates that the M882 ammunition was not excessive in its chamber pressures. Thus the explanation of metallurgical problems on a limited number of M9 pistols remains the only defensible conclusion.  

Frame-Up

Another problem that cropped up with production of the M9 pistol was a problem with frame cracks. In December of 1987 and January of 1988 routine lot testing of the M9 production pistols revealed frame cracks occurring at the rear of the grip area of the frame just above where the trigger bar rides. The Army representatives determined that the cracks did not affect the safety, reliability, or function of the weapons and were merely “cosmetic in nature.” (NSIAD-88-213)

The cracks, however, did violate the terms of the M9 contract, so the lots were rejected. Beretta continued production into February and March of 1988 with the effected frames, stockpiling them in hopes of a retrofit. In April of 1988 an engineering change was approved by Berretta and Army representatives that resolved the frame crack issues. The previously rejected lots were retrofitted with the new frame design and retested. The new frames did not display the cracking problem or any other problem during the tests and were subsequently accepted by the military. (NSIAD-88-213)  There were 24,000 effected handguns produced with the defective frame. ALL of them were rejected and then retrofitted and accepted by the Army. (NSIAD-88-213)

The Magazine Controversy

Recent reports from Afghanistan and Iraq have reported less than satisfactory reliability with the M9 pistols traceable to the magazines. Until very recently, the magazines for the M9 pistol were produced by Mec-Gar. The military decided to go with another vendor, Checkmate, to supply the magazines for the M9. By all reports I have heard from the field, the new magazines are not made as well and are extremely sensitive to dirt and sand. Considering that the troops are using the M9’s in an area of the world that is populated by little else but dirt and sand, this makes the use of such magazines a bad idea.

Many soldiers have “written home” to family and friends and have managed to obtain the original production magazines made by Beretta through back channels. (The original factory magazines are of superior quality to any others I have found.) Reports have been extremely positive with the use of the original style magazines. The military has enough knowledge to understand that magazines and ammunition are the most common causes of reliability problems, and so their purchase of magazines that are not as reliable as the original production magazines is puzzling. They should resolve this by going back to the Beretta production magazines, or at least back to the Mec-Gar produced ones as soon as possible.

The 9mm Controversy

A great deal of the hostility aimed at the M9 pistol is the result of its use of the 9mm cartridge. The military stated that its goals in searching for a new standard sidearm were to improve effectiveness, reliability, safety, and operational suitability of the sidearm over the .45 caliber pistols and .38 caliber revolvers then in use. (NSIAD-89-59)

Effectiveness is measured by range and accuracy, volume of fire, inherent lethality and lethality against body armor. Somehow the military’s study on the subject of effectiveness produced a proclamation that the 9mm NATO round was more accurate, had longer range and greater lethality inherently AND against body armor than the .45 caliber bullet. (Veteran firearms users can pause to laugh loudly here…) The method used to actually achieve these results is a shadowy combination of numerical calculations rather than on good hardcore scientific data like gelatin tests. (PLRD-82-42) The range and accuracy “tests” also seem to have been rigged in favor of the 9mm round by doing the measurements at 50 meters instead of 25. (The .45 caliber pistol’s sights were only regulated out to 25 meters…)  It is a well known and documented fact that there are many .45 caliber 1911 pattern automatics that are capable of shooting 3” groups at 50 meters, thus one wonders how the military got the crazy idea that the .45 caliber bullet was not as accurate at that range. The idea that the 9mm NATO ball round hits harder at 50 meters than the .45 caliber round is also laughable. Certainly a 9mm weapon that can hold 15 rounds in the magazine and one in the chamber has greater CAPACITY than the 7+1 round .45 caliber pistol, but whether or not that translates into greater “firepower” is a matter of debate. (Is it better to hit someone with 3 puny rounds, or 1 round that knocks them out of the fight?)

The other measures are equally debatable. Is the M9 more reliable than the .45 caliber pistol? Well considering that many of the .45 caliber pistols in inventory had been in use through WWII, Korea and Vietnam, and that over 100,000 of them were no longer serviceable according to the military’s numbers, I am sure that a brand new pistol that had not suffered all of that abuse might indeed be a tad more reliable. (The fact that the .45 survived three nasty wars and became the favorite weapon of so many military and civilian shooters is a testament to how good a weapon it is.)

Is the M9 safer than the .45 caliber pistol? The addition of a firing pin safety in the M9 pistol does add safety should the pistol be dropped. The long heavy double action trigger does make it harder to accidentally fire the weapon through negligence, but most will agree that relying on a long heavy trigger rather than proper training to keep accidents from occurring is a poor strategy for safety. One could also argue that the heavy DA trigger makes it harder to hit an intended target when you need to, increasing the odds of missing a threat in actual combat and thus making a soldier LESS safe than with the single action 1911 pistol. Not to mention that the weaker 9mm round would not be as effective at stopping the threat coming at you if you did manage to hit it.

Another possible reason mentioned for adoption of the 9mm pistol was to make it more shooter friendly for small stature and female soldiers. While the 9mm is easier to control than the recoil of the big .45 caliber pistol, the Beretta 92 platform is ergonomically less than ideal for those smaller shooters.
Conclusions

The Beretta M9/92 pistol has been in service with our military for almost 20 years now. After the production problems documented previously were addressed, the pistol proved to be mechanically sound and reliable, enduring hundreds of thousands of rounds with little trouble provided proper maintenance was supplied. A redesign in the locking block of the M9 pistol made changes to that important piece less frequent, causing the pistol to require even less time at the armorer’s bench.

The M9 is far from the perfect military sidearm. The 9mm ball ammunition that our troops must use in the M9 is a dismal man-stopper. The M9 itself is a large and heavy weapon for its job. (There are other 9mm pistols that hold more ammunition and weigh a fraction of what the M9 does.) The wide grip of the M9 is too big for many shooters, and the heavy double action trigger hinders accuracy. (Even the Beretta M9’s competitor in the trials, the Sig-Sauer P226 suffers from the same hindrances of caliber, size and trigger pull.)

Despite all of this, the M9 pistol remains a reliable combat proven weapon. Most current/former military personnel that I have been privileged to speak with while researching this article have stated a general satisfaction with the weapon’s reliability while citing the concerns about the size, weight and caliber that I have mentioned already. It has saved the lives of soldiers, law enforcement officers and civilians alike over the years. It remains today an accurate and reliable weapon suitable for personal defense. Few military sidearms have proven themselves to be as good a weapon as the M9 has turned out to be, despite the gunshop gossip to the contrary.

It remains worthy of our consideration when choosing a weapon.


DOCUMENTATION: All documentation cited in parenthesis are from Government Accounting Office documents. The strange number/letter combinations are the catalog numbers for these documents. You can obtain the very same documents through the GAO.

Many thanks to the numerous military personnel and others who helped me track down this information. It would have been impossible to do without your help!

Many thanks also go to the members of AR15.com, Berettaforum.net, and TacticalForums.com for their help in gathering information.

Good read, thanks for your efforts.  

I guess I'll have to keep my 92.

Very interesting read, thank you for posting it!

NsB

I have heard the story, from several reliable sources, that the Beretta was also chosen to help the Italians offset the licensing costs for Bell helicopters they wanted to produce.

Wussy little 9mm... I'll stick with my CZ75... wait... that one shoots 9mm too!

ALL HAIL THE 9MM!! KING OF PISTOL CALIBERS!!!

There's lots of little conspiracy rumors around about the Beretta contract. I have heard that we bought the Beretta so they would let us build an airbase in Italy as well.

In any case, the Beretta was just as mechanically sound as the Sig P226, so we didn't buy a bad weapon to make Italy happy.

I'll be keeping my 92FS, thank you. Personally, after a suitable amount of training/practice, I do not find the "long trigger pull" in DA to be bad-but then again, I've not had to fire the weapon in anger with the 'ol adrenaline pumping away. When I bought a SIG P239, I liked the DA trigger pull much better than the 92FS (SIG DA 9lb, SA 3lb vs 92FS DA 10lb, SA 4lb) so I contacted Beretta USA and asked if they could adjust the 92FS to the same pull as the SIG-they can/will for $100. (no local gunsmith I contacted would do it) I'll be having it done soon.

The Secret Service was under pressure to adopt the 92 soon after the military. The Secret Services' response was that after testing they could not adopt a pistol with slide mounted controls.

And the slides STILL break.

We HAD a rental 92 for about 9 months. First the takedown lever broke, then the locking block, and then the slide cracked ALL the way through on the L/H side and 3/4 of the way through on the R/H.

I'll pass on the 92, amd keep 'ol Slabsides from '44.

Good paper.   You did leave out the trigger spring problems, cracked locking blocks and the magazines unreliability in dirt.

And to top it off, at least the civvie version 92's are coming through with plastic parts.
I'm also wondering why the Beretta's step sister, the Taurus PT-92, soldiers on without any bad press.
Yes, good read John, thank you for compiling the facts.
I remember reading some old reports years ago about how S&W was rejected...had something to do with firing pin force being insufficient.
Or how Ruger supposedly rushed the P-85 project to get in on the later tests.
History takes some strange twists and turns, some of it sadly forgotten by time.

I believe the Army brass was impressed by the pentration of the 9mm in balistic gelatin.  It made a slightly  longer, but of course thinner, hole than the .45.

Which is great...If you are ever attacked by a block of gelatin.

 The cracking of the slide was the reason I bought Brigadier 92, instead of the 92.

Couple of things that I noticed:

1. Regarding the accuracy at 50 meters; sure the sight for the 1911 are for 25 meters, but shouldn't such an accuracy test be done with a Ransom rest (or something of that sort) where the weapons mechanic accuracy rather than the shooter's ability is tested? If so, the sights are of no consequence, though they should still be replaced if the firearm is to remain in service and/or the intended distance for use is to be 50 meters rather than 25 meters.

2. Regarding the 9mm ability to penetrate flakvests etc; I do not know what capabilities of the ammo issued with the M9, but I do know that the U.S. army was at one time looking into purchasing the Swedish m/39B ammo, which far exceeds +P+ rating, and has superior penetrating ability over the .45ACP.
The m/39B will easily penetrate a flakvest with magazines etc worn in front of it. The issue here is rather that the issued ammunition is not taking full advantage of the caliber's ability. Kinda like having dragracer and then gas it up with unleaded 95 octane.

3. Why is the M9's DA-triggerpull compared to the SA triggerpull of the 1911? Shouldn't the M9's triggerpull be compared from a SA state rather than a DA? The fact is that the M9 can be fired either SA or DA, and as such is easier/safer to use (in regards to this area) than the 1911.

Please note that I am not defending the M9, I just noticed some discrepencies in the article.

1. That is a good question. I do not know exactly how the test was done, but the GAO seems to think it was rigged as do many others. I think that the guys in the Pentagon wanted a new 9mm pistol and were going to push aside any obsticals to get one. I do not have information on the specifics of the test, but they kept referring to the projectile and not the weapon, which is silly because no projectile can do any better than the weapon firing it.

2. The problem with that uber-hot ammo is that it will tear up damn near any modern pistol no matter how good. A Sig or Glock or HK or Beretta 9mm pistol will get the snot kicked out of it by shooting ammo that is +P+ all the time. The SMG's, which are way overbuilt anyway, can take it, but handguns can't. To make a 9mm that could stand that kind of punishment would require building one so big and heavy that it would make the old 1911 look like an ankle gun.

3. The M9's DA trigger is compared to the 1911's SA trigger because when the pistol is needed for immediate action, that will be the state that the pistol is in. Anytime you need a handgun you need it in a hurry and you REALLY need it, so it is legitimate to compare the immediate readiness and usefulness of each pistol under those circumstances.

Quoted: Good paper.   You did leave out the trigger spring problems, cracked locking blocks and the magazines unreliability in dirt.

Well I will tackle them now...

Trigger Springs:

These are the suckiest part of the M9/92 platform. They should be replaced every 2-3,000 rounds, which stinks if you are shooting a 3,000 round training course. If you don't regularly replace them, they break. Even if you DO regularly replace them, they STILL break.

A TS failure requires you to manually reset the trigger after every trigger pull if you break a trigger spring. This sucks in a gunfight because it is difficult to have presence of mind enough to remember this little tidbit of information. It is hard enough on a range where nobody is trying to kill you.

Wolff makes a trigger control unit that replaces these horrid springs for good, and its easy to install to boot. I have one in both of my 92's and have a few thousand rounds through them with no problems at all. Does make the trigger pull a little worse, but Ernie Langdon can smooth all that out.

Locking Blocks:

The Beretta uses a locking block design similar to the Walther P38. This design actually places most of the force of firing the weapon on that locking block instead of on other parts of the pistol. This type of design means that the barrel and slide don't bear the pressure, which theoretically will make them last longer than the Browning derivatives that use a barrel camming action to lock up the breech.

In reality I have yet to see a pistol with a Browning lockup wear completely out, so this advantage is more imagined than practical.

The locking block, then, is a critical part of the weapon and is subject to a lot of force. Thus they need replacement. Early in the M9/92's life it was not uncommon to break one of these blocks within a few thousand rounds. Users complained and Beretta designed another locking block with different radiusing on the edges and better heat treating making the block much stronger.

The result is that the newer locking blocks are reccomended for replacement every 30,000 rounds, though most will far exceed that number of rounds before failure. I have yet to see actual documentation of a modern locking block breaking. Even when cracked the locking blocks usually function as normal, with the crack not being noticed until the weapon is stripped for cleaning.

Reliability in Dirt:

I have to say that I think this issue is mainly caused by lubricant. I have been in situations where my Beretta had so much mud in it that racking the slide sounded like rubbing 2 pieces of sandpaper together. Eventually my pistol just siezed up.

Then I switched to Tetra lube for the rest of the course, and though my weapon was still full of mud and muck, it never stopped running. It got a bit sluggish a time or two, but it ran. (Still sounded like sandpaper)

I have fired it in mud, sandy conditions, and after prolonged exposure to salt water and it seems to do just fine with Tetra or the Miltech I swiped from one of the SRT guys.

None of these conditions are enough like the talcum-powder type of sand found over in Iraqi stan for me to speak with much authority on that type of environment. I can say that I have tried desperately to like CLP but have always found it to be an inferior lubricant.

Thus I lube all my guns with Tetra. Instructors and operators I have met/worked with use Miltech a lot. I saw a Colt M4 issued to a Blackwater Instructor that had over 6,000 rounds through it without cleaning that worked perfectly using Miltech. (The gun was so filthy that touching it left your hands black...) It ran through our 2,500 round + course without a single malf. I was impressed.

CLP lubed weapons (and there were several there) did not do well once we got on the sand of the KDR. The miltech/tetra weapons did just fine.

Hardly scientific, but I offer it to those who care to investigate further. As for me, I am sticking with Tetra or Miltech to lube, and Hoppe's, RB-17 or Simple Green to clean. I have had good success with those products.

You could have made this thread a lot shorter had you just stated that the M9/92 sucks and you would be better off with something else.

Not really, because I don't believe that for a second. I think they are fundamentally good weapons with drawbacks common to many other pistols out there.

From your report it seems the Beretta has a few "issues" of it's own.

They have no accuracy or any other advantage that would tend to overide the POS trigger springs and their other reliability and parts breakage "issues".

So what is the point of buying one when other modern designs do not have these problems?

Quoted: 2. The problem with that uber-hot ammo is that it will tear up damn near any modern pistol no matter how good. A Sig or Glock or HK or Beretta 9mm pistol will get the snot kicked out of it by shooting ammo that is +P+ all the time. The SMG's, which are way overbuilt anyway, can take it, but handguns can't. To make a 9mm that could stand that kind of punishment would require building one so big and heavy that it would make the old 1911 look like an ankle gun.

Sweden use that ammo in the Glock 17/19 and have so far had no problems.

Quoted: Sweden use that ammo in the Glock 17/19 and have so far had no problems.

It is a known fact that the 9mm Glock is a very strong pistol and they tend to hold up longer than a lot of others using hot ammo.

But according to John Wayne if you bring up such facts then you are a "Glock licker" and have serious mental problems.

If it is such a known fact, then post some documentation for it. Put your money where your big mouth is...

Quoted: From your report it seems the Beretta has a few "issues" of it's own. They have no accuracy or any other advantage that would tend to overide the POS trigger springs and their other reliability and parts breakage "issues". So what is the point of buying one when other modern designs do not have these problems?

EVERY weapons platform has ISSUES. Why don't you get that? The M9/92 has no more issues than any other handgun on the market, including the Glock.

The Glock has gone through multpile upgraded and production issues itself, just like the 92. The Glocks also had a problem with frame-rail seperation.

Sigs have been known to break frames. Some 229's have been breaking slides over in Sweeden, with one officer being hit by the rear half of the broken slide. (Sound familiar?)  

ALL WEAPONS HAVE "ISSUES". NONE ARE IMMUNE.

The FS and subsequent 92 pistols DO NOT have slide/frame breakage issues. They can occasionally break a locking block, but this too is rare. The only real "issue" they suffer from is that trigger spring.

A simple replacement part fixes even that issue. Berettas are fundamentally good weapons and are worthy of consideration. Given proper maintenence they will serve as well as any tupperware product out there. If they don't work for you, then pick something else.

But for Heaven's sake, quit being such a dork.

Quoted:  The cracking of the slide was the reason I bought Brigadier 92, instead of the 92.

Certain USASOC units are currently retrofiting their M9s with the Brigadier slides just because of these issues.  

JW777; Thanks for the great article. This information really filled in the blanks for me on the M9/92FS. I have a 92FS I bought in '94 that I have been going back and forth on selling or trading for years, but when I pick it up now it seems so familiar that I believe it's become part of the 'family'. It helps that I have amassed about a dozen original mil magazines (the good kind) for it and that I have only fired it one time for about 50 rounds. I think the purpose of going with the NATO 9mm ammunition played a huge part in the decision to replace the 1911, with magazine capacity a close second.

Quoted: It is a known fact that the 9mm Glock is a very strong pistol and they tend to hold up longer than a lot of others using hot ammo. But according to John Wayne if you bring up such facts then you are a "Glock licker" and have serious mental problems.

It was my understanding that "hot ammo" or reloaded ammo was the major problem behind Glock "Kabooms" especially in the G19 as used by the NYPD whom experienced many problems using hot or reloaded ammo.  Please dont try to tell me that "Kabooms" don't exist, Iv'e personally seen over ten pictures of blown up glocks.  Granted the G17 seems to be the exception.

Sigs have been known to break frames. Some 229's have been breaking slides over in Sweeden, with one officer being hit by the rear half of the broken slide. (Sound familiar?

Isn't frame breakage in a SIG extremely rare?

Doesn't it have less problems than a beretta, or do you think that a beretta is a better Gun?  

With all of the problems that you've mentioned, could I reasonably say that a name brand 1911 is more reliable than a beretta?

Also, you said in your post that Sig got outbid by one dollar?  How come there is like a 100+ dollar difference between the two in the civilian market?  It was my understanding that the military chose the M9 because it was cheaper than the SIG, and I would think more than a dollar!?

The Beretta is a piece of junk and a liability.  After reciting it's history it's beyond me how you reach your mostly positive conclusions.  There's alot of ass covering over the Beretta at higher levels but Marines on the ground despise it.

Well that is a statement that defies lgoic.  ';ll take a Glock any day.

Quoted: Not really, because I don't believe that for a second. I think they are fundamentally good weapons with drawbacks common to many other pistols out there.

Now your really being ridiculous.  Comparing this POS Beretta to a Glock??  Ask the LAPD why they are switching to Glocks from the Beretta.  Glocks durability and reliability are common knowledge as is the Beretta's lack of both.

Quoted: Quoted: From your report it seems the Beretta has a few "issues" of it's own. They have no accuracy or any other advantage that would tend to overide the POS trigger springs and their other reliability and parts breakage "issues". So what is the point of buying one when other modern designs do not have these problems? EVERY weapons platform has ISSUES. Why don't you get that? The M9/92 has no more issues than any other handgun on the market, including the Glock. The Glock has gone through multpile upgraded and production issues itself, just like the 92. The Glocks also had a problem with frame-rail seperation. Sigs have been known to break frames. Some 229's have been breaking slides over in Sweeden, with one officer being hit by the rear half of the broken slide. (Sound familiar?)   ALL WEAPONS HAVE "ISSUES". NONE ARE IMMUNE. The FS and subsequent 92 pistols DO NOT have slide/frame breakage issues. They can occasionally break a locking block, but this too is rare. The only real "issue" they suffer from is that trigger spring. A simple replacement part fixes even that issue. Berettas are fundamentally good weapons and are worthy of consideration. Given proper maintenence they will serve as well as any tupperware product out there. If they don't work for you, then pick something else. But for Heaven's sake, quit being such a dork.

Quoted: Now your really being ridiculous.  Comparing this POS Beretta to a Glock??  Ask the LAPD why they are switching to Glocks from the Beretta.  Glocks durability and reliability are common knowledge as is the Beretta's lack of both.

Actually the LAPD are not switching to them but allowing them as another option to the Beretta.

Quoted:  Please dont try to tell me that "Kabooms" don't exist, Iv'e personally seen over ten pictures of blown up glocks.  Granted the G17 seems to be the exception.

So you have personaly seen over ten PICTURES of blown up Glocks.

How many have you seen in in person with your own eyes in the real world? They made millions of them. What % of them have "blown up"?

Looking at "pictures" on that asshole Dean Speir's website and reading his bullshit does not make you an expert on anything.

Quoted: It was my understanding that "hot ammo" or reloaded ammo was the major problem behind Glock "Kabooms" especially in the G19 as used by the NYPD whom experienced many problems

The NYPD "problems" with the Glock 19 had NOTHING to do with "kabooms".

Their problem was with idiots too ignorant to use their weapon. What do you expect from a bunch of ignorant liberal morons form some third world country that can bearly speak English. They can not be trained to carry a deadly weapon in public. Notice their constant habit of shooting themselves in the ass and their habit of shooting unarmed men.

There never was and never will be a "kaboom" problem with the Glock 19.

Their "problem" was using CCI Blazer ammo for practice and the aluminum getting built under the extractor and causing problems later down the road when using their duty ammo.

Unlike the NYPD I learned not to use it in a Glock a long time ago.

The Glock is designed fo fire JHP brass cased factory ammo. If you use other types of ammo it may not work. Just like putting diesel fuel in your car if it was designed to run on unleaded gas.

!!!KABOOM!!!



!!!BAM!!!


!!!BOOM!!!

!!!BAM!!!



!!!KABOOM!!!


And just to be fair here is a slide fracture in a SIG, notice how the whole gun is not blown up.

Once again.

How many Glocks have been made?

How many have "blown up?

What is the faliure rate?

It is higher or lower that other brands?

Untill you give us these facts your BS photos mean nothing.

Im not an expert cornbread; from personal experience my brand new G19 jammed with a shell stuck in the slide about the 100th round, brand new out of the box.  Iv'e since sold the P.O.S., mainly because I don't like the chunky feel of glocks.  You've got to admit those are some funny ass pics though!

!!!!!!KABOOM!!!!!!

Quoted: from personal experience my brand new G19 jammed with a shell stuck in the slide about the 100th round,

Would that be a sea shell?

Perhaps you should keep your Glock off the beach.

I'll stick some .45 supers in my USP and show all you Berretaa boys what a real gun is.

You know, HK USP's have a major problem with firing pin breakage, there was a very bad batch of pins made with no quality control and they're all over the place; they even sell the defective pins as replacement parts, unbelievable.

And how many Glock 19 pistols did you have "blow up"?

Have there ever been any documented cases of a beretta brigadier breaking?  I think beretta realizes its shortcomings in the slide dept. or they would not even make the brigadier!

Cornbread, so you don't think that a model 17 or 19 has ever KB, only other models?  

Does anyone think that it would hurt a glock, or cause excessive wear to fire it with no lubrication after chemically degreasing it like they show in their advertisements.

Quoted: Quoted: Their problem was with idiots too ignorant to use their weapon. What do you expect from a bunch of ignorant liberal morons form some third world country that can bearly speak English. Hmmmn, nice blanket statements.

Quite. And I believe it should be "barely speak English," not "bearly." But then again English is not my native language...

Quoted: Im not an expert cornbread; from personal experience my brand new G19 jammed with a shell stuck in the slide about the 100th round, brand new out of the box.

Don't limp wrist it and stop shooting like a girl.

Spoken like a true disciple of "Gaston the not so great";

Glock rule #1 always blame any malfunction on the ammunition.  

Glock rule #2 if all else fails blame it on the shooter.  

I never have any malfunctions to blame on anything.

The reason for that is my choice of pistol and ammo and my average ability to shoot and maintain my pistol.

When I say maintain my pistol I don't mean keeping it perfectly boot camp clean and properly lubed.

What every Glock owner should do about once a year is remove the extractor and clean out the brass residue from underneath it.

If the NYPD done this then the so called "phase three malfunction" would not exist.

That is all it takes. Once a year. A five minute job.

I've had a Beretta 92FS for almost 12 years now. I've lost count on how many rounds I've shot through it, but I would guess it to be in excess of 7K.

I have yet to replace a single part on this weapon.

Up until a month or so ago I've never experienced a single jam. When I did experience a problem it was due to doing drills in a soybean field and dropping my AFTERMARKET mags in the dirt. The problem was the gun not holding open after the last round was fired. We were conducting 2 round drills, 1 in the pipe and one in the mag.

The original 15 round mags that came with the gun have never given me a single problem.

Having said all that, I did recently purchase a 1911 in .45. There is nothing wrong with the Beretta except the caliber and stopping power. What it lacks in stopping power it makes up for in capacity. However, in a firefight, do you have the luxury of time to make second and third follow up shots?

Choose the right tool for the right job.

I carry the 1911.

JMHO
YMMV