M&P .40 kabooms?

[Hmac]

I think you are seeing the Shields for a few reasons.

They are new and guys that blow stuff up do it quick, there seems to be more guys pushing loads(this includes some of the small commercial vendors), no one is going to admit they screwed up.

Years ago some guy blew up a colt 45, the first assumption it was the idiot with his finger on the trigger. Nowadays the first blame has to be the gun, then the ammo, then the moon phase, then guy in the next lane...never the idiot.

Idiots are disproportionately drawn to the .40 Shield? That's your take? Really?

[mmcnx2]

Idiots are disproportionately drawn to the .40 Shield? That's your take?

No, not at all. But within every group of buyers there are always the representative number of idiots, be that shield, boat motor or turkey fryer buyers.

All I'm saying is idiots tend to show their colors pretty quick, thus the result is you tend to hear about their exploits early in the life cycle. In the case of turkey fryers they burn the house to the ground, with boat motors and shields they blow them up.

[Lumpy]

40 chamber pressures are up there already, playing on the high end would not take much of a variation to spike pressure and cause an kaboom.

Yeah, my .40 came with the notice that loading anything but factory ammo in it voided the warranty.

[crbutler]

While a "kaboom" I don't think this (from the pictures on the S&W site) was a burst barrel, ie defect in materials or worksmanship.

It looks like it either an OOB detonation or an unsupported chamber detonation. That may be a design flaw, but its not a defect in materials or worksmanship. If unsupported chamber, its more an ammo issue than anything else.

I find it more likely its an ammo issue rather than a gun issue, especially since Glock has had this issue forever, and that is the consensus of what it is, even though they originally had a very wide chamber (at least my gen 2 .40 does) to promote reliability.

With a metal frame gun when this happens, while the gun needs repair it doesn't look as dramatic (pieces of frame sitting all over the place) as a polymer framed gun.

[Hmac]

Ultimately, all kabooms are ammo-related. The concern is a given firearm's design being good enough to withstand variations in ammo, case defects, charge variation.

[JohnGageMN]

My first curiosity is why any ammo manufacturer is selling ammo labeled as .40+P? SAAMI recognizes no such rating, and .40 is known to have a very hard pressure ceiling. Seems like asking for trouble and/or a lawsuit. I'm sure not going to run anything like that in my XD40.

[Seismic Sam]

My first curiosity is why any ammo manufacturer is selling ammo labeled as .40+P? SAAMI recognizes no such rating, and .40 is known to have a very hard pressure ceiling. Seems like asking for trouble and/or a lawsuit. I'm sure not going to run anything like that in my XD40.

^^^^ THIS!! If there is no listing in SAAMI for the rating, then the manufacturer went off on his own and "cooked the reloading books" and stamped it 40 +P to get market share, and damn the consequences and the people who bought this stuff. Calling the Law Firm of Duuhe, Cheatham, and Howe....

[cobb]

My first curiosity is why any ammo manufacturer is selling ammo labeled as .40+P? SAAMI recognizes no such rating, ...

Is it really +P ?
Maybe marked that way as a marketing ploy, like ammo marked Law Enforcement or Zombie ammunition.

[Hmac]

Nobody is using this mythical .40 +P round in any other .40 S&W firearm? If it's all ammo-related, we should be seeing kabooms all across the platform, not disproportionalely concentrated in one particular model/brand.

The .40 Shield bears watching IMHO. I wouldn't buy one until it's clear that the 4 reported kabooms are coincidence, even if I had any interest in a pistol with a manual safety.

[JohnGageMN]

My first curiosity is why any ammo manufacturer is selling ammo labeled as .40+P? SAAMI recognizes no such rating, ...

Is it really +P ?
Maybe marked that way as a marketing ploy, like ammo marked Law Enforcement or Zombie ammunition.

I suppose you'd have to ask Underwood, apparently they publicly say it's at 34,000. Interesting thing someone on the S&W forum pointed out though, the velocity listed for that projectile by Underwood puts it into where the "full power" loading range is for 10mm. I know just enough about reloading to know that I don't know ****, but something doesn't smell right about that to me.

[JohnGageMN]

Nobody is using this mythical .40 +P round in any other .40 S&W firearm? If it's all ammo-related, we should be seeing kabooms all across the platform, not disproportionalely concentrated in one particular model/brand.

The .40 Shield bears watching IMHO. I wouldn't buy one until it's clear that the 4 reported kabooms are coincidence, even if I had any interest in a pistol with a manual safety.

I'm not saying it wouldn't point to the Shield as being a structurally weaker firearm as compared to other ones chambered in the same caliber. By the same token I would probably be more comfortable running a hotter 380 round through an all metal PPK than I would be in my P3AT. That doesn't mean the KelTec is a bad gun, but logic tells me that a much smaller unit made from composites vs a larger one made of metal isn't going to be as strong.

My point about the Underwood ammo is that based on what I'm reading about it I wouldn't want to run it in a full size pistol, and I wouldn't dream of it in a little pocket gun.

[Seismic Sam]

Well, checked out the Underwood site, and their 40 S&W 180 grain is 1100 FPS, when the original design spec is 980 FPS. Worse than that, their 200 grain 10mm ammo is 1250 FPS, which is 50 FPS over the Norma spec, and while that wouldn't be a big red flag by itself, there is a BIG RED WARNING that this ammo can NOT be shot in rampless barrels, such as the Colt Delta Elite. In other words, it can't be shot in full stock 10mm pistols, and can ONLY be shot in RAMPED barrels such as Nowlin barrels, and that's unique in the 10mm world. The ONLY other place you find that warning is for the hot 38 Super loads to make a PF of 175 using ramped barrels to provide 100% case support back in the bad old days of 175 PF IPSC with the 38 Super. These guys are playing fast and loose with the factory specs, and going out of their way to say "can't use rampless" when they actually mean "must use ramped" like the hot rodded 38 Super race guns say.

These guys smell worse than my Bridge Odor on a hot day in August!!

[Ironbear]

... someone on the S&W forum pointed out though, the velocity listed for that projectile by Underwood puts it into where the "full power" loading range is for 10mm. I know just enough about reloading to know that I don't know ****, but something doesn't smell right about that to me.

Trying to turn a .40 S&W, into a 10mm sounds like a path fraught with risk and adventure...

[mmcnx2]

Well, checked out the Underwood site, and their 40 S&W 180 grain is 1100 FPS, when the original design spec is 980 FPS. Worse than that, their 200 grain 10mm ammo is 1250 FPS, which is 50 FPS over the Norma spec, and while that wouldn't be a big red flag by itself, there is a BIG RED WARNING that this ammo can NOT be shot in rampless barrels, such as the Colt Delta Elite. In other words, it can't be shot in full stock 10mm pistols, and can ONLY be shot in RAMPED barrels such as Nowlin barrels, and that's unique in the 10mm world. The ONLY other place you find that warning is for the hot 38 Super loads to make a PF of 175 using ramped barrels to provide 100% case support back in the bad old days of 175 PF IPSC with the 38 Super. These guys are playing fast and loose with the factory specs, and going out of their way to say "can't use rampless" when they actually mean "must use ramped" like the hot rodded 38 Super race guns say.

These guys smell worse than my Bridge Odor on a hot day in August!!

Sam hit it on the head. Idiots accidentally load over spec but these guys seem to take great pride in doing it intentionally.

[Seismic Sam]

And let's be real clear here about the blatant nature of these rogue snake oil salesmen. There has NEVER been a stock 10mm sold by ANY company that has a ramped barrel, and this goes all the way back to the original Bren Ten!! The only reason you would want a ramped barrel is to make Major in IPSC with a custom gun, and the 10mm can do that with its eyes closed with a STOCK barrel. So we're talking about an ammo company making a load that can only be used in a custom 10mm with a Nowlin barrel, and there are maybe 3 or 4 guns out there in the whole world that are set up like this?? Are you EFFEN kidding me?? How blatant can you get with your phony disclaimers to try and sell these pipe bombs to unknowing customers who won't read the disclaimers anyway??

Oh, and here is a hair raising testimonial about their nuclear 9x25 Dillon ammo that pushes a 125 grain bullet to 1700, and a very clear illustration of dangerously hot this s**t is, and the kind of innocent n00bs that are buying and shooting this stuff. Prepare to be shocked by what you're about to read:

"I fired 33 rounds of this cartridge and was surprised at how hot it was. I enjoyed it and noticed that through my LoneWolf barrel it shot pretty accurately at 50 ft as compared to the 10mm stock barrel. The reason for the 4 star rating I gave this cartridge was that there was 1 miss fire and one of the fired cases lost a primer. Why the primer fell out of the case is beyond me maybe the high pressure caused it to fall out."