First off, just want to thank Wizard for letting me play in his sandbox. I’ve been lurking around a number of gun blogs for a couple years now, yadda yadda yadda…
Ok, now that that’s over with, on with the actual post.
Back in January, I picked up a Springfield XDm compact in 9mm for when I finally get my rear in gear and get my carry permit. I enjoy the gun. The only complaint I really have is that, since it’s such a new model, it’s damn near impossible to find magazines for it besides ordering from the factory. I can find the full-sized mags in some shops, but none of the grip extension sleeves. Oh, and Springfield ran a special right before and right after I bought it where they would give you 3 more mags… grr.
Anyways, I was shooting it a few weeks ago at a shoot after a hacker con here in town. No problems other than my usual bad aim when I pull the trigger and the report felt and sounded wrong, plus my face was sprayed by… something. I froze as I waited for my hands to start letting me know that something was wrong. Fortunately, there was nothing to report. Next was “did I have a squib load?” no… I saw the bullet strike the target.
I finally actually inspected the gun. The slide was forward, but jammed up tight due to the slide release being on the wrong side of the slide. The RSO saw me wrestling with it and came over to investigate. Between the two of us and some percussive maintenance, we got the slide open to find this:
Apparently I had a round with a weak casing, which blew out. This was a new manufactured Monarch brand (Academy’s bargin brand) round. I’ve shot thousands of this brand of various calibers, so I think I just got the one in a million bad round.
After getting the slide off, I was able to get the slide release back in it’s channel and working. I reassembled the pistol, and the RSO and I both inspected the pistol for damage. It’s probably a sign of something that I was then willing to try some more rounds through it. So far, I’ve put about 100 rounds through my gun without incident since then. I guess I would say that’s a pretty good indicator of the quality of the XDm!
Looks like a weak rim, doesn’t even loom like a classic head separation (unless your blurry photo doesn’t show the petal-like blow-out where the head broke free)
I had it happen in my S&W1911 with a handload that probably had spent too many trips up the feed ramp.
Needed to hammer the case out with a dowel and clean the bejesus out of the gun, but no damage. Did you check the barrel for a ring? You certainly should Check for that just in case.