ALERT! Issue w/ Winchester White Box 9mm from Wal-Mart

[CowboyT]

Folks,

We have discovered an issue with the Winchester 9mm in the white-box "100-round Value Pack" available at Wal-Mart. Looks like Winchester had a bad run of this ammo, and it's jamming up semi-auto pistols. Sometimes, you have to use a rawhide or hard-rubber mallet to pop the slide open.

After closer examination, we've found that not all the 9mm brass is getting the primer hole punched out during manufacture! What happens is that the primer gets backed way out of the pocket, since there's nowhere for the primer fire to go. When that happens, the gun jams up.

This just started happening a few weeks ago, so if you have any of this ammo and run into this, call Winchester with the lot # and make sure they take care of you.

The Winchester .40 S&W and .45 ACP lines appear to be unaffected. It looks to be 9mm only. Given that Winchester has a reputation to uphold, I'm sure they'll correct this soon, if they haven't already by now.

So, for the next few months, I suggest sticking with the Federal 9mm at Wal-Mart. No issues there at this time.

[OakRidgeStars]

Has Winchester issued a recall on this ammunition? Any other links you can post would be helpful too.

[WRW]

Thanks for the info. I saw one locked up that way but didn't know it was a widespread problem.

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[Jakeiscrazy]

Wow, that's a fail Winchester!

[Chasbo00]

Folks,

We have discovered an issue with the Winchester 9mm in the white-box "100-round Value Pack" available at Wal-Mart.

Who is the we? I'm unable to find any info on this from Winchester or anywhere else. Are you saying that you are seeing multiple instances of WWB 9mm having cases with no flash hole in the primer pocket? What kind of frequency are you seeing? No, I don't work Winchester - just curious.

[dorminWS]

Zombie sabotage, obviously. Lord knows Winchester would never have a quality control issue for any other reason. It's those damn zombies trying to decommission all you 9mm shooters.

[Chasbo00]

Well, I dug a little deeper and hit pay dirt. CowboyT and group is not alone:

http://forum.pafoa.org/ammunition-reloa ... -duds.html

[CowboyT]

Yep, Chasbo00's link shows exactly what we're seeing. The "we", BTW, is us rangemasters at Sharpshooters. We've had this happen to several customers. Like I mentioned, one decent whack on the pistol's beavertail generally does the trick.

It's just a bad lot. I'm sure Winchester will make it right if they're told about it enough, because normally Winchester ammo's good stuff. To my knowledge, they haven't issued a recall on the affected lot numbers yet. Interesting to follow that PAFOA link and learn that the lot # is actually inside the box, though.

[allingeneral]

Nice to see you CowboyT. Thanks for posting this information.

[Reverenddel]

APPRECIATE THE HEADS UP! Thank ya' kindly!

[CowboyT]

A couple of the rangemasters noted an interesting observation last weekend. So far, every problematic box of Winchester White Box 9mm, that we have seen, has had the date of "3/12" on the bottom of the box (March 2012). Not every box will have the issue, but if you see "3/12" on the bottom of the lot #, just be aware.

[ShotgunBlast]

I noticed that Walmart had Winchester 9mm off the shelf for a few weeks. Just saw it back in stock this past weekend. Hopefully their bad batch woes are over.

[KimberHighCap86]

Yeah I am sick of the issue, it seems everyday I am working at the range I have to beat the crap out of a gun to get it unstuck from this ammo. I had to do it tonight on a friends gun while she was at the range. Also I have contacted Winchester about the issue and their comment was it was ammo made between May thru August, I asked them for the lot numbers (lot numbers are to identifey what month and week the ammo was made) they sent me the list and I was dumb founded at the number, there is 1200 lot numbers involved in this issue, if you have a box and not sure cotact me and I can let you know if you have a f up box. Cowboyt I'll see you this weekend at the range.

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[KimberHighCap86]

Yeah I am sick of the issue, it seems everyday I am working at the range I have to beat the crap out of a gun to get it unstuck from this ammo. I had to do it tonight on a friends gun while she was at the range. Also I have contacted Winchester about the issue and their comment was it was ammo made between May thru August, I asked them for the lot numbers (lot numbers are to identifey what month and week the ammo was made) they sent me the list and I was dumb founded at the number, there is 1200 lot numbers involved in this issue, if you have a box and not sure cotact me and I can let you know if you have a f up box. Cowboyt I'll see you this weekend at the range.

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

[Reverenddel]

Could you post the lot numbers? That's very helpful indeed.

[CowboyT]

Looks like we're getting through that bad ammo run. I haven't seen it crop up in a few weeks. We *might* be in the clear now.

I'll ask KimberHighCap66 if he's got it in easy-to-post digital form.