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New Kahr CW380

33K views 42 replies 30 participants last post by  Stetson 
#1 ·
As someone who is looking for a pocket gun late this year, I am very interested in this. I wonder if this gun is going to be reliable, unlike the P380.



What do you guys think?
 
#38 ·
Well I kinda feel Crowbait's pain. I am really upset with a Wather that does not run right. I know a lot of people have good success with em and I do know that they sell a solid platform but because mine is not right Imma pissed and honestly I found the warranty to be lacking or at least customer service. I won't take another chance on a Walther. Having said that I love my Kahrs. I had a PM9 and have currently a CW380 which the OP inquired about. I shot a Bodyguard, LCP and a Taurus before I bought a .380. Hated each of them. I was surprised the Taurus was the best of the lot. No one had a CW380 for me to even look at. I took a chance because I loved my PM9 and only sold it because it was supposed to be a pocket gun but I could not pocket carry it in my jeans. Since it was one of the smaller 9's I started to look for a .380. I got the CW380 and wow is it nice. No issues and it goes everywhere with me.
 
#39 · (Edited)
Hi all!!! My first post on here. I found this forum while googling kahr cw380 problems. I own a kahr cw45, cm9 and just bought the cw380 in march 2014. I use to own the cw9 but sold it so I could get the more compact cm9. I have had great results with all my kahrs so far. I don't even use the slide release method for loading a fresh mag. All my kahrs will feed this way even with wide hollow points. I currently carry the cm9 in place of the ruger lcp I use to own because its not much bigger and I get more firepower. I decided that I needed another 380 so I broke down and got the cw380. This pistol is really small and also registered for +p unlike some other 380 pistols out there. I took the pistol out about a week ago and put about 150 rounds through it. This pistol has dual recoil springs and is a LITTLE harder to pull back than the lcp, but remember it's +p rated. I only had three different brands of ammo to try for breaking in the gun. I used fiocchi fmj, magtech fmj, and buffalo bore +p hollow points. I fired 50 rounds of magtech first no problems at all. I the switched to the fiocchi and started having failures of the slide to fully return on the chambered round. A quick tap on the slide fixed it every time it happened. I finished up on the box of fiocchi disgusted but not mad. I noticed the recoil impulse lower on the fiocchi than the magtech. I knew the springs are strong and figured just stay away from the fiocchi. Have read of others having the same problem with that ammo also. I went back to another box of magtech and all went well as did the buffalo bore. No more problems. The only thing I did encounter and for me personally is a weak link in the pistol, is the slide release spring. When I took the pistol down for cleaning the spring pulled out from around the washer that holds it in. I noticed that the washer was loose and it seems just a tad lower than it should be mounted. I checked my other kahrs and the washer was on top of the spring, not so on the 380. I called kahr and they said send it back and gave me a return label without hesitation. I even bought the extremely small torx bit, t5 I believe, to adjust the washer myself but the screw was too low in the frame and wouldn't allow the washer to go over the top of the spring. I would rather fix it if I could than send it back since I had just bought it new. Oh well. I really like the kahr pistols but could do without a slide release on the 380. Maybe just something like the ruger lcp has that just holds the slide back for takedown and cleaning. I know kahr says to use its slide stop to release slide for chambering a new round so maybe that's why they have it. A lot of stuff crammed in a small package though. Sometimes more isn't better. Just more things to go wrong, but just my opinion. I would buy a cw380 without the slide stop that it currently has because I like their guns. I have been thinking about grindng down the slide stop so it wont engage the lip on the magazine follower. This way wont have to worry about slide staying back accidentily when firing or not locking back after last round. Would just use slide stop manually for holding slide open to clean barrel or to show clear on the range. I like the kahr pistols for their quality and also the offering of a cheaper price model for those that can't afford their premium line. If we dismiss gun brands due to some imperfections then I guess I'll never buy the 380 pistol in the review on YouTube from hickok45. Its of a new model 42 semiautomatic that would not function with Corbon solid copper hollowpoints at all. Why would I spend 500-600 dollars for a pistol that won't feed one brand of ammo. If I liked and believed in the brand I would. That's our choice. I know that there are people out there that bash everything, sometimes without facts or experience. All we can do is share our experiences with the truth and let others decide from there what they want or like. I hope I helped someone out there with my rambling. Lol!!! I'll post further test results when I get my pistol back from kahr. Oh I did have one other thing wrong I forgot about and it was some slag on the inside of the slide where the slide stop notch is cut. Just an oversight in QC I guess but fixed it quick with small file. Told kahr about it though. Will include pics of that and how slide lock spring looks when properly installed on their polymer frames. Thanks all!!!
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#40 ·
CW380 and Kahr Are Massive Disappointments

I was quite excited when I purchased my CW380. The ergonomics seem decent and it disappeared in my front pants pocket or anywhere else I might want to carry it. Then I tried to load it. I first tried some 88 gr. Silvertips left over from the eighties. They simply would not feed. The nose jammed against the feed ramp with the cartridge sides parallel to the slide and the cartridge still completely contained within the magazine feed lips. Every. Single. Time. This was while I was attempting to feed by releasing the slide using the slide release. So I tried some 90 gr. Fiocchi hollowpoints with the same results. I dug up a box of old Federal FMJ and gave that a try. Same results — they would not feed.

Thinking it appeared that the cartridges were being kept from feeding because the case rims didn’t want to feed up under the extractor, I field stripped the gun to check it out. When I tried to feed the case rims under the extractor by hand, it was all but impossible. By that I mean that I could do it but the effort required was just short of sitting the frame upside down on a flat surface and using a nylon punch and hammer on the rim of the cartridge. The extractor tension on any other pistol I’ve ever owned was generally just enough to hold a loaded round but light enough to allow the round to be released if the slide was struck. Not this Kahr CW380; the extractor tension is such that it doesn’t even want to allow a rim to go under the hook at all without massive persuasion.

So, I called Kahr’s “customer service.” The very first thing out of their CSR’s mouth, before I’d even finished explaining the problem, was “what ammunition are you using?” My immediate response was, “What difference does that make? Case rims are the same across all brands.” He then explained, asl though by rote, that Kahr's guarantee applies only if using “quality American-made ammunition.” Apparently, Fiocchi ammo doesn’t qualify even though they have a plant only ninety miles from me in Ozark, MO. No matter.

I tried again to explain about the stiff extractor and the near inability to manually push a round under the extractor with the gun field-stripped. In a very supercilious and condescending tone of voice, the CSR informed me that “Kahr recommends at least a 200 round break-in” and that I should “fire at least 200 rounds before reporting any problems.” When I started to ask about the feasibility of at least polishing or lightly chamfering the bottom edge of the extractor hook, he repeated again, as if reading from a script, “Kahr recommends at least a 200 round break-in before considering any problem.” When I asked just how I was supposed to shoot those 200 break-in rounds if the d***ed gun wouldn’t feed them, he simply repeated the same phrase in the same smug, supercilious tone of voice.

I’ve owned quite a few handguns over the past three or four decades, some new and some used. I even apprenticed with a gunsmith for six months before health problems interefererd. When purchasing a new gun, I expected the occasional mis-fire or mis-feed during break-in it rarely proved necessary even for the inexpensive Ket-tecs. But I’ve never before had one that the factory expected me to expend over $100 worth of ammunition simply to get it to function at all. If that’s Kahr’s attitude toward their customers and their product, I guarantee this is the last Kahr product I or any of my children will ever own. (And that’s without even considering the wear in the polymer frame rails already visible simply from manually working the slide.)

I would recommend that anyone considering a the purchase of one of a Kahr product run, not walk, in the opposite direction. Even Taurus has more respect for their customers than Kahr seems to have.
 
#42 ·
I bought a CW380 just before Valentine's day (which is my wedding anniversary and Me Other Half went with me to ENSURE I bought myself a nice gift from her ... we were joined by another friend who has a P380 who took her side ... [sigh]). Anyway, I bought it and shot it quite a bit that day. It shot quite well. I had a few FTF initially and a couple of weird stove-pipes but I quickly diagnosed most of the trouble to be my grip. I'd just that week been doing a lot of high-zoot-double-naught-uber-cool shooting with a friend and fellow firearms instructor who has a school locally. I realized I was gripping that tiny .380 just like I hold my full size pistols (Two handed solid grip). When I started shooting it one-handed I had ZERO problems. Body mechanics are such that when you hold it like a "duty pistol" you don't support the backstrap quite enough. It LOOKS like you are but there is in fact a tiny gap up near the top. Your goal should be for the weapon to not move at all when fired. Oh, it will, but try to keep it from doing so and let the slide and springs do as much of the work as they can. The more the weapon rolls up in recoil, the less energy is there to work the action.

Mine is very accurate. I'm talking smaller than 2" groups at (some under 1") at 7 yards. Little guns, especially little guns that have a bit of power to 'em are best shot one-handed. Let's face it, under a stress-fire type situation, you're probably going to be doing that anyway. Oh, and the recoil was not unpleasant at all. It seemed to beat my hand up much less than my old Kel-Tec P3AT did. Overall, it's about the same size as the P3AT so it virtually disappears in a pocket. I made a front pocket holster for it and took an old nylon front-pocket card and coin wallet for the other pocket. It holds a copy of my IDs, etc., and two spare mags for my CW380.

I'm happy with mine ... and my two Kahr 40s. :D

Does anyone besides me remember when all the gun gurus raved at how great Colt 1911s were, saying that once you bought one ($600-700, IIRC) all you needed to do was send it off to a 'smith for several more hundred bucks to make it reliable and accurate and it was then the perfect machine? Now we expect perfection out of the box. I've seen SIGs break, and once upon a time everytime I bought a Beretta product it failed spectacularly (my last three Beretta purchases are awesome though).
 
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