Report on Kel-Tec P-11 Trip to Factory

D

Drakejake

New member
I have posted several messages in recent months regarding problems with my P-11. It will not feed Winchester white box fmj and jams from time to time with UMC. After talking to Cliff at KT, I sent the slide to Florida. I got it back in about 10 days. They replaced the barrel and apparently the recoil springs, which seem to be stronger.

I went out yesterday and found that the replacement parts do not seem to have made any difference. I concentrated on holding the pistol rigidly to avoid "user error." But to no avail. I have given up on the Winchester ammo but will try again with the UMC. Perhaps this pistol just isn't the right one for me. I have found my P-32, bought the same day as the P-11, to be very reliable with several kinds of ammo.

I have sets of stronger springs from Wolff but doubt that they would help what seems to be mainly a failure to extract rather than a failure to feed. With the white box fmj, I typically have a jam with the spent shell still in the chamber and the new round stuck below it. I suggested to Cliff that I might have a problem extractor but he apparently didn't think so. The white box round is slightly longer than the UMC and this may be the problem.

Drakejake
 
Try the UMC & some better quality ammo & see if that helps. Some particular guns are just finicky about ammo even if they work fine in others. I use S&B for practice, which is fairly cheap, but is good ammo. Try some HP also & see what it does with that. I assume the feed ramp has been polished if you sent it back to KT. I haven't tried Winchester but mine has been 100% with everything else.
Good Luck!
 
I sent my P11 to Cliff at Kel-Tec this morning. It jammed entirely. I couldn't even rack the slide. I am confident from what I've heard about their customer service that it will be fixed quickly. I'm a little more concerned that it will be fixed right. I really like the gun, and hope it works since I paid about a hundred bucks for an Alessi ankle holster for it. Wish me luck.
 
Drake....

I'm not an expert on KelTec anythings....

but if the case is not being extracted, the extractor ain't working right.

You might check to see if the ejector is long enough. A non functioning ejector might allow the fired case to rechamber... but the fresh round below should push it somewhere out of line.
 
Drakejake...

...please find out what ammo Cliff used.

Then we're going to run a little experiment.
I'm going to swap out your barrel and shoot it in my P-11 and you can shoot my barrel in yours.

Then we'll swap the barrels back and trade slides.

And then perhaps a combo of the two. :cool:

If we can't fix it, I'm going to buy it from you.

Drop me an e-mail after Labor Day and we'll set it up if you want.

...Zander

PS: Was the chamber polished in either barrel?
 
The shop where I bought my P-11 was supposed to send my P-11 back to the factory on Monday. I'll be calling Kel-Tec soon to see if they have it and also to talk with the gunsmith. I too was having FTE. I like the Kel-Tec and will keep it if it comes back fixed, but I'm not fond of repeat trips back to the factory for the same problem. I did speak with a Kel-Tec Rep in the last week and she informed me that turnaround time might be a little slower than normal because they are in the process of moving into a new building. She still thought it would only take them from 7 to 10 days turnaround time. Also it seems very easy to speak with the gunsmith if necessary. Kel-Tec customer service seems much better than Taurus the only other manufacturer in which I've had dealings.
 
Doug S,

Did you try your P-11 with ammo other than UMC & polish the feed ramp and watch out for limpwristing before you sent it back?
Was curious if you did that & what your experience was?
 
Alamo,

I did polish the feedramp, but not the entrance to the chamber. I also tried Winchester White Box, which had some FTE also. I did my best to make sure I wasn't limpwristing. I agree with one of the posters who noticed that initially most of my FTE happened between rounds 50 and 100, and might be the result of limpwristing. Unfortunately it seemed to start getting worse and I started getting multiple failures in the first 50 rounds. I also had a friend shoot the gun and he experienced a FTE. I'm sure I could have tried some better quality ammo and possibly did some additional polishing, but to be honest, after 500+ rounds I didn't want to spent anymore money on ammo. I was starting to lose faith in the gun, and I thought a trip back to the factory might renew this faith. As I've posted many times, I'm extremely happy with my P-32, and would like my P-11 to be just as reliable. I like shooting the cheap stuff for practice and have seen many posts stating that the P-11 usually handles most any ammo fine. By the way I appreciate your quick response time to many of my past questions regarding Kel-Tec handguns.

Doug
 
See My Positive Report Posted Today

I had a good experience with the P-11 this morning and posted a report a few minutes ago.

Drakejake
 
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