[Chuck_N]

Am not sure if this thread belongs in this forum, or the AR-15 subforum. If I'm in the wrong place, please feel free to move the post.

Anyway, I recently took delivery of the SL8-6, had no trouble stripping it down and giving it its first cleaning and took it out yesterday to dial it in. For those of you not in CA, the SL8-6 forces you to use the HK 10-shot magazine unless you have an AR magazine retrofit installed. Not anticipating any issues with the stock configuration, I opted to keep the factory original setup.

Long story short, I ran into a problem with the weapon jamming during the dial in process. Upon further inspection, I noticed about 1/16"-1/8" (eyeball measurement) of vertical play or "slop" in the magazine. When free firing (with nothing putting pressure on the magazine), the weapon would tend to jam after the first shot (i.e., the next round wouldn't fully chamber, and the bolt would ride up over the round). The first shot of the magazine would eject just fine.

When firing with the magazine resting on the bench (effectively eliminating the magazine's free play), the weapon performed beautifully.

I've not yet had the opportunity to strip the weapon back down to see if I can clear up the problem (am writing this from work). Before I do re-strip... and before I call the dealer about a potential repair/exchange, I figured I'd run this issue by you all, and see if any of you have experienced this.

Any comments/advice are welcome.

Chuck

[matt g]

Give the magazine a hard push to ensure that it's seating fully. If the bolt is closed, don't be afraid to give it a nice hard slap with the butt of your hand.

If that isn't working for you, consider the magazine to be a 9 rounder.

[Chuck_N]

Tried that... no go. Tried a mag loaded with only 5... same problem. It's definitely related to how it's seating in the receiver.

[Chuck_N]

Turns out when Cold War Shooters made the weapon CA-legal (by installing a "tool required" mag release), the new mag release was either improperly installed, missing a part or <insert problem here>, thus preventing the mag from seating properly. They recognized the symptom immediately, but would say exactly what the problem was.

I dropped the weapon off today for repair at their Highland, CA shop. Unfortunately, they're so slammed with backlog on new weapons, they couldn't fix it on the spot (a 10 minute fix, tops), so I'll have to take another 3 hour round trip by car to get it when it's done

Nice folks... but am rethinking where my next purchase might be due to this customer service issue.