We were in the process of purchasing 200 S&W M&P Ts when they all started to fail… Being a “Colt” guy, I used this as further proof that anything without a pony on it is suspect until proven otherwise…
We sent a number of rifles back to S&W with a list of our concerns and I must say that they were very receptive…
The S&W tactical rifle production manager flew out from Springfield with an armorer and several new complete uppers… I had an opportunity to ask him several direct questions about the problem and he was very forth coming…
The gas block issues that the M&P Ts had were traced back to a QC issue with an outside vender, an attempt to save weight and make the rifle as light a possible, all combined with other assembly problems. The original gas blocks were aluminum and were a very tight fit that required being pressed in place. Two set screws were then added to the bottom to help hold it in place. Over course of the production run of aluminum gas blocks that were used, there were some variances in the internal diameter of the blocks. That combined with how they were assembled and the different rates of expansion of dissimilar metals as they heated up, led to the problems…
The fix is a new steel gas block, from a new vendor, that is pined in place with a GI spec pin. We fired several thousand rounds through this new style upper with no stoppages…
Additionally I asked about the PMAG issue and he stated that all of their original testing was done with GI style aluminum magazines from Okay Industries and that they did not anticipate the use of the PMAG in their carbines. He added that all current production S&W’s will have a correctly beveled magazine well that will accept the PMAG…
I additionally advised him that over several weeks of hard use, the Troy sights that come on the Ts had a tendency to work loose, and if not checked, fall off. The simple fix for this is to figure out where you want them and blue locktight them in place. He agreed and you may start to see a small tube of blue locktight included with the Ts in the near future…
In the end Smith & Wesson was very responsive to our requests (demands), and I have nothing but positive remarks about the level of customer service that we received.


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