Winchester .40 S&W issues

[ikor]

I have no idea if any of this ammo has made its' way to SA...probably not since, as noted, this uses the bonded bullet...but for those who have recent .40 caliber WW rounds, check to be sure.

Note that this is not an official recall as yet, but rather a copy of a LE email. When all is said and done, WW is likely to pull all of it and, as some other companies have done, resell it as 'Not For Duty Use' at low prices.

There is a reason why high end loaded ammo is suddenly sold at low prices and marked in such a manner by any manufacturer (Speer did something similar a few years ago with some Gold Dots).

Note the fact that there is no way to visually check for this condition...


"The FBI is working with Winchester on a potentially serious condition affecting all recently
produced .40 S&W, Winchester, Q4355, 180grain, Bonded SERVICE ammunition.**Some of the
cartridge casings were produced without a flash hole.**This condition completely eliminates
the ability of this Service cartridge to fire – this is a “silent killer” in that no visual inspection by
FBI personnel can detect this manufacturing defect and it would only be known at the time the
Agent attempted to fire their handgun. A limited number of problems have been reported
however this is such a dangerous condition immediate action across the FBI is necessary.

Affected ammunition will have a four character “day code”, two letters, two numbers, i.e., FA
42. All Q4355 with day codes beginning with the letter F and any Q4355 with the two letter
combination of EN are included in this recall.
This ammunition must be removed from FBI service weapons and magazines IMMEDIATELY.

Again, boxed ammunition with the following codes must be removed from service
IMMEDIATELY:
Product Code: Q4355
Day Code: Any code beginning with F or EN

[Matt01]

Jeepers I feel sorry for the guys who have thrown away there ammo boxes with the batch code on them,

[Brendank]

I have no idea if any of this ammo has made its' way to SA...probably not since, as noted, this uses the bonded bullet...but for those who have recent .40 caliber WW rounds, check to be sure.

Note that this is not an official recall as yet, but rather a copy of a LE email. When all is said and done, WW is likely to pull all of it and, as some other companies have done, resell it as 'Not For Duty Use' at low prices.

There is a reason why high end loaded ammo is suddenly sold at low prices and marked in such a manner by any manufacturer (Speer did something similar a few years ago with some Gold Dots).

Note the fact that there is no way to visually check for this condition...


"The FBI is working with Winchester on a potentially serious condition affecting all recently
produced .40 S&W, Winchester, Q4355, 180grain, Bonded SERVICE ammunition.**Some of the
cartridge casings were produced without a flash hole.**This condition completely eliminates
the ability of this Service cartridge to fire – this is a “silent killer” in that no visual inspection by
FBI personnel can detect this manufacturing defect and it would only be known at the time the
Agent attempted to fire their handgun. A limited number of problems have been reported
however this is such a dangerous condition immediate action across the FBI is necessary.

Affected ammunition will have a four character “day code”, two letters, two numbers, i.e., FA
42. All Q4355 with day codes beginning with the letter F and any Q4355 with the two letter
combination of EN are included in this recall.
This ammunition must be removed from FBI service weapons and magazines IMMEDIATELY.

Again, boxed ammunition with the following codes must be removed from service
IMMEDIATELY:
Product Code: Q4355
Day Code: Any code beginning with F or EN

This is AFAIK all brass cased 180gr Ranger Bonded, sold in plain white boxes minus the Ranger decals etc. None of this ever reached our shores AFAIK.