I’m struggling with my choice for maintenance on a few of my pistols, especially my P322. I’m not referring to cleaning. I religiously clean and oil every gun after shooting them at the range. 50 rounds…gets cleaned. I have about 12k of rounds through my P322. It still looks new. Do I proactively replace the firing pin or recoil spring now or just keep cleaning and firing?

How significant or important would an unexpected failure be?

I have training duplicates of the guns I would require for serious purposes, and therefore I don’t practice proactive parts replacements. That, however, may not be an option for many/most people and they should probably determine what proactive measures are appropriate. For example, SIG’s recommendation to replace a P320 striker is after 20,000 rounds. If I had only one P320, that’s what I’d do. But because I have a primary training gun that’s separate from the carry weapons that get fired very little, I’ll replace its striker when it becomes obvious: i.e., it fails.

On the other hand, proactive measures cannot hurt, and FWIW, I just purchased >$600 of P320 proactive repair parts. Most will go to my heirs, but that was $600 of peace of mind.

Depending on round count, I might keep a firing pin and spring on hand. But until they actually fail, clean and fire away.

Parts are cheap.

And as another comment about parts: Sooner or later they will become unavailable, so get them while you can. I would not be the least surprised if SIG up and announces that the P320 has been discontinued one day, and at that point, and perhaps already, replacement parts for the gun will start to disappear. I hope that someone will be saying, “What do we do with all this stuff‽” the day my ashes get spread on a slippery walk, but I don’t want to ever have to say, “How do I fix this?” any sooner than that.

this is a 22. its going to break. just when. Just get a set of spares and enjoy life. It's a .22 if it breaks its unlikely to matter in the scheme of bad things can happen.

Proactive = cheap insurance
Reactive = costly destruction

Ask me how I know.

Replace them now.
When I got my STI I called and asked about lifespans and measurements of the springs-they said just replace em every 5k.

When I was an armorer in the CG, we measured the springs bc we didn’t keep track of round counts on handguns, shotguns and M16s.

So at one armory we just swapped out every spring in the M9s and began anew. We would only take the same 20 weapons to the range and wear them out until failure, then send them off for replacements. Same with the rifles.

Another unit kept logs on the range weapons, but units didn’t …so it was a crapshoot and we swapped out their guns every couple of years(they didn’t get shot much)

One unit demanded I bring guns to the range and use mine (saving theirs from wear)

In my personal guns, if I’ve put 5000 thru a pistol I just replace the springs

[QUOTE]Originally posted by sigfreund:
How significant or important would an unexpected failure be?

I have training duplicates of the guns I would require for serious purposes, and therefore I don’t practice proactive parts replacements. That, however, may not be an option for many/most people and they should probably determine what proactive measures are appropriate. For example, SIG’s recommendation to replace a P320 striker is after 20,000. (Quote)
This is probably great advice. The guns I put loads of rounds through are range toys not ones I carry. They go from the range to the safe after being cleaned. My perspective is more I would hate for a range day to get ruined because of a worn out part. It’s like going to launch your boat and it won’t start. I always take 3 guns to the range. 50-100 rounds through the other calibers. The 3rd is the .22. I love putting 300-500 through it every time. Cheap to shoot and it allows me more time at the range, which is cathartic. I am going to buy some parts for the .22s to counter down time.

quote:

Cheap to shoot and it allows me more time at the range, which is cathartic.

I like to call this group therapy.

It's a .22, not something your life should be depending on. I might get some spare parts to keep on hand, because as others have mentioned companies suck and discontinue support long before the products they sold are no longer viable. I don't think I'd swap stuff out on that gun until it started showing me that it needed it, though.

That's actually my approach with most gun stuff...use it till something fails and then fix it. I clean and inspect regularly , but I'm not throwing parts at non-existent problems. I'll swap springs on carry guns every so often if I'm shooting them a lot, but I also have complete backup guns for most of those, and anything that gets really high round counts is typically a dedicated gun for training or competition anyway. If I ever shoot a gun so much that I've completely worn it out, I figure I got my money out of it...and anything I'm shooting that much is a tool, not some irreplaceable collectible.