TargetTalk

A new thread, to cover the seemingly neverending troubles of the MG2.

To owners and users of the MG2: do you own yourself, or do you have accurate knowledge of ANY MG2 that is trouble-free?
I am sorry to inform you that to to this date I have never seen, in actual use, any MG2 that was free of any trouble.
Even MG2s, refered to by owners to operate smoothly, showed relative frequent stoppages in actual firing at the range...

Let me kindly ask you to forward your experiences of the MG2, be god or bad, her in this colomn. The shooting public and potential buyers deserve to get informed.

I wouldn't go through my problems with one of the originals---let's just say the Late Don Nygord offered me my money back and I took it---Thank God. The issues and number of owners with myriads of problems is already legend, there are a few who say they have absolutely no problems with the gun. It is an example of an over engineered monstrosity that is such a bad performer, I believe the factory has turned it's back on those unfortnate owners as they either don't know or care about what to do. I personally would never own anything again made by any one of Morini's myriad corporations and/or manufactuers.

There were some hot exchanges on the subject on suisse french speaking forum www.pistoliers.com.

The biggest defenders of MG-2 were french national rapid team members. They all shoot with MG-2 and they know what they are talking about.

Yes, there were some isssues with MG-2, but nothing catastrophic. The pistol is not made to everybody. You have to be careful to clean it, need to think when you feed it and so on ...

There is a defective part, I think that reference is "2070". There two members of my club own the pistol and have this piece broken. After that, no problems at all.

For the shooters who have it and don't like it I say sell it. If you want to buy it andt you are expecting to have problems and already panicking about (does it sounds english ?) do not buy it. If you cannot trust your pistol, forget about it.

From my point of view, the issue is not about the pistol it is more about the company. First of all, they should have never released the pistol without extensive testing. Knowing the shooters from my club, I estimate that part 2070 broke after 3000 rounds.

Ok, they are not so big like Walther who make 100 pistols and ask shooters to try it, but ...

Next, I think there are quality control issues. Otherwise who can explain so much nasty reports.

- Ned

Bob,

Without making any attempt whatsoever to change your mindset about Morini products, I will say the following in all fairness to the Morini name.

Guns bearing the MG brand are made in Parma, Italy by Cesare Morini's company doing business as Matchguns.

Guns presently sold bearing the MORINI name are NOT made by Matchguns or Cesare Morini. Instead, Morini arms are now made in Bedano, Switzerland by folks who bought the rights to the Morini name.

In short, today's Morini products have no connection to Cesare Morini or Matchguns.

On a more personal note, I visited the Morini factory in Switzerland last year and I can tell you that the people who own and run the factory are very concerned with the quality of today's Morini products, the shooting sports as a whole and that they stand firmly behind what I believe are world class products.

This information is also not intended to disparage the Matchgun\Cesare Morini reputation. On the contrary I think it's only fair to note that there simply is no connection between the man and the company that still bears his name.



F. Paul in Denver

The clue there is if you are a member of a European National Team you have a tremendous advantage over the average American Joe or Jane Shooter. (1) All these teams have gunsmith/armorers with almost unlimited technical skills and equipment. (2) Direct access to the "factory" regardless where it is or who it belongs to. (3) An almost unlimited supply of necessary parts, available within 24 hours. To my good friend in Denver I should say I liked my 162E AP, but fell in love with the new LP10, I owned an CM22 hvy and it was an absolute doll---but a close friend purchased one the same time and he went ballistic with it's problems until Don Nygord came through with the fix. All I can say is that most importers will not take on MG products because of the myriad problems with them. I think if it were one part only---MG would gladly provide that part, just to get the complaints squelched---so far no "fix" is forthcoming from the factory, and guys here in North American are agonizing in the pain they have to suffer owning an expensive "alibi gun." Believe me, I only wish the gun was "good", it looked like a keeper when I got it, but after three rounds it jammed up and continued to misbehave this way until Nygord offered me a refund.

I've had mine since 2004, purchased from the late Don Nygord. The original sear broke, was easily replaced, and I haven't had a problem since.

I mounted a Docter sight on it, and it's a sweet bullseye gun.

cheers.

Hmmm, a continuation of an interesting topic...

I guess I'm one of the lucky ones. My MG-2 functions very well. I have had some problems with it, but in all honesty I've had just as many problems with my Pardini. As an example, last Friday the Pardini, which I use as a "spare" gun, simply stopped firing, with no warning. This may well have resulted in a non-allowable malfunction in my match on Saturday. I shot the match on Saturday using the MG-2. Seventy shots, no malfunctions. The match followed several evenings of training, with NO CLEANING in between. I would guess that I've gone something like 800-1000 shots without cleaning, and without malfunction. This for me is quite normal with my MG-2.

Now, with all that having been said, I have broken a hammer spring and the spring ball that provides the detent function on the dry-fire selector. I suspect the spring ball stopped functioning because it may have been jammed in place with some metal that wore off the dry-fire selector. If this is the case then it would represent poor design.

The other major problem with the MG-2 is Part Number 2060 (not 2070 as previously mentioned in this thread). This is the Bullet Insert Lever. In an earlier thread Mike T. put forth an excellent explanation of why the Bullet Insert Lever breaks and I would tend to agree with his analysis. In short, if the gun jams with a cartridge sitting vertically on the carrier one should not attemt to clear the jam by cycling the slide. Cycling the slide will put undo force on the Bullet Insert Lever.

Oh, one other point.... Last week I conducted a test of the reliability of my MG-2. In this test I loaded four magazines. In each magazine was a random assortment of the following ammunition: PMC Scoremaster, Eley Target Pistol, RWS250, Remington Thunderbolt, and Eley Tenex. This means that each magazine contained one of each of the above cartridges, inserted in random order. Although it's a short test of only 20 shots, I can say the pistol functioned flawlessly. And since I was shooting 6second strings in rapidfire training I can say that I also learned a lot from the exercise too!

Mark, you have got one of a kind MG2. Moderate number of broken and malfunctioning parts. Great.

So there really exists at least one relatively sound MG2 out of about 1700 - 1800 sold. That is good news.

IMHO---If you're going to slam a product, you should post under your own name, instead of using a pseudonym.

My Mg-2,after selecting the most reliable brands of ammo,continues to operate perfectly.I have shot over 4.5k shots and the unit has had 6/9 minor jams and some ruptures with 3 questionable brands of ammo.As a member on our forum had suggested before-if you are so unhappy with the pistol-SELL IT. Ernie

MG2-owner wrote:Mark, you have got one of a kind MG2. Moderate number of broken and malfunctioning parts. Great.

So there really exists at least one relatively sound MG2 out of about 1700 - 1800 sold. That is good news.

I also have a trouble free MG-2. I had two misfires (in the same match), but both rounds showed solid hammer strikes, so I'm just as inclined to blame the ammo on that one. Other than that, flawless, with every single type of ammo I put through it.

By my count, we have as many posts about flawless MG-2s as we have about MG-2s with problems.

I was advised to trim off the plastic on each end of the batteries to maximise contact opportunity. Many thanks to Toni Küchler for this valuable advise.

I have packed the rear of the grip where the grip comes into contact with the frame so the pistol is not as dropped wrist to shoot. Even after this angle change, the contact is still good and function is fine. Whilst dropped wrist is nice for air and free, I find it hard to shoot centre fire/standard/rapid with a dropped wrist.

Help.
Last sunday, suddenly with no warning, my pistol broke. The cartridge insert lever broke again!

Nothing for it except to replace the lever, again!
Happened to me, too, recently.
Did you see, on page 3 of the "Matchguns MG-2" thread, my analysis of the cause of BIL breakage?
If you haven't, or for others that might not have seen it, I repeat it here:
To avoid damaging (stretching or breaking) the BIL, I recommend, when a cartridge mis-feeds and becomes jammed between the slide and the barrel, that the slide not be pulled back to clear the jam. Instead, remove the slide cover (four screws) in order to release the jammed round.
Now this is not absolute. Examination of the nature and "degree" of the jam may indicate that the slide can be retracted some slight distance before the rear of the slide would contact the depending rear portion of the BIL. This small amount of slide movement might be enough to allow the jammed round to fall free.
However, contact of the slide with the rear of the BIL must be avoided if the front of the BIL is not free to pivot down. Usually, the front of the BIL is prevented from moving fully down because it contacts the jammed round. Pulling back on the slide, in this instance, forces the BIL to pivot because of the great leverage the slide exerts on the rear tip of the BIL, but the front of the BIL is bearing on the jammed cartridge and can not move. Something has to give! Sometimes, the cartridge wall gives enough, but if it doesn't, the BIL breaks (or maybe only stretches). If the BIL only stretches, rather than breaks, feeding of cartridges is affected and the likelyhood of another jam increases.
The MG2 can be a great target gun but it requires more than ordinary care to avoid damaging it.
Mike T.