"new" CZ-52 with problems

[blue255]

I got the CZ from JG sales. I paid extra for the VG+ condition.

The grips appear to be beat to hell. Is this normal? I will change out the grips later after I fix the slide.

It wont lock back after the last round. It actually locked back a couple of times, but its intermittent and it wont lock if there is an empty mag in place. Is there a fix for this? I have to count my rounds as I will miss and dryfire. I've probably ended up dryfiring the gun over 50 times. The pin is still going strong. I was told these things were brittle.

This gun takes down nice and easy. Very, very nice.

The finish has a crude utilitarian look to it. I've seen cleaner examples where the slide has no machining marks.

I hate the mag release. I actually sanded the magazine cause it felt rough, but it made it harder to pull out. Whoops. I shouldnt have done that.

The safety is also a problem. I manage to engage it while firing. This is problematic. I could tighten it up a bit, but first I'm going to try altering my grip.

I'm going to try and sand the edge of the hammer down a bit. The edge is somewhat sharp, and I fear would cut my finger if it were to slip off when cocking the gun.

All in all, its still a solid firearm and is a nice addition to my CZ collection.

[texdoug1]

With the slide off, put in a magazine slowly.  Try to see if the mag follower is making good contact with the slide stop bar.  Make sure the mag follower is rising all the way to the top of the mag.  I found that after reassembling mine my spring pressure on the slide stop was a little heavy, as to not let the mag follower push it all the way up..  Just carefully bent it up a little and so far so good.

[skucera]

You can better diagnose if the follower in the mag is pressing up on the hold-open catch if you take the slide off then insert an empty magazine. As the mag slides into place, you'll see the follower press the hold-open up. If it is, attach the slide and pull it back to see if it is locking open like it should.

Once or twice folks on the forum have reported a failure to lock open then discovered that they hadn't cleaned all the Cosmoline out of the pistol after first getting it. Remember that Cosmoline is a terrible lubricant, especially when it is years old.

Usually grip condition is a part of the overall rating of a pistol's condition, but some distributors focus so closely on the condition of the bore and chamber and the condition of the blueing that they overlook the condition of the grips. Have you called J&G yet to discuss it? They might trade you for better looking grips, or they might not. If you were planning on replacing them anyway, c'est la vie.

Scott

[brigadier]

The CZ-52 slide stop depends on the tightness of the portion of grip that covers it to maintain good reliable contact with the slide. If the grips are damaged, they may be the cause of your problem. CZ-52s should always have their grips replaced with after markets anyway so you might as well whether changing them fixes the problem or not. With any luck, that's your problem. There is also a follower problem but it's much harder to fix and you can't get replacements with the fix-it already installed.

[woadyurt]

I took the out the pin that holds in the slide stop and replaced it with a hardened allen screw and a locking nut. If that slide stop isn't held perfectly snug against the gun, it slips off the magazine follower. It cost me 50 cents to fix and works perfectly now.