warranty help

[BrokenHammer]

I have an older Bersa 380, blued steel model, and I recently purchased a new twotone model for my wife. During pratice the Hammer broke on my older blue gun. I probably have between 200 and 400 rounds in this handgun. Is this typical or have I just been unlucky. I purchased this pistol used in the box and it looked unfired so my estimate of rounds should be pretty close. I purchased the second handun for my wife to carry and now am having concerns about reliability. Untill mine broke I was satisfied with it, now not so sure.

Any ideas on how to get it repaired or is it something I can do. Does the warranty cover broken parts or labor. I checked the parts catalog and the hammer is reasonably priced.
I may not be the orginal purchaser but I feel sure that I am the only owner/shooter.

[Outlaw]

Hi Brokenhammer,
Welcome to the site. I don't know where you are but Colorado Gun Works is really good. If you go to the Bersa web site and click on repair it will give you the closest repair center to you. I just happen to live in Colorado and CGW is only 40 miles away. I hear they are the best. I would image Bersa would warranty the hammer for life.

[BrokenHammer]

I live in East TN. So Colorado is a little far. However, I checked and Gander Mtn. is listed as a repair center, Their store is only about an hour and half away so I will probably give them a try. Was at their store Sunday but no one in the repair center so was unable to get any info.
I was a little curious if this is something I can do or does it require a qualified GS. Never taken the Bersa down to spring level before and have been known to repair some things and lose springs on others.
Also a little qurious if this a common breakage. Not a lot of rounds and some but not a lot of dryfire. Is dryfireing a cause of this problem, the metal at the breakage lookes if it was a forging and the ground to finish, looks to grainy to be a machined part. Any infor would be appreciated.

[Americangirl01]

Hello, BrokenHammer,
I'm sorry that you are having troubles. Fwiw, I own two Thunder .380s. One has almost 6K rounds through it, and the other is at almost 3K. I've been reading Bersa forums for almost 4 years and I can honestly say that I've never read of this problem before, so I'm prone to say it is a "fluke"..

The lifetime service contract is valid only for the original purchaser of the pistol, but any authorized service center should be able to handle the repair. Good luck to you.

[BrokenHammer]

I will probably check with Gander Mtn. again this evening. I will be in that area to make a pick up so depending on the estimate of repair costs I will either drop it off or order the replacement hammer from the factory.

Just a quick question Americangirl01 do you dry fire your Bersa any. Because we/I switch between carry handguns fairly often I sometimes will dryfire to adjust to a different trigger pull. Usually no more than two or three times maybe half dozen times at the most. This has never been a problem with any of my other double action guns but want to make sure I don't repeat a mistake if this is one.

Thanks again.

[mitchr]

Hi BrokenHammer. I've been told that dry firing is not a problem with center fire pistols. But, I have read about one failure with a glock. Just to be safe, I use snap caps.

[Americangirl01]

Just a quick question Americangirl01 do you dry fire your Bersa any. Because we/I switch between carry handguns fairly often I sometimes will dryfire to adjust to a different trigger pull. Usually no more than two or three times maybe half dozen times at the most. This has never been a problem with any of my other double action guns but want to make sure I don't repeat a mistake if this is one.

Thanks again.

Hi BrokenHammer:
I have dry fired both of my Thunder .380s quite a few times. One of the smiths who belongs to this forum has posted many times (on a forum that no longer exists) that is is okay to dry fire the center-fire Bersa pistols. You shouldn't dry fire the Bersa / Firestorm rimfire pistols, but the Thunder .380 should not be hurt by it. Like mitchr, I now use snap caps, but I will still dry fire my pistols from time to time.....

[Mountain Walker]

In one of the Reyersons Gunsmith video, Nick said don't dry fire and I think I will go with that advice from the service center.