Early Farmingdale Cracked Slides

[ap1169]

This post may have come up before, but I could not find it on the Forum.  Is or was there an issue with Farmingdale Slides?  I see where owners have sent their pistols back with a Farmingdale Slide and get a Deer Park one in return.  Is the Deer Park slide machined better or stronger than the early Farmingdale ones?  I have a Farmie that I carry from time to time and shoot it also.  Is there a chance that I could crack the slide shooting my early Rohrbaugh R9?  Thank you for your feedback, Robert

[BlueC2]

Robert,

The only Farmingdale slides that are thinner than other slides are the Pre R serial numbered guns - which I don't think have any documented history of slide cracking. The slide cracking as I understand is limited to a bad batch of steel. I had a Deer Park with Serial Number R1XXX that had a cracked slide. I believe most of the cracked slides were in the high hundreds/low to mid 1XXX serial range. Your gun is too early to have any slide cracking problem.

With that said it does not take a cracked slide to end up with a DeerDale. Some members have sent in early guns that work fine to get rewarranted and they have come back with the Deer Park slide just because there have been some minor updates and they wont let the gun back out without those updated (probably liability reasons). My recommendation to you would be to carry your gun as there is very little chance you will ever develop a problem. If there ever is a serious failure you can judge what you want to do - but dont count on it coming back with a Farmingdale slide. I would probably avoid sending it in for any minor issues that may pop up, but that is just me.

Hope this helps.
-Ryan

[tracker]

It was not particularly an issue with Farmingdale slides but it was a small batch of flawed bar stock that only affected a few Farmingdales. The factory replaced them with Deer Park slides because they had moved from Farmingdale. In my opinion the Deer Park slides are slightly "beefed-up" from the previous ones. Is there a chance yours could crack? Yes. Is it likely? No. The large majority of Farmingdales have performed flawlessly.

[BlueC2]

Also I forgot to add.......That is a BEAUTIFUL FARMIE! Love those BLUES.

Congrats on a very handsome gun.

[Richard S]

See the following:

http://www.rohrbaughforum.com/index.php?topic=4649.msg52298#msg52298

Although the "cracked slide" issue was limited to a very few early R9s and the problem was traced to a small batch of defective bar stock, Rohrbaugh took the precaution of adding thickness to the area involved. Still and all, I have been carrying and shooting R9 No. 132 ("Farmingdale") since May 2004. No cracks. No vices. No problems.

Here is its most recent photo taken in May of this year:

[BlueC2]

AP,

You will notice that the gun described in the link Richard posted was in the R129X range....much newer than your gun. I don't think you have anything to worry about with your gun. Enjoy.

-Ryan

[tracker]

That is interesting. Although the s/ns don't often track on a linear origin basis, R129X is the highest number Farmingdale I have heard about. One of our knowledgeable members even questioned that my no. R74X was a Farmingdale.

[BlueC2]

That is interesting. Although the s/ns don't often track on a linear origin basis, R129X is the highest number Farmingdale I have heard about. One of our knowledgeable members even questioned that my no. R74X was a Farmingdale.

I believe the R129X gun is a Deer Park, as was my R1XXX gun that had the cracked slide. I think only very few "Farmingdale" slides (if any) had a cracking problem.

[tracker]

Not that it matters where they were made but there were some Farmingdale labeled cracked slides.

[BlueC2]

Not that it matters where they were made but there were some Farmingdale labeled cracked slides.

It is interesting that the problem does stretch back into some Farmingdale produced slides - I wonder how far back it goes SN wise?

[tracker]

I recall from some past posts that it was in the 500-700 range.