I had hit the “milling around” stage at the Smith & Wesson booth earlier today when I found what is possibly the coolest display I’ve seen at SHOT Show. They actually had a bunch of their guns that had been used in big movies on display along with a photo from the movie. I snapped a few pictures, check it out:
I found two more of those little 9mm guns today and I recognized them both as ones I’d been asked about. I was really excited about having a chance to handle both of these guns, since I do like both Sig and Kimber and I had high hopes that if anyone could pull off this really small 9mm thing one of them could. However, both companies let me down and while I still want to give all of these guns a try I am not exactly pleased with what I’ve seen so far.
Sig was my biggest disappointment. I love my P238 so much I couldn’t imagine the P290 being anything less than the awesomeness of the P238 combined with the awesomeness of 9mm. Instead they made a heavy gun (20.5 ounces) with an unimpressive trigger pull and brick-like ergonomics. I’m willing to bet it probably shoots better than most of its competitors since the weight will enhance the shooting experience and Sig makes good guns. I feel like they missed a note here though, I thought the whole point of these super small 9s was to be able to carry a 9mm in deep concealment?
The Kimber Solo Carry Stainless I looked at was equally “meh”. I expect a lot from Kimber because of how much I love my Pro CDP II. It really wasn’t a bad gun, it just wasn’t a good gun either. It had a nice double action trigger and is over a quarter inch wider than the LC9, making it less convenient for deep concealment carrying – which I’m still pretty sure is the point.
At the end of the day I’m beginning to think this whole itty bitty 9 thing is ridiculous. There is clearly a market there that has a need, or at least a want. The companies are trying to fill this want but really struggling to make a good gun in the process. Consumers need to stop demanding something that is not only nearly impossible to make (light, small, powerful and super easy to shoot please!) but also completely unnecessary. Seriously, put the silly little 9mm down and go buy a Sig P238 and a M&P Compact.
ParaUSA has two cool new announcements for 2011 – the first of which is that they’ve brought Travis Tomasie on board as their new shooter. In one of his first official roles, Travis talks about one of their new guns, the ParaUSA 14.45 Tactical. This is a .45 ACP double stack 1911 with a rail, Dawson magwell, and adjustable sights with a fiber optic front.
Looks like my Para weakness is acting up again, I handled the demo gun, and according to the guys that got to shoot it at Media Day it’s quite the shooter.
The first time I had a chance to shoot the KRISS Vector I had no idea what I was holding, all I knew is that it was really cool. A customer brought one in and let me run a few mags through it, nothing out of the ordinary when you spend your life behind the counter at a gun range.
The first day at SHOT Show 2011 opened my eyes to exactly how “cool” the Vector really is. This is a .45 ACP submachine gun that uses a new operating system to reduce felt recoil. Below you can see how little muzzle climb the Vector actually has when I was shooting it on burst:
The other neat thing about the Vector is how simple it is to use. It was my second time picking up the gun but Caleb had never seen one outside of videos and magazines. Knowing this, watch him own this full auto mag dump:
The statement at the end of the video, “Took you one magazine to understand the weapon”, is accurate. This little SMG is extremely intuitive and easy to operate and shoot. Although my favorite part of this stop was the look on the KRISS rep’s face when I told him I’d already shot one.
There are a lot of reasons slim frame 9s are popular, not the least of which is having the concealability factor of an itty bitty gun with a
grown up round like a 9mm loaded in it. This popularity is not lost at SHOT Show this year, and today I had the chance to handle a couple of the new slim frame 9s.
First is the Ruger LC9 everybody has been talking about. I was excited to shoot this gun just to find out how it compared to the LCP. I do have to compliment Ruger on the fact that the trigger pull is awesome relative to the .380 version. Also the ergonomics are very well done. For what it is the gun is comfortable to hold and easy to manipulate. However, the muzzle flip on the LC9, like pretty much every other slim frame 9 ever made, is just ridiculous. My first shot was right on target but after that myflinch was so horrific I was impressed all my bullets hit the paper. Even Caleb managed to hold his group but took a good amount of time getting his sights realigned and his grip back on target.
For what it is the Ruger LC9 is very nice. I would pick it over a Walther PPS any day just based on ergonomics, and the trigger pull alone makes it preferable to the LCP.
There is another slim frame 9 out there that I’m curious to see though. We stopped at the Diamondback booth and were shown their new toy, and now I just must compare and contrast. As such, be looking for some upcoming articles on slim frame 9s: The Walther PPS, the Ruger LC9 and the Model DB9.
It is actually here – consider this S&W’s apology for the Governor! The new M&P-22 is exactly what we’d hoped for, a .22 LR version of the M&P pistol, which has the exact same dimensions at the 9mm and .40 S&W pistols. If you’re looking for a dedicated .22LR trainer to go with your M&P pistol, now you have the option.
It does have a thumb safety, some users will like this, some won’t, but the nice thing about this is that if you have the M&P without the thumb safety, don’t use it. If you have the M&P with the thumb safety, you can practice with your .22 LR trainer the same way you would with a full-size gun. This is the kind of stuff I’m excited to see from S&W, and I can’t wait until these hit shelves.
The first (or zeroth) day of SHOT has come and gone, and lots of cool guns have been shot and photographed. Obviously, the big news of the day was the new Smith & Wesson Governor. I did actually have the chance to shoot the gun with both .410 rounds and .45 ACP rounds. While 6 rounds of .45 and 12 of .410 shotshells isn’t enough to really evaluate a gun, I can say that I definitely liked it a lot more than every Taurus Judge I’ve ever fired. It does have a better trigger than the Judge, it’s lighter, thus easier to carry, it will shoot .45 ACP, and holds 6 rounds to the 5 in the Judge. I’m really shocked that S&W made this gun, but I think it will sell like crazy because this gun is what the Judge should have been when it first came out. At 28 ounces you could actually carry this into snake country. Will I be running out to buy one? Probably not. However, now when someone asks me what I think about the Judge, I can at least steer them to a S&W if they’re really set on a .410 handgun.
One of the neater guns from S&W was actually from Walther, their new PPQ. The PPQ is Walther’s next generation entry in the practical pistol line. It’s a nice little 9mm, and it’s styled similarly to the HK P30. It has a great trigger, which according to the Smith and Walther rep comes in at around 5 lbs. The gun itself is another flat black people popper with interchangeable backstraps, but the trigger is pretty sweet. Walther has also updated their P22 to look like the new PPQ.
We did more shooting at the second media event, hitting up offerings from Colt, Glock, Blaser Rifles, the KRISS Vector and pistols from Sphinx. The Sphinx pistols are pretty neat – it’s what a CZ-75 wants to be when it grows up. KRISS is going to be importing the Sphinx line to the US, and they should be available starting in March or April of this year. I ran the “Standard Model” in .45 ACP, which is designed for the IPSC Standard division, similar to USPSA Limited. This gun was very nice to shoot.
Media day at SHOT 2011 went very well. Lots of new products and lots of guns are coming out, and we’re happy to bring them to you live! Remember to keep checking the following pages for regular updates and we’ll see you at SHOT!
Meet the newest from S&W – this 28 ounce scandium framed revolver is chambered in .410, .45 Colt, and .45 ACP (using moonclips). You can guess what market S&W is targeting with this.
SHOT SHOW begins today for media and certain vendors with Media Day at the Range and the Smith & Wesson shootout. At these events, professional outdoors media, be they magazine writers, bloggers, tv crews, or any combo of that will get a chance to actually shoot some of the new firearms that you’ll be seeing in 2011. Team Gun Nuts was lucky enough to receive an invite to the S&W event, which means our wrap-up post will have a great look at some of the new guns and gear from S&W, Thompson-Center, Crimson Trace, and more.
Make sure to get the latest updates from media day and Shot Show by becoming a fan of Gun Nuts Radio and Shelley Rae on Facebook or by following Gun Nuts and GunUp on Twitter.
Should be a great show!
I log all the rounds I fire in competition and training, and I wanted to share some of those stats with you guys. Here are the fun pulls from my spreadsheet:
On the Ruger failure rate, it’s also worth noting that 7 of those failures were with the SR-556 after I first received it, and hadn’t yet adjusted the gas system. Since I adjusted the gas system for the ammo I’m using, it has run like a top for an additional 700-ish rounds. I even used it as a loaner gun for an IDPA DMG stage, and it was flawless.
The reason I like to publish this data is to give you guys exactly that – data. There is so much conjecture and bad information floating around on the internet that I believe it’s important to look at hard numbers in the thousands of rounds to help create a better picture of reliability in firearms. It’s also useful for me, because I can go back and see how effective my practice and training was in the last year. While it may seem kind of wild and unfocused, my training in the latter half of 2010 was much better than it had been in previous years, allowing me to punch through a wall I’d been hitting and achieve some shooting goals I had set. Additionally it helps me set additional goals for 2011.
2010 Accomplishments
Unfortunately, time and my crazy schedule in 2010 prevented me from doing as much shooting as I would have liked. I missed Bianchi Cup in 2010, which really bummed me out. However, I’m back at the Cup and really excited about it. With that in mind, here are my 2011 goals:
All of those are goals I can hit – the 1750 at Bianchi Cup is the one I’m focused most on right now. In the two years since I shot a 1500-something, my shooting has improved tremendously, and I think with some hard practice in between now and May I’ll be able to get to that goal. I think the hardest goal on that list is going to be a sub 5 second run on the FAST Drill with a revolver. To hit that goal comfortable, I need to be able to hit a 3×5 index card with two rounds in less than 1.75 seconds, reload and fire again in around 2 seconds, and then get my last three shots off with no more than a 0.3 second split between them. From concealment. Definitely not going to be easy, but the drills I have set up to practice for this will benefit all the other shooting I do as well.
So stay with us here at Gun Nuts in 2011 as we go for a fun ride of shooting!