I was at the range today to test some new defensive ammo in my CZ-75, and found that they had finally got in a fresh supply of 9mm. I decided to buy a box and try out a Springfield XD(M)–the range had the 9mm competition model available for rent. I’ve fired numerous Glocks (of various models) over the years, and never really liked the feel, but I hadn’t tried any of the various polymer frame striker-fired pistols that have come along in recent years to compete with them. The XD(M) is a derivative of the Croatian HS2000.
As expected of a polymer-framed pistol, the XD(M) was quite lightweight. It probably weighs about as much empty as my CZ-83, which seems strange in a much larger pistol. Of course, I’m used to all-steel pistols, so my weight expectations are based on pistols which are actually rather heavy by modern standards.
The trigger was a pleasant surprise–it was much better than a Glock’s, and roughly on par with my CZ-75 (which has a stock trigger). It’s not nearly as good as my M1911 triggers, but that’s to be expected. The Glock trigger is one of the things I don’t like about that design (I can shoot it accurately, but I don’t like the feel), so I was pleased to find that not all striker-fired pistols have mushy triggers.
Accuracy was good. I didn’t shoot quite as well with it as I did with my CZ-75, but then I’d never laid hands on an XD(M) before while I’ve fired thousands of rounds through that CZ-75. With greater familiarity, I’d expect to shoot it just as well. In any case, it was more than sufficiently accurate for self defense use.
A magazine loading device (not supplied with the rental gun) is a necessity for loading the XD(M)‘s 19-round magazines. Even though a range rental’s magazine has no doubt seen considerable use, I still found loading the last few rounds unaided to be very difficult (not to mention hard on my thumbs).
Overall, I was impressed enough that I’d definitely consider buying one at some point, albeit after some rifles I’m currently more interested in.
Let’s get something straight. Anyone who uses a CZ-75…in a shooting competition is basically a cheater. This thing is simply too easy to shoot.
MrColionNoir
I’ve only entered one shooting competition, ever (I’m not at all competitive and was basically nagged into it), and I used my CZ-75B. Yes, I won.
In recent years the amount of money the California state government steals directly from my paycheck had gone up dramatically, far in excess of what they claim for taxes. They do send out tax refund checks, but this was effectively a forced no-interest “loan” to people I loath. I just deposited my last tax refund check from California, and decided to use the money to do something to show what I think of the scum who rule that state. So, I bought 1,000 rounds of 5.56 NATO ammo–a type used by many rifles that they think only they and their enforcers should be allowed to own.
Check out the Magpul on that one!.
Via Jerking the Trigger, Magpul offers Colorado lawmakers a parting shot…
Due to a bill currently moving through the Colorado legislature, there is the possibility that Colorado residents’ ability to purchase standard capacity magazines will soon be infringed. Before that happens, and Magpul is forced to leave the state in order to keep to our principles, we will be doing our best to get standard capacity PMAGs into the hands of any Colorado resident that wants them. Verified Colorado residents will be able to purchase up to ten (10) standard capacity AR/M4 magazines directly from Magpul, and will be given immediate flat-rate $5 shipping, bypassing our current order queue. Our customers outside of Colorado, please know that our PMAG production will continue at an ever-increasing rate until we do relocate, shipments to our distributors in other states will continue, and that we do not expect relocation to significantly impact PMAG production. We are also aware that Colorado is not the only state with existing or pending magazine capacity restrictions; we are working on programs for other affected states as well.
Due to a bill currently moving through the Colorado legislature, there is the possibility that Colorado residents’ ability to purchase standard capacity magazines will soon be infringed. Before that happens, and Magpul is forced to leave the state in order to keep to our principles, we will be doing our best to get standard capacity PMAGs into the hands of any Colorado resident that wants them.
Verified Colorado residents will be able to purchase up to ten (10) standard capacity AR/M4 magazines directly from Magpul, and will be given immediate flat-rate $5 shipping, bypassing our current order queue.
Our customers outside of Colorado, please know that our PMAG production will continue at an ever-increasing rate until we do relocate, shipments to our distributors in other states will continue, and that we do not expect relocation to significantly impact PMAG production. We are also aware that Colorado is not the only state with existing or pending magazine capacity restrictions; we are working on programs for other affected states as well.
Yeah! The best activism is the kind that’s in your own interest.
[The Ultimate Answer to Kings]
I’m always happy to see people defying tyranny. I don’t own any rifles that will take PMAGs, but if that changes I’ll certainly give them my business.
Addendum: One Source Tactical is now making a similar offer.
Maryland Handgun Permit Restrictions Found Unconstitutional by Federal Judge.
Happy details from the Associated Press:
Maryland’s requirement that residents show a “good and substantial reason” to get a handgun permit is unconstitutional, according to a federal judge’s opinion filed Monday. States can channel the way their residents exercise their Second Amendment right to bear arms, but because Maryland’s goal was to minimize the number of firearms carried outside homes by limiting the privilege to those who could demonstrate “good reason,” it had turned into a rationing system, infringing upon residents’ rights, U.S. District Judge Benson Everett Legg wrote. “A citizen may not be required to offer a ‘good and substantial reason’ why he should be permitted to exercise his rights,” he wrote. “The right’s existence is all the reason he needs.” Plaintiff Raymond Woollard obtained a handgun permit after fighting with an intruder in his Hampstead home in 2002, but was denied a renewal in 2009 because he could not show he had been subject to “threats occurring beyond his residence.” Woollard appealed, but was rejected by the review board, which found he hadn’t demonstrated a “good and substantial reason” to carry a handgun as a reasonable precaution. The suit filed in 2010 claimed that Maryland didn’t have a reason to deny the renewal and wrongly put the burden on Woollard to show why he still needed to carry a gun.
Maryland’s requirement that residents show a “good and substantial reason” to get a handgun permit is unconstitutional, according to a federal judge’s opinion filed Monday.
States can channel the way their residents exercise their Second Amendment right to bear arms, but because Maryland’s goal was to minimize the number of firearms carried outside homes by limiting the privilege to those who could demonstrate “good reason,” it had turned into a rationing system, infringing upon residents’ rights, U.S. District Judge Benson Everett Legg wrote.
“A citizen may not be required to offer a ‘good and substantial reason’ why he should be permitted to exercise his rights,” he wrote. “The right’s existence is all the reason he needs.”
Plaintiff Raymond Woollard obtained a handgun permit after fighting with an intruder in his Hampstead home in 2002, but was denied a renewal in 2009 because he could not show he had been subject to “threats occurring beyond his residence.” Woollard appealed, but was rejected by the review board, which found he hadn’t demonstrated a “good and substantial reason” to carry a handgun as a reasonable precaution. The suit filed in 2010 claimed that Maryland didn’t have a reason to deny the renewal and wrongly put the burden on Woollard to show why he still needed to carry a gun.
The Second Amendment Foundation sponsored the suit, and Woollard’s lawyer was Second Amendment vindicator Alan Gura, who also won the Heller and McDonald suits at the Supreme Court that established our right to own commonly used weapons for self-defense in the home, against both federal and state encroachment. By moving the Second Amendment argument here beyond the home, this case promises to help expand Second Amendment rights even beyond the Heller and McDonald standard.
My July 2009 interview with Gura. My 2008 book on the Heller case, Gun Control on Trial.
UPDATE: Thanks commenter Chris Brennan: The full decision.
[Hit and Run]
It will be interesting to see where this goes (if anywhere) as California has roughly the same law. In practice, “good and substantial reason” is a euphemism for “rich and/or powerful.” For example, some years ago I was told that I could get a concealed weapon permit in Orange County for a $15,000 bribe “campaign contribution”–certainly not a sum that an ordinary person stuck living in a high-crime neighborhood could readily afford. Ironically, that price was too low, and that sheriff was ejected from office for it.
The good news for us peasants is that the government seems to have finally caught on that they really don’t need to worry about an armed citizenry demonstrating the purpose of the Second Amendment, for the reason I quoted a few years ago, but it is a good way to lose the next election. While elections are meaningless in terms of their impact on the government, they do matter to the individual politician who losses his place on the gravy train.
The philosophy of gun control: Teenagers are roaring through town at 90 MPH, where the speed limit is 25. Your solution is to lower the speed limit to 20, outlaw any vehicle that has a round hood ornament or that can carry more than 10 gallons of fuel, require sensitivity training and mandatory annual testing for all licensed drivers, require all vehicle purchases to be documented at a dealership (with a 10-day waiting period), and specify the locks on the garage where the vehicles are stored (with their wheels removed and stored in a locked container on the other side of the home). Meanwhile the most dangerous intersections are changed from stoplights to yield signs, and residential and school zone regulations are tightened with ‘no-stop’ rules so strict that even police cannot stop to set up a speed trap, thus giving the speeders free reign in the very areas they are likely to do the most damage.
Tony B.
A Journalist’s Citizen’s Guide to Firearms Identification. Courtesy of The Arizona Rifleman.
An amusing joke about the mainstream media’s abysmal and willful ignorance on the subject of firearms.
…Guns will never be confiscated in the US: when martial law is declared, the gun owners will be given badges and arm-bands and sent out on patrol. As long as the President at the time is a right-winger and white, the gun nuts won’t put up a fuss.
Unknown Liberal
Guns and Mumbai.
India’s government not only failed to protect its citizens from terrorism, it wouldn’t allow them to protect themselves. Check out this paragraph from the Wall Street Journal:
At about 9:45 p.m., two gunmen, slender and in their mid-20s, ran up the circular driveway at the entrance to the Trident. They shot the security guard and two bellhops. The hotel had metal detectors, but none of its security personnel carried weapons because of the difficulties in obtaining gun permits from the Indian government, according to the hotel company’s chairman, P.R.S. Oberoi.
On the other hand, at least some Indian officials are taking responsibility for their failure, which is more than we can say about anyone in the U.S. government after September 11.
[The Agitator]
I’ve seen this sort of claim a number of places, but I disagree, because this isn’t a case of an individual going postal in a shopping mall or a school. In those parts of the US where ordinary people can legally carry handguns, the percentage who do so is very low–so low that there would be at best one or two people with a pistol around if something like this happened here. Real life isn’t like Die Hard–one guy with a pistol going up against a trained infantry squad is just going to die without accomplishing anything.
For the people on the spot to stop a terrorist attack like this, it’s also necessary for the culture to be such that all or nearly all of the people are armed at all times. That’s not the case in the US, and I know of no reason to think it’s the case in India either. In fact, the only incident I know of in my lifetime where an armed citizenry repelled heavily armed terrorists was in Somalia, when the city of Mogadishu drove off a terrorist attack by the Evil Empire. It was a costly victory, though–thousands of Somalis died fighting about a company of Imperial Stormtroopers.
460 Rowland — .44 Magnum Performance from a 1911 Platform.
Just learned about a new wildcat cartridge. The 460 Rowland cartridge gives better than .44 magnum performance by switching the barrel, guide rod, and spring on a standard 1911 pistol. Felt recoil is similar to regular .45 Auto, but, due to the compensator, directly back instead of twisting up. The case, made by Starline, is 1/16″ longer than a .45 Auto case, to prevent chambering it in a regular 1911. Can be reloaded with standard .45 Auto dies.
A $300 drop-in conversion kit is available from Clark Custom Guns
Press release: http://www.clarkcustomguns.com/460press.htm
Conversion kit order page with links to reloading data: http://www.clarkcustomguns.com/rowland.htm
Demo video: http://www.gunsandgears.tv/movie1.php?file=460_demo.flv
Guns and Gears Television promises a .460 Rowland carbine soon: http://www.gunsandgears.tv/
Photo below from This Real Guns article.
[End the War on Freedom]
I like the idea, but I’d be afraid to try it with my own M1911–I suspect that it might be a bit much for a ninety year old frame.
