On Thanksgiving my wife and I finally took my new 380 for its inaugural shoot. Didn't keep tabs of the grouping but had a great time with it. Shot Winchester WB, American Eagle, and Remington FMJ. Since it was 23 degrees and getting dark and we were meeting some friends at a casino for dinner, we cut the time short and only ran 33 rounds through her. Without a hiccup. No fail to fire, feed, or eject. I know its not enough for a break in but it was great and I was really pleased with the performance. On December 27th I took it out by myself and ran 9 Speer Gold Dots, and 5 Federal Premium defense rounds and a few more target rounds. This time two Remington rounds jammed while feeding. Two jams out of 82 rounds while still being broke in, I think thats acceptable and doesn't bother me. This is gonna be my primary summer carry gun. I'll be getting myself a pf9 shortly for winter carry. Since my wife doesn't have the physical strength to pull the slide back to chamber a round on the 380, and assuming she'll have similar problems with a pf9, I'm looking at getting her a S&W model 642. I think its a great little gun.
I have looked at that gun for the very same reasons. My wife likes to shot my S&W .40 it is a heavy gun with very little recoil. Since we have no small kids around I just leave it loaded and ready.
Interesting info on the Wincheser ammo. Strolling threw the local WalMart last week, I checked out the ammo stock and saw that a new shippment of Winchester 95 gr fmj had come in. I would have loved to buy it all [WalMart has lifted thier 6 box limit]. But, my finances limited me to three-100 round boxes, which ran about $100.00. I haven't been out to the range with these rounds yet. But, I'm curious to see how these flat head rounds feed threw my gun. Anyone else familiar with these rounds?
I shoot those 95gr Winchesters from Walmart through my P3AT all the time.....I've done about 150 just in the past few weeks with flawless performance.
Yeah, I'm guessing my just doesn't have the strength to pull the slide. She has no problems pulling the slide on my Ruger MarkIII. That S&W 642 is supposed to weigh 13oz empty. I keep mine loaded and carry it around the house. We don't have any kids around either. Just a couple of house cats and I doubt they'll ever learn to open the box and shoot each other. Anybody know if Kel Tec will go into the revolver market?
I broke my P3AT in with WWB 95 grainers. They worked flawlessly for around 300 rounds and at that time I switched to handloads with 100 grain Berry's bullets for range work. Winchester SXTs and Federal Hydrashocks and Gold Dots for carry, though, and they all function flawlessly as well.
I'll go ahead and post instead of waiting for this thread to be moved to the Other Guns forum. Maybe it won't get moved. Teach your wife the push-pull technique and she'll be able to rack the slide on any semi-auto. Men like to hold the gun at arms length and pull the slide back but not all women can do this. My wife has no trouble with my P3AT or any other gun. She was taught the method in her first NRA pistol course. Have you wife hold the gun in her shooting hand without putting her finger on the trigger. Now instead of fully extending her arm, have her bring the gun up to waist or stomach level in front of her. She will then grasp the slide in her off hand at the rear of the slide as normal. Then, in a simultaneous motion, have her push the gun forward with her shooting hand while pulling rearward on the slide with her off hand. Once the slide is pulled fully to the rear, she can let go of the slide in order to load the next round in the magazine. It's that simple. My wife can rack the slide on my P3AT, on full size 1911s, and on the Walther PPS she carries. I've yet to find a woman this technique hasn't worked for.
