Accessories

The 1911 handgun has survived for more than one hundred years based on excellent ergonomics, great reliability, and its ability to chamber a fight-stopping cartridge. Modern 1911 handguns are much evolved from the Colt 1911 first issued to Army troops in 1911. However, a doughboy going to Europe in 1917 would be able to instantly load, make safe, fire and use a modern 1911 handgun. The ability of the platform to accept a weapon-mounted light was an inevitable part of the 1911's evolution, because a gun-mounted combat light is a good tactical addition. They allow for the identification of a threat, illumination of an area, and make fail-safe identification possible.

Two so-equipped full-size 1911s are the SIG TACOPS and the Smith & Wesson 1911TA E Class. The SIG Sauer 1911 TACOPS 1911R-45TACOPS, $1213 list, is a no-nonsense black tactical pistol. We found it at DefenderOutdoors.com for $1,080, at BudsGunShop.com for a cash discount price of $1,062, and for $910 at GrabAGun.com. Our test gun is part of the larger SIG 1911 family, which at our last count, had 31 members. Generally speaking, SIG 1911s have done very well in our evaluations. In the October 2014 issue, we graded a 1911 Carry Scorpion 1911CAR-45-SCPN as a B+. In the November 2013 issue, a 1911 Carry Stainless 1911CA-45-SSS earned an A- grade and a "Best Buy" nod. In the February 2009 issue, a 1911 C3 No. 19GS0031 earned an A grade. In the May 2006 issue, a Sigarms 1911 GSR No. 19GS0001 earned a Conditional Buy, mainly because of its price, not its functionality. We'd translate that to a B+ today.

S&W's SW1911 "E" Series pistols are supposed to be "enhanced, with tight tolerances, precision-fit trigger, chamfered and recessed muzzle, "fish-scale" scalloped slide serrations and other premium features commonly found on custom-made firearms. The standard E-series 1911s come in blued or stainless steel, and the model number with "SC" appended have scandium-alloy frames. The blued version we tested is #108409, while the stainless model is #108411. List for our test gun is $1399, and we saw it for sale at DefenderOutdoors.com for $1140, TombstoneTactical.com for $1099, and at BudsGunShop.com for $1065.

Smith 1911s have not matched SIG's level of performance in our tests. In the April 2010 issue, the S&W Model SW1911 No. 178017 in 9mm got a B+. A 45 ACP Smith & Wesson MSW1911 No. 108284 earned a B+ in the February 2010 issue. In March 2006, a 1911SC No. 108289 got a "Don't Buy" rating, as did a 1911PD No. 108296 tested in the November 2005. Way back in April 2003, we tested the first-year version of the company's 1911 and said "Buy It" to a Smith & Wesson 1911 45 ACP.

But history isn't necessarily destiny at Gun Tests. Out of the box, the Smith & Wesson had more bling and eye appeal, no denying that. And at the heart of each pistol was a tight barrel-to-slide fit, which provided X-ring accuracy without sacrificing reliability. Just like you, we prefer to shoot good guns, and what we found here were two pretty good ones, though our team had its preference at the end.

Colt still makes the Lightweight Commander (O4860XSE, $1104), but no longer makes one of our favorite carry guns, the CCO, or Colt Concealed Officer's model. We thought this Ruger looked enough like the Colt CCO that a comparison was in order. In this first-look report, we take a good look at the new Ruger and briefly see how it stacks up to a custom CCO on hand.

We shot the Ruger with 230-grain FMJ "hardball" by Black Hills and Winchester, Winchester's 200-grain BEB, and with Federal 185-grain JHP Hi-Shok. We tried a few rounds of Cor-Bon 185-grain JHP, but found the recoil to be much too fierce. Here's what we found from our first look at the new Ruger.

The avid woodsman or outdoorsman, be he/she hunter, hiker, camper, or what have you, has certain necessary items that must always be packed along on the trail. Whether going into the Eastern woods for a few days or into the Western mountains, those companion items will always go along with us: water, fire makings, rope, shelter, and the like. Many of us also want a pistol and knife. In this report we take a close first look at Ruger's new 22/45 Lite in 22 LR and the Mora HD knife and an accompanying Scow Sheath as trail companions.

We must comment that lately we now consider taking quite a few more items for our forays into the bush, thanks to a fellow who is one of the more serious outdoorsmen we've encountered. This is one David Pearson, who has posted nearly 100 rather lengthy, intelligent, thoughtful, educational, and highly entertaining videos on YouTube under the moniker reallybigmonkey1. With his heavy and pleasant Appalachian accent, Mr. Pearson shows in great detail how he deals with the varied aspects of serious camping in his neighborhood of northwest Georgia. This includes making off-the-ground beds, low-cost heated shelters of a great variety, dealing with fires and cooking, the use of rather large knives, and making much of his own equipment, all dealt up with a great deal of self-effacing humor — and absolutely no swearing. Mr. Pearson calls his educational videos "Fun in the Woods."

Though some of us are essentially outdoorsmen, we have learned quite a bit from Mr. Pearson. More to the point, one of Pearson's videos gave us a heads-up about Duane Scow, whose custom sheath for the Mora knife was shown in one of Pearson's videos. But for now, we'll look at the packable pistol from Ruger, then address the qualities of the knife and sheath.

I admit I was miffed when the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) opened a computer case I checked as baggage to Las Vegas for the SHOT Show back in January. The case and contents were a load — a 38-pound Pelican 1730 transport case with a 27-inch iMac in it. I prefer to use a desktop machine to update the Gun Tests Facebook page, YouTube page, website, and new-product files when I'm at SHOT for a week. I've done the jobs with a laptop before, and I admit, it's much easier to carry-on a smaller machine. But once it's set up, the full-size iMac is heaven while we're processing words, photos, and movies for our various media in a hurry. In previous years, I had shipped my back-up iMac 27 in its original box a few days prior, so I hadn't had to wrestle what I lovingly refer to as the Pig Box through airport check in. I call it that because the Pelican is big enough (37.5 x 27.1 x 14.4 inches) to hold a whole pig. Oh yes, extra weight and size charges apply.

Beretta's APX, a new striker-fired full-size pistol in 9x19mm, 9x21mm IMI and 40 Smith & Wesson cartridges, debuted at the 2015 International Defence Exhibition & Conference IDEX expo in Abu Dhabi Feb. 22.

"IDEX is one of the first venues where defense contractors present their wares to worldwide military customers and Beretta felt this was the ideal environment to present the international offering of its APX pistol," said Carlo Ferlito, general manager of Beretta and Beretta Defense Technologies (BDT) vice president.

Beretta intends to market a variant for the commercial market later this year. The new Beretta APX has an ergonomically-molded reinforced polymer frame fitted with a built-in MIL-STD-1913 Picatinny rail, interchangable backstraps and grip panels, and a modified Browning locking system. The APX is 7.56 inches long with a 4.25-inch barrel.

The trigger can be considered a light double action, with a 6-pound break, 0.2 inch of travel, and a 0.12-inch reset. The rear portion of the striker slightly protrudes from a round slot on the back of the slide as a loaded-chamber indicator.

The slide is machined from stainless steel and has a nitride coating that reduces glare, scratches, and corrosion. Other features include wide front and rear slide serrations, three-dot sights dovetailed into the slide, and no manual safety save for a Glock-style trigger safety.

Ferlito said, "Beretta waited to enter the striker-fired market until we had a pistol we knew would meet the needs of the operator. The APX has been more than three years in development. We tested it extensively with professional end users and incorporated that feedback at every opportunity. The result is a pistol platform that delivers superior performance in durability, reliability, accuracy and ergonomics."

A slot on the frame allows the use of a tool to decock it before it can be field-stripped by operating a lever found on the left side of the frame.

An optional manual safety system will be available upon request, consisting of a frame-mounted two-position switch. A reversible magazine-release catch and a factory ambidextrous slide stop/hold open release lever help make the pistol suitable for left- or right-handed shooters.

Supplied black double-stack metal magazines have polymer bottom pads and offer 17-round capacities in 9x19mm NATO and 15-round capacities in 9x21mm IMI (9 Italian) and 40 Smith & Wesson.

Many Americans choose a revolver as their concealed-carry handguns. Most carry a snubnose revolver; a few carry a 4-inch barrel 357 Magnum like those tested elsewhere in this issue. Their faith in the revolver is understandable. Our raters observe that criminals often run in packs. The natural polarity between good guys and bad guys may erupt into a gun battle. While high-round counts are not the norm, the possibilities are endless. At any rate, after you win the fight, you will wish to reload the handgun, which means carrying spare gun loads - a somewhat more difficult task than with magazines for a self loader. We believe the reason the revolver reload isnt carried as often is because of the bulk of speedloaders, and carrying loose ammunition in the pocket is a bad choice. Revolver speed strips help, but are far from ideal. In our view, a revolver speedloader is best, but they are about as wide as the revolver cylinder, which makes for a bump on the belt with conventional old-style speedloader pouches.

During the past few months, SIG Sauer, Walther, and Heckler & Koch have introduced pistols that feature striker-fired actions. These handguns are designed to compete for the hearts and minds of institutional buyers and concealed-carry-permit holsters as well. The improvement in rapid-fire combat shooting is provable, and absolute accuracy is improved over the original SIG P250, Walther P99 and HK P30. The question is, which handgun is the most improved and the best buy for the money — that is, the most reliable and accurate?

In this test of three 9mm striker-fired models, we were firing handguns intended for personal defense in the home, concealed carry, and practical competition. We are certain each maker is hoping to compete with Glock for institutional sales as well. At first glance, the handguns appeared similar. Each featured a polymer frame, a light rail, and similar sights. Each was relatively simple to operate. None had a manual safety as part of the design. Some features, such as the sights and the magazines, were similar. A casual shooter might sign off on all three handguns, but that isn't what we do.

Our shooters noticed the trigger actions were markedly different, and grip texturing and handling were considerably different. As the firing sessions progressed and the brass stacked up, the shoot out turned into a strong challenge between the Walther and the HK pistol. These worthy competitors traded places several times in the firing evaluations. The SIG P320 brought up the rear, in our estimation. Here's why:

The 357 Magnum has an excellent reputation as a defensive round. On medium-sized game like whitetail deer at modest distances, it is effective as well. The round has been around since 1934; General George Patton carried an ivory-handled S&W 357 Mag during WWII. It is a versatile cartridge with many bullet types offered by a variety of manufacturers. Plus, 38 Special ammo in standard and +P loadings can be used in a 357 Magnum as a low-recoil alternative when training or plinking. We wanted to see if we could find a bargain in a full-size revolver with a 4-inch barrel that we could use for personal protection, and we came across two such contenders, a Smith & Wesson Model 19-4 that rated about 90 to 95 percent and a Colt Trooper MK III that rated 80 to 90 percent. Both featured 4-inch barrels, adjustable sights, and wood grips. We also came across an uncommon choice in this chambering, an FN Barracuda, available in the 1970s on a limited basis. It is unique due to the availability of an interchangeable cylinder, which could be switched between 9mm Luger and 357 Magnum. Here's more about these interesting and affordable choices, along with our recommendations.

Many concealed-carry customers pooh-pooh pistols chambered in 380 ACP as being underpowered for self defense, but they may well be in the vocal minority, because sales of 380-chambered handguns and ammunition continues apace, with more of the smallish sidearms finding their way into pockets and purses than ever before. It can be argued, in fact, that Glock kept seeing its rivals sell so many inexpensive-to-make pocket pistols that the Austrians were forced into the U.S. 380 ACP market with the G42 just so they could grab a slice of the ever-growing pocket-pistol pie.

At Gun Tests, we have mined this lode plenty ourselves, finding quite a few worthy pocketguns and pocketguns-plus over the years. We have previously given A grades to a new CZ USA Model 83 No. 91302, a Bersa Firestorm, a Colt Mustang Pocketlite, and a Kel-Tec P3AT. A half-grade down at A- grades have been the Ruger LCP-CT, a used Beretta Model 84 and CZ Model 83, a Ruger LC380 No. 3219, and a Taurus 738B No. 1-73803. Our new e-book on 380s, available on the Gun-Tests.com website, recaps those guns and six more B+ or B pistols, or you can search for "380 ACP" in the archives and pull up the entire list of such firearms we've evaluated over the years.

We think many consumers like these pistols because most of them are easy to carry and conceal, and they're willing to trade off the "carry everywhere" portability for slightly less power than some 38 Specials, for example. Our tests of several 380 ACP self-defense loads had three (Federal 90-gr. Hydra-Shok JHP, Speer 90-gr. Gold Dot JHP, and Fiocchi 95-gr. FMJ) that penetrated at least 13.5+ inches in water, very close to what a Remington 125-gr. JHP 38 Sp. +P did as a control — and not too many experts say the 38 Special is "too little" gun.

This round, we tested three brand-new models and one variation of a previously tested model as a reference point. The first of the new models was the Colt Mustang XSP Pocketlite Polymer O6790, MSRP $649, but which we found at ImpactGuns.com for $565 and $572 at BudsGunShop.com. Or Bud's would sell it for a cash price of $555. Next up was the Glock 42 Subcompact Slimline, MSRP $480, which SlickGuns.com had for sale at $490 plus free shipping. Bud's listed it for $437 or $424 cash. Kahr's CW 380 No. 3833, $419 MSRP, comes in at a $322 retail price at Bud's or a $313 cash discount price. At GeorgiaGunStore.com, the price was $312. The fourth entry was a P238 from SIG Sauer, No. 238-380-NBS12, with a hefty MSRP of $710 and a retail price of $498 from Bud's Gun Shop (but listed as out of stock the last time we checked), or $583 from TombstoneTactical.com or $520 from JoeBobOutfitters.com.

In more detail, the polymer Colt XSP is one of two Mustangs in the company's 380 line. Colt ceased production of the Mustangs in 2000 then reintroduced the line in 2011. The new guns are designed to accept original parts. Both have stainless-steel slides, measure 5.5 inches in length, have 2.75-inch barrels, and operate with short single-action trigger function, or like miniature 1911s. The Mustang Pocketlite has an aluminum frame, while the XSP, introduced in 2013, has a lightweight polymer skin. According to company specs, the polymer XSP is about an ounce lighter than the Pocketlite.

The new Glock 42, made in Georgia, is a slimline subcompact pistol and is the smallest pistol Glock has ever introduced, but it's not the company's first 380 Auto. The Glock 25 was introduced in 1995 in Germany as a small-dimension firearm for markets where civilian personnel are not allowed to possess handguns featuring military calibers. In the USA, the G25 is reserved for law-enforcement agencies only. Like the G25, the Glock 28 is reserved for LE. The G25 is 7.36 inches long, 5 inches tall, and has a capacity of 15+1. The G28 is 6.41 inches long, 4.7 inches tall, and has a capacity of 10+1. Both are noticeably larger than our tested G42, which was 5.94 inches long, 4.13 inches tall, and has a capacity of 6+1. Marketed for pocket carry and to shooters with smaller hands, the single-stack G42 lacks the interchangeable backstraps of other Glocks, but field-strips the same way as other larger Glocks.

There are many types of holsters and carry modes for concealed carry. Most work okay when a jacket or other covering garment is worn over the rig, but they dont work as well during hot weather, when only a pulled-out sport shirt or even a T-shirt may be worn. Also, when a T-shirt isnt worn between the holster and the body in hot weather, some rigs are terribly uncomfortable and become a chafing nuisance rather than a trusted friend. While concealment and access are the primary concerns for the CHL holder, few of us are able to afford disposable clothing, so wear and tear are also important considerations. When the weather is hot and humid, we either have to go to greater lengths in selecting our concealment gear or carry a light and possibly ineffective handgun. But a better choice is to examine the best holster technology.For hot-weather carry, we have to factor in a number of considerations, such as perspiration reaching the handgun, chafing, hiding blocky gun profiles, and, of course, presentation and reholstering issues. To find out which products worked for carrying a 38 Special or 9mm handgun in hot, humid weather, we got a selection of both holsters and carry systems, comparing their usefulness for carrying guns with the minimal weight and profile while still offering acceptable speed and retention. We should point out that we rated these hot-weather rigs head to head for this specific use. We did not compare them to traditional holsters that may have a better draw angle or offer more speed.

Gunmaker SIG Sauer has agreed to stay its civil suit against the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives while ATF reviews a sample of a muzzle brake that the agency called a silencer. By agreement, approved by the U.S. District Court of New Hampshire, SIG will stay its lawsuit against the ATF until Sept. 17. In the meantime, both sides agree, SIG will send the ATF a sample of its muzzle brake for review and the ATF will issue a third ruling by Aug. 6.

Adding a red-dot reflex sight to a carry pistol has pros and cons. First, the cons. The total cost of the weapon system nearly doubles as the sights are almost as expensive as the pistol, the sights have a larger footprint than the typical rear sight, battery life must be monitored, and foul weather can diminish the capability of the sight. The pros are the sights offer faster target acquisition and ease of aiming. The ability to shoot faster and more accurately in situations under 25 yards are strong reasons to make the switch from iron sights to a reflex sight, so we wanted to investigate mounting a reflex sight on a pistol to see how a reflex sight would work on a carry gun. We chose a Glock 20 Gen 4 as our test platform for two reasons. Glocks are popular pistols among LE and civilians and because the G20 is chambered in 10mm, which has comparable power to a 41 Magnum. We wanted to rattle the innards of these tiny sights to see if anything would fall out, get loose, or go out of zero. Even though the G20 is a full-size pistol, we have found that with the proper holster, like those from Bravo Concealment, and a concealing garment, the G20 can be invisible to the untrained eye.

A reflex sight allows an operator to keep both eyes open and view a target through a small curved glass lens, which has a reticle projected onto it. A light-emitting diode projects a red dot, amber chevron, or other aiming point, giving the operator an unlimited field of view since there is no magnification and the aiming point projects out to infinity. This means that parallax will not affect sighting; place the aiming point on a target, and if zeroed properly, the target will be hit.

Think of them as mini heads-up displays for your pistol.