Matt, my nephew’s cousin, had gone with us last year for some introductory rifle shooting. Ever since then he’d been wanting to try his had with a pistol, and we finally got together the other day.
We started with the safety rules, and more importantly, the application of the safety rules (I’ve found that people can memorize the rules and recite them perfectly, but applying them at the range is sometimes a very different matter). In the short time we had, we sailed through the basics: safely loading and unloading, position, grip, sight alignment, breath control, trigger squeeze, follow-through, avoiding slide bite (no blood was let that day). Dealing with anticipation, or flinch, was emphasized and we did much dry firing.
Then we loaded the Mark II. Matt’s a southpaw, and I was demonstrating right-handed. That resulted in some confusion, so I took to demonstrating left-handed, but sometimes lapsed into RH operation. I have to work on that more, for sure. The Mark II with Remington copper washed hollowpoint ammo was a jam-o-matic that day and I’d forgotten I had some CCI which runs well in it (second mistake). We quickly graduated to the 9 mm.
Matt and Ben went through about 100 rounds of 9 mm using a Daewoo DP-51— an alloy framed, conventional DA auto. The light frame likes to be gripped well and solid, or POI NE POA, yet they both did very well at 10 yards. This pistol has always been 100% reliable. It’s nice that way. You forget all about the equipment and just shoot. Crap– I forgot the tap rack bang exercise. I did load unknown (to the shooters) small numbers of rounds in the magazines so they could learn the feel of slide-lock and practice more reloads.
For defensive type shooting, I explained the concept of acceptable group size, and that if you’re shooting much smaller than that, you may be shooting too slow– the balance between accuracy and speed.
I had to crank off a few shots with my carry gun, a G20, and then Matt and Ben put another 100 rounds or so through it. Below is Matt in full recoil with the G20. That’s one good thing about the Glock striker ignition– it and the frame design allow a very high grip. For a newbie, Matt did well– almost as if he’d done this before (though his RH fingers wanted to creep downward on the grip);
Matt went from his first shots, with a .22 rimfire, to doing well with the 10 mm auto with its fat, double stack grip, in a little over two hours. I told him we’d barely scratched the surface of pistol shooting, and that he’d just picked up a few of the many things to practice.
Here’s the obligatory fireball pic;
That Blazer ammo (this was the 200 grain load) has a low flash compared to some.
During our venison steak, baked potato and spicy fried corn dinner afterwards, someone asked Matt what he thought about pistol shooting. He answered; “Loved it.” Now he’s talking about getting his own hardware. That’s what I’m talkin’ ’bout. We definitely have to do more of this.
Edited to Add; I also gave each of them a copy of In Search of the Second Amendment and some magazines– Guns and Ammo, American Rifleman, and American Hunter.
A non-cooperative zealot version of the “Just one Question” (for people like Brady Shills, and Trolls, who won’t play the game with the REAL one-question) is “How many gun owners have you convinced to give up their guns and work for your cause?”
Of course that gets as many answers as the “Just one question”. Go Figure. And its a wonder we’re winning. All they can do is MAYBE recruit un-enrolled people predisposed to gun-control.
But we take anybody to the range and give them good safe instruction, and make sure they have a good time, then answer any questions they might have and BOOM, we have a pro-rights advocate.
And they’re jealous of that!
If I had a nickel for every time I heard “We’ve got to do this again” from a new shooter, I’d have, well, a whole lot of nickels.
I have new shooters call me up from time to time asking to go again. I love that.
Even more telling, out of the dozen or more new shooters I’ve brought to the range, only a couple have *not* gotten their permits – which in MA is saying quite a bit. It takes multiple hundreds of dollars and a not inconsequential amount of time to get any permit in MA…
Verrah nice. What’s your carry load for that G20?
the pistolero; I’m carrying the 180 grain Fed Hydra-Shok. Word is, it’s not loaded much hotter than .40 S&W, and the 10 mm is capable of significantly more than that. I’ve tried CorBon and it’s definitely hotter, but last time I bought ammo the Fed load was all they had in HP. It functions perfectly in the full sized pistol and I certainly don’t believe it’s under-powered for SD. Maybe I’ll bring a chronograph along next time and clock the rest of these loads, just for fun.
It’s funny; a friend recently saw my unusual (for me) shoulder-length hair and cowboy hat, and remarked, “You look like Bill Hickok!” or some such.
“Yeah. All I need is a couple of six shooters.” I didn’t tell him about the sixteen shooter under my shirt.
I also gave them each a copy of “In Search of the Second Amendment” and some magazines– G&A, American Rifleman and American Hunter.
With due respect, the DP-51 is much more then a conventional double-action. They’re a great gun to use if you’re not sure how you feel most comfortable carrying, as they can be carried cocked and locked (a la the 1911), true double-action (though you have to drop the hammer by pulling the trigger on a loaded round while thumbing back the hammer, not the safest proposition), or fast-action (which involves just pushing the hammer down onto the loaded round without pulling the trigger), which is somewhat Glock-like (long but relatively light trigger pull). The Daewoo pistols are great value for the money; it’s a pity they never gained much in the way of popularity.
RC; Right you are of course. I just didn’t want to get into all the detail in the main post. The linked Wikki article talks about it some. The DP is a bit of a freak, but I like it well enough. It was sold as a used cop gun, and though it showed some holster wear, I don’t think it was ever fired much. It’s never once failed, which is a little bit more than I can say for the Glock. The G20 has had a handful of stoppages over the last 15 years.
With the DP “cocked” and the hammer down, you pull the trigger and you get just a light blip as the hammer comes all the way back. At that point it fires just like regular single action. I call it a “split hammer” design. The hammer is separate from the “tumbler” (we all know what a tumbler is from our study of sidelock arms of the last several hundred years) so the tumbler can be fully cocked (mainspring fully tensioned) and you can push the hammer forward. Since the DA trigger pull acts on the hammer, the hammer comes fully back as you pull the trigger, though you’re not adding any tension to the mainspring– you’re just working against a very light detent spring. It feels more like a two stage trigger with a lot of takeup. It’s quite simple in concept, but not so simple to explain. If you ignore the split hammer feature, as I do, it runs and feels like a conventional DA pistol such as the M9, although as you say there is no hammer drop feature. If I were to carry the DP, I’d probably carry it “cocked and locked with the hammer down” which sounds like an oxymoron, but there you have it.
Now there is one quirk in this trigger mechanism that can annoy you slightly. If you intend to decock the piece by thumbing the hammer down as you pull the trigger, and you pull backward on the hammer before pulling the trigger as I do, that can activate the disconnect, and hammer won’t drop. I don’t know if they intended this as a safety feature, or if it’s an unintended result of the disconnect design, but to thumb the hammer down to perform a complete decock, you have to avoid moving the hammer backward from full cock more than just a hair. It’s a bit of a balancing act, but if you operate the piece without doing any decocking, which is entirely doable, it’s not an issue.
I think the most flash I’ve ever seen in a 9mm was from some Remington hollowpoints; on a so-so lit indoor range they were bloody distracting.