lightest recoiling PCC

As was stated the recoil comes from the bolt slamming into the back of the receiver, which gives you an unpleasant jolt to the shoulder if not tuned correctly. It doesn't push you around like recoil from a rifle, its just like someone is smacking your shoulder with a stick repeatedly. Believe it or not, when I first put my 9mm AR together it would actually bruise your shoulder, I kid you not. If I loaded light starting loads it would be fine. The fix was to put a wolf extra power AR10 buffer spring and a rubber shock buffer in the end of the buffer tube. Now its a pussycat with full power loads.

So in conclusion with a blowback semi auto the bolt mass, recoil spring weight, and power factor of the ammo need to work together. You can make changes to any of the three of them to make them shoot softer.

If you want to minimize recoil, look for something locked breech rather than a blowback system The Sig MPX is very highly sought after in USPSA PCC for this reason.

I altered the "perceived" recoil impulse on my 9MM Colt pattern PCC with a .308 Tubbs flatwire recoil spring and a 7.5ish oz buffer.

I say "perceived" because we all know the "kick" is still there, since it is still the same ammo.. its just spread out over a longer time period... IE, milliseconds longer cyclic speed... so if you can slow the cyclic speed slightly.. it will feel softer shooting.

The difference between the OEM setup and my heavier recoil setup was night and day. FAR less bark and blast.... and the 9MM PCC no longer felt like it was gonna beat itself apart.

The Tubbs .308 recoil spring doesn't feel any harder to pull back... and that maybe because of the Radian charging handles larger gripping surface...

Out of the ones I've just shot, owned or currently own ...

The 1) Beretta CX4 Carbine recoiled the least I thought.

2) Then the Marlin 9mm. Pretty mild.

Never fired a Ruger PC carbine or the new one they have out now. Never fired a Hi Point 9mm (995 I think it is) either.

3A) Then a CZ Scorpian Evo carbine.
3B) About the same as a Colt 9mm AR

4) A buddy owned a Kel Tec Sub 2000 and it recoiled more than my CZ Scorpian Evo. Not by a lot, but more.

5) I used to own a semi Tommy .45 ACP gun, but while the recoil was nothing it was as difficult to maneuver as a weight bar.

jak67429 said:

I bought a keltec sub 200 for some of our junior shooters to use for uspsa and steel challenge. the ones who can actually operate it, Bolt is really hard to pull back, and to release. don't like shooting it because of the recoil. So I am looking for suggestions on what I should trade the keltec for. Keep in mind that it will be primarily 10 to 14 year old shooting it.

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I would guess that the lightest-recoiling ones would be A) all the ones that aren't direct blowback operated, and then B) the heaviest of the blowback-operated guns that have nice recoil pads.

The roller-lock action (H&K and clones) guns, the radially delayed blowback CMMG rifles, and the gas-operated Sig MPX are probably the softest.