Lorcin 9mm

Those were the gangsters 9 of choice back in the day, but I usually recovered the Lorcin (Or Raven or Jennings) .380 laying on the ground as they seemed more popular with the hoodlum crowd.

With the zamak (zinc) slide and budget construction they were pretty much disposable, piece of junk guns from the day they first came out.

Personally I would pass on any of the Lorcin-Raven-Jennings guns, even if they were offered to me for free.

Stay safe.

A fair assessment. Pass on it.

In my opinion it makes sense only if it is in perfect conditions and for some reason you are interested to start a collection of these kind of pistols.

Put it down and walk away QUICKLY !

IIRC, the 9mm Lorcins had a reputation for having their frames break. Back in the day, the Lorcins had the worst reputation of all the US budget-priced cast-zinc guns.

However, they would be cheap to collect, as 5-SHOTS suggests.

Monac said:

However, they would be cheap to collect, as 5-SHOTS suggests.

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A rock collection would be cheaper. More durable, more ergonomic...and more accurate.

Total junk

RUN FORREST, RUN!

They only function if held sideways and discharged in the direction of innocent 3rd parties.

They usually cost less to buy than what anti-gun city governments pay during buy-backs.

If you need a budget 9 mm buy a Hi Point. Same price range (under $200) and comes with a lifetime no questions asked warranty.

Guns shouldn't be made from zinc. Inexpensive firearms are a good thing, not everyone has five hundred bucks to spend. Hi Point is the way to go, as has been pointed out.

If you can get it for under $100 take it. Anything over that reconsider. It's a ok toy. Wouldn't trust my life to it! I've had a few. They break I would take it apart and throw it away.

Anything over a .32 I wouldn't want to buy a "ring of fire" gun, with the exception of the Jimenez 9mm and that's simply because that company is still going and will honor warranties.

IMO, the only ring of fire gun worth paying money for are the Raven .25's. Phoenix Arms still makes mags for them.

A Hi Point will at least function.

What Riomouse911 said!

Junk. If I had one, I would sit on it until a gun buy-back. Maybe get a gift card for something useful, like a filet-o-fish meal.

A friend of mine had one of those garbage guns. He bought it because he wanted a gun but he was cheap. The slide rail on the right side cracked. Only reason I know is his gun jammed and when I looked at it the thing was all gummed up. I found the crack when I removed the slide. I did him a favor and used pliers to snap the rail off at the least 2 inches of the slide. Boy, was he miffed.

I would advise not wasting time or money on a Lorcin unless you just have to have one. If it’s a budget issue look for a High Point as already mentioned above.

I bought one of those about a decade ago. Guy needed beer money so I basically gave him 2 cases of bud light for it. It was junk, but it rose around in my truck for a year or two until a friend of mine had a nasty divorce and her ex husband kept getting drunk and trying to get in the house. She never had to use it and gave it to somebody else who was in a bad spot in life. I have no doubt it would have worked, but it was one of those things that was cheap enough to buy and forget because it could have served a pileup par at any time in an up close and personal situation and would have given peace of mind if nothing else.

I have a cousin of that Lorcin 9, a Davis Industries P380 (as well as a D32 .32 mag derringer) both purchased in the mid-90s. The only kind things I can say about the P380 is not once has it ever choked on anything and it's chrome finish is holding up quite well. I probably have less than 400 rounds through it (and less than 100 out of the D32) but some of those were Hansen 95gr JHP, so not all were the nice feed-friendly FMJ.

The bad, where do I start? 400 rounds has completely stripped out the rifling of the P380 to the point where it resembles something with trace polygonal rifling... but more of a smoothbore look. The barrel is the hardest and strongest part of this pistol and it's about shot out.
The D32 was advertised with a PTFE (Teflon) black finish that has since bubbled and sloughed off. The cross-bolt safety fell out after the retention ball bearing striped its way out of the retention divot. Now there's a hole where the safety was. The trigger pull about requires a team of mules.

Both still fire and I guess that was the whole point.

Blowback is an abusive action better suited to steel, decent alloy or polymer frames. The .380acp is about the cusp of what the Zamak can handle in a blowback. Though beefed up, I don't think the Lorcin 9 will have any appreciable lifespan. If it makes it to 1k rounds without major parts breakage, consider yourself lucky. Of course, that's not what it was intended for. Lorcin Engineering Co. was well aware someone purchasing such an inexpensive pistol likely wasn't financially able to put a substantial amount of ammunition through it. Perhaps a few magazines to function-fire at most.

They and their ilk filled a niche. Unfortunately, due to the incredible numbers they churned out and the demographics of their intended market, a noticeable percentage found their way into the wrong hands and wrongful death lawsuits drove Lorcin to bankruptcy. I believe that was the fate for many manufacturers of inexpensive pot-metal pistols.

WheelGunMan said:

I get the feeling that you guys don't think much of this gun! That's what I was thinking too. I am going to offer $50 for it. If I'm successful in procuring it, I'll pull the firing pin out of it and use it in my CPL classes as training aid. I can pick up a blue gun for the same money but thought one with an operable slide would be better.

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$50 is as high as I would go for any Jennings/Lorcin/Jimenez handgun. At that price it wouldn't be a bad training aid.

Funny story, I was preparing a case for trial a couple years ago (I was the paralegal, not the attorney) and was going over the police report when I came to the inventory page from what they confiscated.

They confiscated a Lorcin pistol, and the officer estimated a value.
I think the estimate is spot on, assuming the magazine was full.
I had to take a photo.

^^^LOL^^^ That's too funny!

About as funny as the gas company hooking up a high pressure line to a low pressure line somehow years ago, and burning down dozens of homes in the hood, when all the pilot lights became blow torches!! The local news reported total damages under $100,000!!