Olympus
Member
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2008
- Messages
- 4,212
Well I decided to take a gamble and get one of the new Canik TP9SA guns to try out. I'll start out by prefacing that I am certainly not a polymer pistol fan. I've owned quite a few over the years and never cared for any of them really. The closest one I came to actually "liking" was a Beretta PX4. A lot of other ones over the years I've flat out despised. I'm a steel shooter, particularly 1911s, revolvers, and single action target 22 pistols. So I'm certainly not a polymer combat pistol expert by any means, but I'll try to lay out my initial thoughts on this gun for anyone interested.
The box is crammed full of literature, various tags, gun lock, etc. After putting all that aside, I got to the heart of the box. I was caught off guard by all the "goodies" that were inside the box. I'm sure everyone already knows all this stuff, so I'll stick that part. I took the gun out of the box and immediately noticed that it was not covered in oil like I expected from an overseas import gun. On first looking, the gun appeared to be very nicely finished. It's a sharp looking gun! Next I noticed how big the gun was. Not gigantic, but bigger than I expected. Having never owned a full size polymer gun for many years, I was distracted at first. Then I got used to the overall size.
Next, I just had to try out that trigger that everyone seems to be going on and on about. Racking the slide was extremely smooth for a polymer frame gun. No scraping noise or spring tension noise. Just a smooth rack with a solid lock back. After releasing the slide, I tried the trigger. Wow! That's from a polymer gun? There's a good amount of take-up, but once you hit resistance the trigger breaks clean and smooth and I will have to say, fairly lightly. This coming from a die-hard single action only shooter. I put the trigger gauge on the gun and it breaks at exactly 5lbs. My last 1911 purchase was a Ruger SR1911 Night Watchman whose trigger broke at 7.5lbs out of the box. I have to say that this Canik blows the doors off the Ruger 1911 in terms of out of the box trigger! I'm looking forward to range time with this gun for sure.
Ergonomically for me, the gun feels great in the hand and points naturally. It feels like the grip distance from front strap to back strap is a bit too long for my medium hands. It's not uncomfortable, but I'm used to getting a lot more of my hand around a pistol grip on single stack guns. I think it's more of a feeling that I'm going to have to get used to.
Field stripping the gun found the inside of the slide to be just as nicely finished as the outside. I was expecting heavy tool and chatter marks in side the slide, but there were simply none present on my gun. Compared to a recent CZ SPO1 I got in, the inside of the slide on this Canik is finished leaps and bounds above the CZ. The top of the slide on the Canik is flat and has serrations from the front to rear sight. This is a very big feature for me, considering this option only comes on upper end 1911 models. To see it on a budget pistol like the Canik was a big surprise.
I won't get into the decocker in terms of practicality or real world application. I'll let everyone make their own decision regarding whether they feel comfortable with this gun as a defensive gun. I will say that pushing the decocker takes a specific effort. It's not something that I can imagine being accidentally pushed. The gun is certainly too big for me to consider as a CCW piece, but I don't think I would have problems using this as a home defense weapon provided that it can prove itself to be reliable and dependable. It's going to be a while before I get a chance to put some rounds through it, but I wanted to provide a no nonsense, initial review of the gun. I am certainly not getting paid to say good things about this gun. But I have high expectations for this gun, mostly for my own sake. I have a generally low opinion of polymer guns in general and maybe this will be the first one that I actually like and enjoy shooting.
The box is crammed full of literature, various tags, gun lock, etc. After putting all that aside, I got to the heart of the box. I was caught off guard by all the "goodies" that were inside the box. I'm sure everyone already knows all this stuff, so I'll stick that part. I took the gun out of the box and immediately noticed that it was not covered in oil like I expected from an overseas import gun. On first looking, the gun appeared to be very nicely finished. It's a sharp looking gun! Next I noticed how big the gun was. Not gigantic, but bigger than I expected. Having never owned a full size polymer gun for many years, I was distracted at first. Then I got used to the overall size.
Next, I just had to try out that trigger that everyone seems to be going on and on about. Racking the slide was extremely smooth for a polymer frame gun. No scraping noise or spring tension noise. Just a smooth rack with a solid lock back. After releasing the slide, I tried the trigger. Wow! That's from a polymer gun? There's a good amount of take-up, but once you hit resistance the trigger breaks clean and smooth and I will have to say, fairly lightly. This coming from a die-hard single action only shooter. I put the trigger gauge on the gun and it breaks at exactly 5lbs. My last 1911 purchase was a Ruger SR1911 Night Watchman whose trigger broke at 7.5lbs out of the box. I have to say that this Canik blows the doors off the Ruger 1911 in terms of out of the box trigger! I'm looking forward to range time with this gun for sure.
Ergonomically for me, the gun feels great in the hand and points naturally. It feels like the grip distance from front strap to back strap is a bit too long for my medium hands. It's not uncomfortable, but I'm used to getting a lot more of my hand around a pistol grip on single stack guns. I think it's more of a feeling that I'm going to have to get used to.
Field stripping the gun found the inside of the slide to be just as nicely finished as the outside. I was expecting heavy tool and chatter marks in side the slide, but there were simply none present on my gun. Compared to a recent CZ SPO1 I got in, the inside of the slide on this Canik is finished leaps and bounds above the CZ. The top of the slide on the Canik is flat and has serrations from the front to rear sight. This is a very big feature for me, considering this option only comes on upper end 1911 models. To see it on a budget pistol like the Canik was a big surprise.
I won't get into the decocker in terms of practicality or real world application. I'll let everyone make their own decision regarding whether they feel comfortable with this gun as a defensive gun. I will say that pushing the decocker takes a specific effort. It's not something that I can imagine being accidentally pushed. The gun is certainly too big for me to consider as a CCW piece, but I don't think I would have problems using this as a home defense weapon provided that it can prove itself to be reliable and dependable. It's going to be a while before I get a chance to put some rounds through it, but I wanted to provide a no nonsense, initial review of the gun. I am certainly not getting paid to say good things about this gun. But I have high expectations for this gun, mostly for my own sake. I have a generally low opinion of polymer guns in general and maybe this will be the first one that I actually like and enjoy shooting.
