Howdy folks,
Dad got a call from Academy saying that his number had come up. He had just purchased a 638 at my suggestion for pocket carry, but figured he'd at least go LOOK at the LCP since he was curious... big mistake
He got the LCP figuring it'd be good to have a little variety... and honestly, this damn thing could fit anywhere. Paid $299 out the door.
Off to the range we went. I've got smaller hands and I've still got a two finger grip on this gun. Nevertheless, it shoots easy enough that I didn't find myself bemoaning the small size. I'm still a relative novice shooter, but I did perfectly acceptable at 3 and 5 yards and I liked the surprisingly smooth trigger more than my Dad's aforementioned J-frame Smith. I also felt like it was more pleasent to shoot (read: less recoil, less juking around). We shot a box of WWB with zero issues of any kind.
Two problems:
#1 The slide lock sucks ass for spare change, to put it mildly. It flat-out does not engage (I'm not talking about empty chamber lockback, which the LCP doesn't do nor claim to do). I talked to Jim Mills at Ruger, who explained to me that, yeah, they were replacing slide locks for free whenever I wanted to send it in. One free shipping label in the mail. He sounded embarrassed. It's a bonerhead error for Ruger to make, but not the end of the world. Sling-shotting the slide had no negative impact on my shooting experience (no functionality issues), but my 60-year old pop didn't enjoy it. It's his gun, so he wants the slide lock... I probably wouldn't have bothered.
#2 The trigger guard smacks my finger when I pull from my prefered location. It's mildly irritating, not painful. I'm typing away on it right now !!!!! In the future I'll put a mag or two through the LCP and take a break with another gun if I just couldn't kick back for 2 minutes and watch somebody else shoot something else interesting. It's not a serious beef. I can move my finger up a fraction on the trigger too, and the problem thusly ceases for me, but it's such a negligible issue that I don't bother.
WHAT I LEARNED FROM JIM MILLS, OFFICIAL RUGER SERVICE GUY
...besides the voluntary slide catch replacement deal. I called Ruger because I wanted a definitive answer on the dry-fire issue. You may have seen the infamous post on the Sig forum about an LCP self-destructing after 80-100 dry fires. Well, while there has been plenty of speculation and theorizing on what caused that particular defective gun to be defective, Mr. Mills made it clear that firing WITHOUT SNAP CAPS is FINE. Noooo problem at all. I'm not dying to practice with the trigger anyway (it's not in need of lightening), but it's good to know that I can click on an empty chamber without freaking out. Finally, NO +P AMMO! Don't do it. He said he was also aware of issues with Rem UMC (no news there) and, brace yourself.... CorBon. I don't know if that's because their stuff is largely +P, but I'm not wild about speding $33 for a box of 20 rounds that are questionably "better" than SGD in the first place so I didn't really care.
All in all I'll be buying one of these as soon as I need a CCW. It's better than I could have hoped for (sorry 642/442).
For the record, as there have been duds on the market (it's a new gun, I'm not surprised) I encouraged my Dad numerous weeks ago to wait and handle the LCP he would buy before/if he bought it. I don't know how widespread the problems have been (they obviously circulate repeatedly), but it's a sensible precaution I'd personally adhere to for any new gun.
Count us in as extremely satisfied consumers.
Dad got a call from Academy saying that his number had come up. He had just purchased a 638 at my suggestion for pocket carry, but figured he'd at least go LOOK at the LCP since he was curious... big mistake
He got the LCP figuring it'd be good to have a little variety... and honestly, this damn thing could fit anywhere. Paid $299 out the door.
Off to the range we went. I've got smaller hands and I've still got a two finger grip on this gun. Nevertheless, it shoots easy enough that I didn't find myself bemoaning the small size. I'm still a relative novice shooter, but I did perfectly acceptable at 3 and 5 yards and I liked the surprisingly smooth trigger more than my Dad's aforementioned J-frame Smith. I also felt like it was more pleasent to shoot (read: less recoil, less juking around). We shot a box of WWB with zero issues of any kind.
Two problems:
#1 The slide lock sucks ass for spare change, to put it mildly. It flat-out does not engage (I'm not talking about empty chamber lockback, which the LCP doesn't do nor claim to do). I talked to Jim Mills at Ruger, who explained to me that, yeah, they were replacing slide locks for free whenever I wanted to send it in. One free shipping label in the mail. He sounded embarrassed. It's a bonerhead error for Ruger to make, but not the end of the world. Sling-shotting the slide had no negative impact on my shooting experience (no functionality issues), but my 60-year old pop didn't enjoy it. It's his gun, so he wants the slide lock... I probably wouldn't have bothered.
#2 The trigger guard smacks my finger when I pull from my prefered location. It's mildly irritating, not painful. I'm typing away on it right now !!!!! In the future I'll put a mag or two through the LCP and take a break with another gun if I just couldn't kick back for 2 minutes and watch somebody else shoot something else interesting. It's not a serious beef. I can move my finger up a fraction on the trigger too, and the problem thusly ceases for me, but it's such a negligible issue that I don't bother.
WHAT I LEARNED FROM JIM MILLS, OFFICIAL RUGER SERVICE GUY
...besides the voluntary slide catch replacement deal. I called Ruger because I wanted a definitive answer on the dry-fire issue. You may have seen the infamous post on the Sig forum about an LCP self-destructing after 80-100 dry fires. Well, while there has been plenty of speculation and theorizing on what caused that particular defective gun to be defective, Mr. Mills made it clear that firing WITHOUT SNAP CAPS is FINE. Noooo problem at all. I'm not dying to practice with the trigger anyway (it's not in need of lightening), but it's good to know that I can click on an empty chamber without freaking out. Finally, NO +P AMMO! Don't do it. He said he was also aware of issues with Rem UMC (no news there) and, brace yourself.... CorBon. I don't know if that's because their stuff is largely +P, but I'm not wild about speding $33 for a box of 20 rounds that are questionably "better" than SGD in the first place so I didn't really care.
All in all I'll be buying one of these as soon as I need a CCW. It's better than I could have hoped for (sorry 642/442).
For the record, as there have been duds on the market (it's a new gun, I'm not surprised) I encouraged my Dad numerous weeks ago to wait and handle the LCP he would buy before/if he bought it. I don't know how widespread the problems have been (they obviously circulate repeatedly), but it's a sensible precaution I'd personally adhere to for any new gun.
Count us in as extremely satisfied consumers.