Just bought a Walther P1

[sm]

lendsringer,
thanks for the info and sharing real world experience--I learned something. Since I don't know...what are the spec's on the P1 ?

 

[Schuey2002]

re1973,

Every post that Lendringser has written, I have learned a boat load of information..

 

[denfoote]

HOT-DAMN!!
The first brouhaha!!!!!!

My P1, a Bw issue dated Sept 1980 has the hex pin right where it should be, just like my P5!!! I have several hundred rounds through the gun with no problems to date!! There are no other markings on the gun that would indicate any other issue than the Bundeswehr.

 

[BHP9]

No German police agency has ever used or issued hand-me-down Army P1 pistols. The police of the German states has its own requisition system, and they had pistol trials long before the Army got rid of their P1 pistols. For a long time, the Laender police forces had better handguns than the military: they all switched to either the Walther P5, SIG P6 (P225), or the HK P7 PSP in the late 1970s. The Bundeswehr didn't start selling off their P1 pistols until they switched to the P8 (USP) in the mid-1990s. Why would the police give up their superior sidearms to acquire older and more worn Bundeswehr P1s?

You are getting your time frame mixed up and putting the cart before the horse. The Walther p5 ,Sig p6 and hkp7 all came after the the P1 pistol. I agree that the Germans did indeed us these pistols but it was after they decided to drop the P1.


I find your remarks condescending, by the way. You imply that I'd know better if I had enough experience collecting and shooting P1 pistols

Sorry if I appeared that way but I find it hard to believe that if you have the experiece you say you have you have never heard or seen this problem happen. Perhaps Alamo's explaination about the possibility of you only using standard ammo would accout for you never having this problem. Its a well known problem with them. As a matter of fact the design of the later model P4 pistol resulted in a closed top slide because of this very problem with the P38. And if you look at the P5's redesigned extractor it too came about because of the propensity of the P38 to loose its extractor if hot loads were used.

I suppose next you will say the the distinguished author and Gun Writer J.B. Wood does not know what he is talking about either.
Just about very bit of advice that I have ever gotten from good old J.B. turned out to be right on the money so if you choose to not believe anything about the top cover problem from my posts what is your response to J.B.Woods excellent book called "Trouble Shooting Your Handgun".?

I have not seen any books on handguns authored by yourself as of yet. If you do some day perhaps you could provide proof that this problem never existed. Which of course is impossible because I have seen it happen more than once in my own experiece and that of my collector and shooter friends.

I really did not want this to turn into a p38 bashing post. I have stated that the P38 is a good pistol if used with the ammo that it was intended to use and I have no intention of every selling my P38 and as a matter of fact I may in the future purchase yet another. But I do not believe that it is advisable not to educate people about the gun so they may avoid any problems and headaches with there weapons. Far better to err on the side of caution as opposed to pretending that the weapon is perfect in every way. No handgun is. They all have there quirks and being aware of them will enable the shooter to keep his gun running with a minmum of problems no matter what the design or caliber.

I find it somehow amazing that so many people choose to believe that every mechanical device that they buy is perfect in every way just because they happen to own it personally or they themselves never had a problem so they believe that no one else could ever have a problem either. I personally take no offense when people write posts in the interest of helping others out and if they have had a problem or discoverd a quirk the reader can take or leave the information or simply recall it in the future if the same problem would occur to them. He then with this knowledge can often take action to correct the problem quickly because he has retained the education he received and thought that perhaps he would never need with his particular weapon. If nothing happens like this to his weapon on the other hand nothing is lost. Pun intended.

 

[Tamara]

You are getting your time frame mixed up and putting the cart before the horse.

Re-read his post. He said "No German police agency has ever used or issued hand-me-down Army P1 pistols." The police agencies of the various laender started issuing the P5/6/7 in the 1970s. The Bundeswehr stopped issuing P1s in the late 1990s. Perhaps you could tell us which German state got these alleged "hand-me-downs"?

I have not seen any books on handguns authored by yourself as of yet. If you do some day perhaps you could provide proof that this problem never existed. Which of course is impossible because I have seen it happen more than once in my own experiece and that of my collector and shooter friends.

I've seen books about bigfoot, too, but that don't make it so.

I find it somehow amazing that so many people choose to believe that every mechanical device that they buy is perfect in every way just because they happen to own it personally or they themselves never had a problem so they believe that no one else could ever have a problem either.

I find it Wild that somebody would go to the opposite extreme. Nobody here said the P1 was perfect, but you are taking freakishly rare occurrences and painting them out to be some wide ranging defect or problem that's happened to you, all your buddies, or the entire Romanian army.

 

[BHP9]

I respectfully ask you a question Tamara. What is your response to to the info that J.B. Wood has published in regards to this problem?

 

[BHP9]

Re-read his post. He said "No German police agency has ever used or issued hand-me-down Army P1 pistols." The police agencies of the various laender started issuing the P5/6/7 in the 1970s. The Bundeswehr stopped issuing P1s in the late 1990s. Perhaps you could tell us which German state got these alleged "hand-me-downs

I have never pretened to be an expert on this part of the p38 history and it is rather irrelevent to the debate anyway. I did not publish the info, the gun rags did. So If you wish to learn more or debate the issue I would suggest you take it up with them.

AS Alamo's post's stated they may have been issued in name only just to get them into the country. His post makes a lot of sense to me. And if true would still jive with what I read in the gun rags. Once again I am just relating to you what I read. I don't understand why you are attacking me just for relating to you what I read.

 

[Marko Kloos]

I agree that the Germans did indeed us these pistols but it was after they decided to drop the P1.

I am telling you again that the German police forces never issued the P1, ever...whether new or hand-me-down. Here's a breakdown of all German service pistols ever used, since the founding of West Germany in 1949:

P1: Walther P1 (P38 with alloy frame), German Bundeswehr (until 1996)
P2: SIG P210, German Federal Border Guards
P3: Astra 400, selected State police forces
P4: Walther P4 (P38 with short barrel and decocker), BKA (Federal Police)
P5: Walther P5, selected State police forces (lower Saxony)
P6: SIG P225, selected State police forces (North-Rhine Westphalia, Hesse)
P7: HK P7 PSP, Bavarian and Baden-Wuerttembergian State police
P8: HK USP, Bundeswehr only (since 1996)
P9: Walther P99, selected State police forces (Schleswig-Holstein)
P10: HK USP Compact, selected State police forces (Thuringia, Saxony)

Once again I am just relating to you what I read.

And I am relating to you real-life experience of a boatload of people. Which do you think has more value when assessing the gun in question: anecdotes and gun rag snippets, or trigger time?

I don't understand why you are attacking me just for relating to you what I read.

I dislike the fact that you constantly piddle into the cornflakes of other gun owners. You never fail to tear down other people's choices, unless they're steel-framed pistols, or M1As. You also spread a lot of wrong information in the process that is misleading at best, dangerous at worst.

I could probably make a P1 break by shooting nothing but +P+ loads through it for a year, but that's not the ammo for which the gun was designed. Claiming that the P1 is somehow deficient because it may break with hot ammo is like complaining that your Model 12 Airweight blew its topstrap because you shot a few hundred rounds of .38 Special +P+ through it. Well, duh.

 

[Marko Kloos]

Since I don't know...what are the spec's on the P1?

The P1 is basically a P38 with an alloy frame. (The Walther P38 has a steel frame.) It's an eight-shot 9mm pistol, single-stack magazine, manual safety/decocker on the slide. The P38 was the main German Army service handgun in World War II, and the P1 was the West German Bundeswehr service handgun from 1952 to 1996.

 

[Betty]

:banghead:

 

[jimmy]

On the topic of Walther P1's, I wonder if somebody could clear up some nomenclature for me.

I have an alloy-framed "P38" marked P38 and 02/1963 on the slide. I have another alloy-framed "P38" marked P1 and 11/1963 on the slide. Except for the markings, the guns appear identical.

Did the nomenclature "P1" exist before 1963? Is a pre-1963 gun marked P38 really a P1 with an old name? Or is a post-1963 gun marked P1 really a P38 with a new name?

If these questions sound a bit dumb, it's because I'm a bit confused.

TIA.

 

[Gewehr98]

I'll go with Lendsringer's info on this one.

Having been TDY to Deutschland too many times to count since 1986. Learned a lot about German service weapons.

I still want a Walther-made P-38 to go with my DWM P-08 someday.

Just glad I could help Lendsringer out on the differences between the straight-pull Steyr-Mannlicher Model 95, and the turnbolt Steyr-Mannlicher Model 95.

 

[Tamara]

Gewehr98,

Just glad I could help Lendsringer out on the differences between the straight-pull Steyr-Mannlicher Model 95, and the turnbolt Steyr-Mannlicher Model 95.

Heh. You should have said "Silly lendringser! The straight pull is the one you tote about in your trunk."

 

[sm]

lendsringer

Thanks for the spec's, and again for sharing REAL WORLD experience.

Schuey2002: yeah I know, bunch of folks like that around here.
I'd like to sit in the corner and watch Tamara, lendsringer...others take these things apart and get the lessons first hand.

 

[buttrap]

Well the geman police never did issue a P-1 gun, P-1 is the army version of the P-38. If its a police gun it will say P-38 on it and no they do not toss slide covers all over the place too. If its Police it says P-38 army it says P-1. Some of the older P-1s are marked P-38 or P-38/P-1 though

 

[alamo]

Well, this thread got me motivated to finally get one. I've been looking them over for awhile. A friend is an FFL (no transfer fee) and I took a certified check to him on Friday. Going to get it from SOG, says they are in "like new" condition (It says "Very Good" over the picture of it but if you read the caption, the $199 ones are "like new" and the $179 ones are "Very Good". I called first to make sure they still had them & they do. Fella at SOG said it would be $199 plus $18.50 shipping.

My FFL friend said they usually quote lower prices for dealers & sure enough they told him it would be $184 plus $14.00 shipping. It was definitely the "like new" and not the "very good". Guess they advertise one price for the general public but sell to dealers at another. Of course they only sell to dealers. Since it was less than I thought, I did the extra $10 for the handpicked although I've heard this is hit or miss.

http://www.southernohiogun.com/surplus_hand.html

I own a couple of Makarovs and those got me interesting in inexpensive surplus pistols. I recently researched the Luger my grandfather brought back from WWII on a couple of Luger forums & that got me thinking about these too.

Guy at SOG said that they really don't know anything about mfg. dates so they couldn't guarantee I'd get one with the reinforcing bar. Not a problem, I don't plan to shoot this a lot and will only do so with standard pressure ammo. Maybe it will have it, we'll see.

Are these OK to dry fire? Haven't anything about that. Any other tips for a newbie to P-1s?

 

[buttrap]

Alamo yes you can dry fire a P-1 gun. A P-1 is just a Walter P-38 sold under the german army contracts, a very costly nice gun in the army finish and not the gloss blue is all. The post war P-38 is a much better gun to shoot just like the post war 1911 guns are much better to hit targets with too.

 

[alamo]

Thanks. I've got some snap caps but that's nice to know. Will save those for other pistols.

 

[namasaya]

p-38

I have recently purchased two p-38s to plink with. Of interest, I had the front sight fly off on me also.(I never found it.) They handle ball ammo fine but I believe they were not designed to use hollow points. They also both shoot low and to the left from a bench rest. They are alot of fun and for the money about the best 9 mm plinkers you can buy.

 

[cptmonroe]

Do know that there was a James Bond movie entitled "Never Say Never Again"?

Marko Kloos - I am telling you again that the German police forces never issued the P1, ever...

What about the issue of the Walther manufactured, but Manurhin marked, P1 to the West Berlin Polizei?

I have also seen an Bundesinnenministerium marked Walther P1 up for sale, in Germany.

By the way, Sean Connery carries a Walther P5 in the above mentioned film!

 

[alamo]

I have recently purchased two p-38s to plink with. Of interest, I had the front sight fly off on me also.(I never found it.) They handle ball ammo fine but I believe they were not designed to use hollow points. They also both shoot low and to the left from a bench rest. They are alot of fun and for the money about the best 9 mm plinkers you can buy.

Please don't reply to 4 & 1/2 year old thread unless you have some important follow-up information that was relevant to the original thread. That was your first posting so I'm sure you didn't know any better.