Fred Fuller
Moderator Emeritus
A while back my wife expressed the idea that a pocketable pistol might be nice to have. Shortly thereafter I ran across a new P3AT at my usual dealer's establishment, and staked a claim to it. This is the first Kel-Tec in the family.
While waiting for the purchase permit to come through (that's a NC thing) we sent the barrel, slide etc. back for hard chroming, and they were returned promptly for the usual $20 fee. When we picked up the little pistol my wife was pleased at its small size and light weight given its respectable caliber. There had been an article on the P3AT in a recent issue of her friend Peggy Tartaro's _Women and Guns_ magazine and she had read it, so there were no real surprises.
She had some difficulty racking the slide, as expected, but the 'push- pull' method worked for her. I lubricated it well with Militech and cycled the slide a hundred times or so to work it in a bit. That helped some. I also went after some of the mold flashing on the frame with a nail file, rounded off the toe of the trigger a bit and cleaned up the grooves on the trigger as well. Then we hied ourselves off to the back yard (we live on 5 acres well out in the country and have a small berm for informal shooting).
I had gotten a couple of boxes of ammo at wallyworld, one box of 100 rounds of Winchester 'white box' 95 gr. flat point FMJs and two boxes of 50 rounds of 95 gr. BEB (brass enclosed base) to start breaking the pistol in with. She fired 25 rounds (5 magazines of 5 rounds each) on her first outing with the little gun and pronounced herself satisfied. There we stopped for the day. There were no problems of any kind with the gun, ejection was markedly brisk and examination of fired cases showed strong firing pin strikes. She noted that the felt recoil was manageable but was getting painful on sustained firing, and that recoil seemed worse with the FMJ loads. She preferred the BEB load, and since the gun has run well with it so far we will keep using it for the break-in period. I brought the little beast inside and gave it a good cleaning, then stashed it back in its rug.
I had also ordered a couple of pocket holsters for it (you listening, Azrael??) and as soon as the holsters arrive and the gun has fired 200 rounds trouble free, she will commence carrying it at home.
She has never carried a .380 before, her only previous hideout gun is her satin nickel baby Browning. She is a well trained and experienced shooter and her primary pistol is a Glock, so transitioning to the little K-T will not be much of a problem for her.
I like the little gun as well. It is IMO not a gun for rank beginners, because the admin stuff is difficult given the small size of the piece and the burly springs inside. But for her purposes it will be sufficient to load a magazine full with six rounds, cycle the slide to chamber a round and then leave the gun alone until periodic maintenance is necessary.
Now I have to start looking for mine...
lpl/nc
While waiting for the purchase permit to come through (that's a NC thing) we sent the barrel, slide etc. back for hard chroming, and they were returned promptly for the usual $20 fee. When we picked up the little pistol my wife was pleased at its small size and light weight given its respectable caliber. There had been an article on the P3AT in a recent issue of her friend Peggy Tartaro's _Women and Guns_ magazine and she had read it, so there were no real surprises.
She had some difficulty racking the slide, as expected, but the 'push- pull' method worked for her. I lubricated it well with Militech and cycled the slide a hundred times or so to work it in a bit. That helped some. I also went after some of the mold flashing on the frame with a nail file, rounded off the toe of the trigger a bit and cleaned up the grooves on the trigger as well. Then we hied ourselves off to the back yard (we live on 5 acres well out in the country and have a small berm for informal shooting).
I had gotten a couple of boxes of ammo at wallyworld, one box of 100 rounds of Winchester 'white box' 95 gr. flat point FMJs and two boxes of 50 rounds of 95 gr. BEB (brass enclosed base) to start breaking the pistol in with. She fired 25 rounds (5 magazines of 5 rounds each) on her first outing with the little gun and pronounced herself satisfied. There we stopped for the day. There were no problems of any kind with the gun, ejection was markedly brisk and examination of fired cases showed strong firing pin strikes. She noted that the felt recoil was manageable but was getting painful on sustained firing, and that recoil seemed worse with the FMJ loads. She preferred the BEB load, and since the gun has run well with it so far we will keep using it for the break-in period. I brought the little beast inside and gave it a good cleaning, then stashed it back in its rug.
I had also ordered a couple of pocket holsters for it (you listening, Azrael??) and as soon as the holsters arrive and the gun has fired 200 rounds trouble free, she will commence carrying it at home.
She has never carried a .380 before, her only previous hideout gun is her satin nickel baby Browning. She is a well trained and experienced shooter and her primary pistol is a Glock, so transitioning to the little K-T will not be much of a problem for her.
I like the little gun as well. It is IMO not a gun for rank beginners, because the admin stuff is difficult given the small size of the piece and the burly springs inside. But for her purposes it will be sufficient to load a magazine full with six rounds, cycle the slide to chamber a round and then leave the gun alone until periodic maintenance is necessary.
Now I have to start looking for mine...
lpl/nc
