Finally, a Beretta I like!

[Citizen Carrier]

Due to favorable leave time I was able to compete in all of the pistol events at the Camp Perry National Matches. The highlight for me (because my shooting was lackluster...) was taking delivery of a national match M9 pistol built by Dr. Nick Abrashamian of Mountain Competition Pistols.

I placed the order about a month and a half ago along with a shooting buddy of mine. When I found out I would have the leave available to go to Perry, I immediately set about finding a suitable "service pistol" to use in the National Trophy and President's Matches.

We were going to go with standard M1911 "hardball" guns, buy my friend suggested we try to go more futuristic and he knew of Dr. Nick. As you can see, he was able to deliver an outstanding pistol on extremely short notice. I phoned Dr. Nick (as he is called) from Kuwait and he said he could bring it in on time.

I didn't know that since I am U.S. Army he would use a limited edition "U.S. Army" model Beretta as the platform. This was a pleasant suprise and a nice touch.

The heart of the pistol is the stainless steel match grade KKM barrel. These are tested in a barrel vise and must be able to put 10 shots into 1 inch or less at 50 yards according to his website. In the picture above you can see the tungsten sleeve (he previously used a stainless sleeve) added to the threaded barrel to increase weight and improve balance. It is held on with the strongest grade of Loctite. Also visible is the high profile LPA front sight blade. The rear sight is an LPA adjustable unit which necessitates the higher front sight.

The trigger is a wider target type with an overtravel screw. I've left the tape on the trigger guard from the CMP armorer's trailer. It certifies the trigger is at least 4 pounds heavy in single action. Dr. Nick told me the gun will lift a 4 pound weight, but not a 4.5 pound weight.

Dr. Nick's method of tightening slide to frame fit. This is very similar to the Krieger rails advertised in gun magazines. The other civilian pistolsmith making match M9s and the Army Marksmanship Unit utilize steel plates in some fashion to accomplish this. Nick's rails are easily replaced for a few bucks when the slide to frame fit eventually loosens. There is no vertical or horizontal play in the slide to frame fit.

This is a recoil reduction system from Springco. Nice touch.

Unfortunately, I didn't get the pistol in time to go to the function range at Perry and sight in the pistol before the President's and National Trophy matches. My shooting wasn't all that terrific anyway. I was pulling most of my shots off the black around the 7 o'clock position. I need to work on my trigger control. I'll try to get in a range session and post the results soon.

 

[mr kablammo]

Almost two weeks, update?

 

[Citizen Carrier]

Geez! Okay already!

Wasn't aware there were people waiting with baited breath.

Here's what I posted over on Brian Zins' website forums. Not as detailed as I wanted to do, as you'll read.

http://www.brianzins.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=208

[If you view that thread, you'll see that another poster was there when I took possession of mine and that he used his Dr. Nick M9 to place in the President's 100 and get a silver in the NTI.]

I did manage to get in about 45 minutes of indoor range time with the pistol two days before my leave was up (back in Kuwait right now) at Lauhorner's in Springfrield, OH.

My typical "range report" format involves painstakingly meticulous shot groups fired from an NTN pistol rest, with those groups being photographed and measured with dial calipers. I just didn't have time for that this time as the range was going to close and I was shooting with my buddy I am not going to see again until late December.

Function.

I wrangled out any function issues during the slow fire stage of the President's match, which was the first time I fired the pistol at all. The pistol comes liberally coated with a reddish-pink grease Dr. Nick says he formulated himself. A goodly sized jar of the stuff comes with the pistol as well.

The pistol jammed on every shot of slow fire. Either failure to feed or failure to extract/eject (hard to tell which). I saw myself having to leave the firing line after slow fire and was mightily disappointed. Indeed, after 10 times of having to clear a jam or eject the magazine and then clear the jam and becoming pretty flustered, I had somehow managed to put 13 holes in the target! But after scoring slow fire I came back to the firing line and the pistol fired timed and rapid and the entire NTI without a hitch. Just needed 13 rounds of "shooting in".

My friend down on the water logged Range 3 only had two such jams during slow fire before his gun proceeded to work just fine.

Accuracy.

Wish I could be more precise about this and show pictures of group sizes. Lauhorner's didn't have regulation 25 yard targets, so I had to use some orange thing that approximated the black at 25 yards. A few sight adjustments and it was keeping everything in the "black" at 25 yards. My friend's gun was similar, if not a bit better, in accuracy. His rear sight bottomed out with his shot groups in the upper top part of the X and 10 ring area (actually, half in the 10, half in the X at 12, o'clock).

We figured that a regulation NRA target has a slightly bigger "black" area for a six o'clock hold and this would result in shots perfectly centered on the X.

I like the LPA sights on mine. I have essentially the same LPA sights on my Glock 24C for GSSF matches mated with an Ameriglo narrow, plain black front sight and it works just fine for me too.

Seems like the Bomar front and rear sights on my Colt Special Combat Government model might offer a slightly sharper sight picture, but the LPAs are quite good.