Fell in love with the thing the minute I wrapped my hands around it Friday evening. Picked it up Saturday, and took it to the range Sunday and Monday evenings. Put 150 rounds of Win white box 115gr 9mm through each time.
General Impressions:
I have small-ish hands and the polymer frame fit perfectly. Slide stop was easy to reach without shifting my firing grip. Mag release was reachable but practicality seemed to push you to change your grip a bit to get good purchase on the button and clear the way to the mag well for a mag change. Pistol seemed to slide in the vertical in my grip for the first few rounds. A bit more pressure with the fingers of my strong hand on the front of the grip (a la what works for me with my G19) combined with a more aggressive stance seemed to ameliorate this tendency. My tendency to choke all the way up and shoot relatively high thumbs has gotten me in trouble in the past (i.e. my P7M8 gives the web of my hand some nice slices if I'm not careful). Not a problem here. A highly controllable and comfortable grip left my hand well clear of the line of travel of the slide. Pointing was natural. The Tritium sights were easy to acquire and fast to come back on target - very good sights.
The trigger . . . (deep breath) . . . Ooooh that trigger. Let me make one thing clear up front. I don't like double action triggers. I don't own any DA/SA or DAO pistols. This Kahr may change my opinion completely. The more I thing about it, I think I bought this gun for the trigger. The curve and width of the trigger itself are very pleasing. The pull is supposed to be @ 7 lbs. I'm not sure. All I know is that I press naturally rearward, note a minor change in resistance, continue smoothly rearward and the thing goes bang. Beautiful. The reset distance of the trigger is longer than my Glocks (or my P7 for that matter) and this caused me a couple stutters in some double tapping latter in my Monday evening secession. More a matter of learning the gun than anything else.
Gun functioned without a failure or stoppage of any kind. All it was fed was FMJ so the jury's still out on defensive loads. I'll probably stock it with 124gr hydro-shoks for carry and those tend to be pretty reliable feeders. We'll see.
Accuracy was impressive out of that short barrel. I didn't work beyond about 20 feet since my interest in the P9 is as a concealable carry gun. I happened to bring along a Browning Hi Power on this range trip. It's not really an equal comparison but, at the ranges I was shooting, the Kahr could do basically what the BHP did. Not bad at all. I wasn't measuring groups since I was really just trying to get to know the gun but we were making one ragged hole. Good enough.
Drawbacks were few. Despite the positive ergonomics, this is a small light pistol. By the end of the Monday evening secession, the web of my hand was feeling each shot. It beats up the hand significantly more than my other 9mms but then again this is only a 9mm. The magazines don't seem to be able to make up their minds as to whether they are drop free or not. Sometimes they dropped cleanly. Sometimes they dropped half way. And sometimes they released but stayed in the gun. Loaded, unloaded, half loaded, pistol at slide lock, pistol in battery, pistol with empty chamber - couldn't find a consistent pattern.
Otherwise, there was nothing yet to stem my rising attachment to this little pistol. Feel very strongly that it is worth what I paid. I'd be very interested in hearing from others regarding holster choices, ammunition choices, and cleaning/lubrication.
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Best,
- Jawper
General Impressions:
I have small-ish hands and the polymer frame fit perfectly. Slide stop was easy to reach without shifting my firing grip. Mag release was reachable but practicality seemed to push you to change your grip a bit to get good purchase on the button and clear the way to the mag well for a mag change. Pistol seemed to slide in the vertical in my grip for the first few rounds. A bit more pressure with the fingers of my strong hand on the front of the grip (a la what works for me with my G19) combined with a more aggressive stance seemed to ameliorate this tendency. My tendency to choke all the way up and shoot relatively high thumbs has gotten me in trouble in the past (i.e. my P7M8 gives the web of my hand some nice slices if I'm not careful). Not a problem here. A highly controllable and comfortable grip left my hand well clear of the line of travel of the slide. Pointing was natural. The Tritium sights were easy to acquire and fast to come back on target - very good sights.
The trigger . . . (deep breath) . . . Ooooh that trigger. Let me make one thing clear up front. I don't like double action triggers. I don't own any DA/SA or DAO pistols. This Kahr may change my opinion completely. The more I thing about it, I think I bought this gun for the trigger. The curve and width of the trigger itself are very pleasing. The pull is supposed to be @ 7 lbs. I'm not sure. All I know is that I press naturally rearward, note a minor change in resistance, continue smoothly rearward and the thing goes bang. Beautiful. The reset distance of the trigger is longer than my Glocks (or my P7 for that matter) and this caused me a couple stutters in some double tapping latter in my Monday evening secession. More a matter of learning the gun than anything else.
Gun functioned without a failure or stoppage of any kind. All it was fed was FMJ so the jury's still out on defensive loads. I'll probably stock it with 124gr hydro-shoks for carry and those tend to be pretty reliable feeders. We'll see.
Accuracy was impressive out of that short barrel. I didn't work beyond about 20 feet since my interest in the P9 is as a concealable carry gun. I happened to bring along a Browning Hi Power on this range trip. It's not really an equal comparison but, at the ranges I was shooting, the Kahr could do basically what the BHP did. Not bad at all. I wasn't measuring groups since I was really just trying to get to know the gun but we were making one ragged hole. Good enough.
Drawbacks were few. Despite the positive ergonomics, this is a small light pistol. By the end of the Monday evening secession, the web of my hand was feeling each shot. It beats up the hand significantly more than my other 9mms but then again this is only a 9mm. The magazines don't seem to be able to make up their minds as to whether they are drop free or not. Sometimes they dropped cleanly. Sometimes they dropped half way. And sometimes they released but stayed in the gun. Loaded, unloaded, half loaded, pistol at slide lock, pistol in battery, pistol with empty chamber - couldn't find a consistent pattern.
Otherwise, there was nothing yet to stem my rising attachment to this little pistol. Feel very strongly that it is worth what I paid. I'd be very interested in hearing from others regarding holster choices, ammunition choices, and cleaning/lubrication.
------------------
Best,
- Jawper