What kind of High Power is this?

S

Skorzeny

New member
I have one of AIM's surplus Israeli (Belgian-made) FN High Powers.

I believe that AIM advertised it as having the Mark III frame. However, it has the old style, small safety (non-ambidexterous) as well as smaller sights than the ones found on the Mark III (but bigger than the WWII mil-spec sights). It appears to have a firing pin lock like the Mark IIIS.

Can someone identify what kind of High Power this is? These were sold to the Israeli security services by FN of Belgium around the mid-1980s. I would appreciate any info or help.

Skorzeny

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For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the supreme excellence. Sun Tzu
 
Skorzeny,

It sounds like you have a Mark III, the Mark II was out only a limited time and is quite rare and the Mark I lacks the passive firing pin safety. I maybe very wrong but I don't think Israel bought any FN HPs after the early 1970s when Browning modified the safety setup. By the 1980s Israel was alerady working on the IMI/Tanfoglio Jericho which replaced the HPs.

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So many pistols, so little money.

[This message has been edited by Tecolote (edited January 04, 2000).]
 
Hey, Skorzeny. Does your HP have an integral rib down the top of the slide and is the front sight part of it? The MkII sights are definitely smaller than the MKIII, but infinitely better and slightly larger than the older HP fixed sights. If so, it is a MKII.
My MkII had no firing pin lock, but later ones did as I saw and shot a couple of them.
My MKII had the MKIII type ambidextrous safeties, but it is possible that the batch sent to Israel did not as they normally do NOT carry in Condition One. Again,I know nothing of the "AIM" guns, but it is possible that this is a variant of the MkII. Best.
 
Mr. Camp:

I cannot tell for sure because I do not have the High Power with me right this moment, but I do believe that mine has the integral rib on the top of the slide.

Does that make this a Mark II? Maybe as AIM claims, it does have a Mark III frame with an old safety plus Mark II slide. Hmmm. Still can't figure out.

Skorzeny

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For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the supreme excellence. Sun Tzu
 
Skorz, it sure appears that you have a MkII.
The "rib," narrow and full-length on top of the slide with the smallish sights tells the tale. By the way, one of these that I shot grouped like their discontinued target GP. Best.
 
Skorzeny-also got one of AIM's Hps. It has the dovetailed sights (front and rear) and no rib down top of slide and does not have the rippled mag well. Only has small safety on left side. Someone had posted a site where you could look up year of manufacture, although can't remember off hand. This one was made in 1992 and has all matching numbers. Dealer where it was transferred through also got one and it had the smaller sights on it and appeared to be well used. It can be difficult to tell specific model of special ordered guns, as the purchaser may have had specefic request on features.
 
Quadcab-thanks, now that i have learned to save bookmarks on computer (yea am a little slow) have saved this one.
 
Well, after perusing the High Power Unofficial website, I found out that my AIM High Power with the serial number, which starts with "245PP," was a civilian model made in the last year of Mark II production (1988).

Since according to Gene Gangarossa, Mark III production began in January 1989 (according to the Unoffical website, 1988), it is conceivable that this particular BHP is a "converted" BHP Mark III (i.e. a Mark II slide married to a Mark III frame), which was further modified per request of the Israelis (replacing the extended ambi safety with the mil-spec left-side only safety).

The last part is a conjecture, but I believe Mr. Stephen Camp supports this notion as the Israelis do not keep their guns in condition one and thus do not need an oversized safety to get in the way of concealment/operation.

Skorzeny

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For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the supreme excellence. Sun Tzu
 
My AIM Hi-Power was from their first batch. I bought it in July and am very pleased with it. Using the information from the Unofficial Hi-Power Homepage I determined that mine is a Commercial(sport) model mfg. in 1989. Ser.# 245 PNxxxxx. Bought some Pro-Mag 13 round mags...don't like em! Bought a Mec-Gar 10 rounder from BROWNELLS...like it alot! Quadcab
 
I, for one, cannot say that I am happy with the High Power from AIM.

I finally had a chance to shoot it last weekend and the "hook" portion of the darned extractor broke off (rather cleanly)!

This happened when I was shooting Federal 115 grain JHP (9BP) cartridges. Now I am going to have to order an extractor from Brownell's ($25 or so) and then have a local gunsmith install it!

This gun isn't turning out to be so inexpensive (have to replace the safety too, as it won't disengage if I tried to pull the trigger with the safety on previously).

Maybe I am just really unlucky.

Skorzeny

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For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the supreme excellence. Sun Tzu
 
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