Why are HK P7s $1k+???

Gents,

The chief reason P7's are so expensive is the exchange rate between German and U.S. currency. The same thing happened to Porsche prices during the eighties. When the Porsche 944 was introduced in 83' (I believe as an 84 model) it cost somewhere in the mid 20s. By the time it was discontinued (as the 968) the car cost in the high 40s to low 50s. Although there were improvements and inflation, the chief problem was the exchange rate. This does not, however, excuse H&K completely--the rate has fluctuated up and down and I have not seen a single price cut. I think that this has more to do with H&Ks decision to focus on its cheaper, more conventional, USP line-up. H&K has given up on the P7 and market it (if you can call it marketing) as a boutique item more than anything else. All of this is too bad because, I believe, that the P7 represents the pinnacle of modern handgun design. If H&K could make the P7 out of a quality stainless steel it would be perfect.

GHB
 
Reading through this thread, it seems like many posters dismiss the P7 because it has a "crude" blowback action. I think it's absolutely ridiculous to view recoil operated pistols as more refined in design. After all, how many recoil operated rifles have any of you seen? I think the Johnson is the last one produced, as well as several machineguns.

The floating barrel recoil operated pistol was the first successful design for the use of high pressure rounds with guns like the Mauser, Borchardt and Luger and early Colts. Straight blowback is problematic and no one bothered with a rifle type gas system. So when you shoot your very "modern" USP or Glock, your shooting a system worked out by Browning and others over 100 years ago.

On the other hand, DELAYED blowback is a system not figured out until some of the German design geniuses of the 1940's got down to it. It works very well in the HK rifles and machine guns, P7, P9S, French Famas rifle and the Steyr GB. All of those guns are known for accuracy and reliability. Certainly, if those designs had been as widely accepted as older designs they would have been developed into even higher levels of perfection.

As to lock up and repeatable accuracy, a USP may lock up very tightly, but the barrel still had to move in two different planes to get there, making it more difficult to find the same spot in relation to the slide everytime.

The P7 doesn't have a particularly tight slide to frame fit, but it doesn't need to; that extra clearance allows the slide to settle in to the same sweet spot without any interference (unlike those with camming barrels) and hold a very repeatable point of aim. That near 210 accuracy comes without any hand fitting. Best of all, the number of parts actually moving during cycling is half that of a recoil gun. Extractors are redundant and failure to extract jams impossible.

You'll never fully appreciate a P7M8 until you shoot it in a combat match; the controls, accuracy and low mounted barrel deliver super fast aimed fire from the draw. A glock is just as fast into the first shot, but can't be refired or reloaded as quickly. And nothing is safer than a P7.

The P7 is the most modern design in handguns that solves many classic "problems" with the majority of conventional designs. That's worth alot.
 
Greg Bell:

I have both a HK P7M8 and a Porsche 944 Turbo. Both were worth the money. For me personally, there is no substitute for German engineering, regardless of the exchange rate.
 
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