Why didn't modernized Hi Powers ever catch on?

My bad on the Mark 1 Ruger. Sometimes when I write quickly I can get the secondary details wrong. That's what happens when one nit picks on a minor point.

Canada still uses the Hi-Power. The UK began to replace it as a service sidearm about 2-3 years ago for the Glock.

http://www.guns.com/2017/01/13/canada-to-replace-1940s-browning-hi-powers-with-new-pistol/

I think my self and others adequately explained why the BHP while popular in the U.S. was never quite as popular as other designs. Walt S summarized these well a few posts back. It was not the trigger that held it back.

Charles Daly, the firearms importer, found that they were losing money on their version of the gun, not because they were not selling or because there was no market for them but because of the cost of production of the guns vs. the return on the investment. They produced their fine version of the gun from about 2003-2006 or a year or so later. The guns were well received. The profit margin however was too low to sustain them and Daly itself was having trouble. These guns were selling for less than $400. in the mid 2000s.

Daly did not produce the gun itself. It was made from parts bought from FEG and assembled in the U.S. the first several hundred were built by Dan Wesson (before it became a part of CZ). But Wesson was in financial trouble and was bought by CZ in 2005 or so as I recall. Daly contracted with Magnum Research to do the guns. Daly had also been bought out by Michael Kassner of KBI international. About this time, 2010, the Hungarian firm FEG which had been having difficulties, declared bankruptcy.

Daly, in addition to it's extensive line of imported shotguns and rifles also imported Philippine made 1911's from Armscorp. It was a time of extensive transition in the arms industry. KBI and Daly closed their doors in 2010 or so.

For a number of years you could buy an FEG Hi-power, the Argentine version or the Daly versions for 1/2 the price, or lower of the FN gun. They sold well and still do on the used gun market.

tipoc
 
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When they make a left hand friendly model I will be the first in line to buy one. I picked an RIA 9mm 1911 over a Colt due to the fact that the Colt thumb safety was for right hand only. If the Colt would have had that simple Ambi safety I would now own a 9mm 1911 with a pony on it. If there was an FNH HiPower that has an ambi safety that I have not seen I would like to see it.
 
When they make a left hand friendly model I will be the first in line to buy one. I picked an RIA 9mm 1911 over a Colt due to the fact that the Colt thumb safety was for right hand only. If the Colt would have had that simple Ambi safety I would now own a 9mm 1911 with a pony on it. If there was an FNH HiPower that has an ambi safety that I have not seen I would like to see it.
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Most MKIIIs come with ambi safeties. :confused:

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Charles Daly, the firearms importer, found that they were losing money on their version of the gun, not because they were not selling or because there was no market for them but because of the cost of production of the guns vs. the return on the investment. They produced their fine version of the gun from about 2003-2006 or a year or so later. The guns were well received. The profit margin however was too low to sustain them and Daly itself was having trouble. These guns were selling for less than $400. in the mid 2000s.
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They sold that low because no one bought them at any where near MSRP. Around the same time you could get FN rollmarked Hi Powers from CDNN for $500. NIB SA or SFS were available. They were the sell off of the last FN rollmarked Hi Power brought into the US.

The Charles Daly was nothing but a FEG clone with different sights, safety and grips. It was not an improvement on what FN was offering it was just cheaper. For many the sights were a huge turnoff.
 
Been standard on them for a number of years now, over a decade I think.

http://www.browning.com/products/fir...r-pistols.html

tipoc
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Ambi safeties were introduced with the MKII pistols. I mistakenly stated with the MKIII pistols but am correcting that. The majority of MKII pistols left the factory with them. There were some MKIIs which left the factory with the older smaller thumb safety.

FNs transition dates were never hard dates. There were always transition franken pistols. FN never throws away parts they just keep using them. You see a lot of what is referred to as MKII 1/2s in the world of military contract FN Hi Powers. These are MKII guns with MKIII features.
 
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Why did S&W cease production of their entire line of semis except for the 1911s and what the custom shop does?

It had nothing to do with their triggers. Or with any other "weaknesses" of the older designs.

It had to do with a revolution that began with the AR (most handgun things begin with long guns) and came to fruition with Glock. It was the use of new materials and production techniques that led to increasing the rate of return for the manufacturers. For a smaller cost of investment they received a greater profit. The cost of maintenance and spare parts dropped dramatically. This revolutionized the industry.

So S&W dropped a whole line of pistols that had been in the holsters of law enforcement across the U.S. It dumped them. It banked it's future on the line of M&Ps and ARs.

Outside of being a single action pistol (which mostly excluded it from being a leo gun in the 1980s and 90s) the place of the BHP has nothing to do with the particular mechanical features of the gun and more to do with the story of handguns in the U.S. Of it's history.

What was the MSRP of a BHP in 1979? Here's a page from "The Shooter's Bible" of 1979.



Get an engraved one?



What about an H&K?



Now look at the price of the S&W M39



A Colt pistol





What gun will a working man buy? Tariffs raised the cost of imported firearms and with the exception of Spanish piece, Star, Llama, and some others made quality guns more expensive than their U.S. made counterparts during those years.

tipoc
 
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Ambi safeties were introduced with the MKIII pistols. There are also some later MKII pistols with them. FNs transition dates were never hard dates. There were always transition franken pistols. FN never throws away parts they just keep using them. You see a lot of what is referred to as MKII 1/2s in the world of military contract FN Hi Powers. These are MKII guns with MKIII features.
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Agree. They are like Colt in that regard.

tipoc
 
It had nothing to do with their triggers. Or with any other "weaknesses" of the older designs.

It had to do with a revolution that began with the AR (most handgun things begin with long guns) and came to fruition with Glock. It was the use of new materials and production techniques that led to increasing the rate of return for the manufacturers. For a smaller cost of investment they received a greater profit. The cost of maintenance and spare parts dropped dramatically. This revolutionized the industry.

So S&W dropped a whole line of pistols that had been in the holsters of law enforcement across the U.S. It dumped them. It banked it's future on the line of M&Ps and ARs.

Outside of being a single action pistol (which mostly excluded it from being a leo gun in the 1980s and 90s) the place of the BHP has nothing to do with the particular mechanical features of the gun and more to do with the story of handguns in the U.S. Of it's history.

What was the MSRP of a BHP in 1979? Here's a page from "The Shooter's Bible" of 1979.
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You and I will have to agree to disagree. I am a huge BHP fan but the trigger is avg at best. It can be improved but it will cost you. The design is overly complicated IMHO.

The 9mm caliber was also not popular and to this day is looked upon by many as a European caliber. US shooters love the 45 ACP. In the end nostalgia had a lot to do with the 1911s continued success. People still love to shoot the gun their grandfather, father, brother etc.... shot in the war.

The cost to produce metal framed hammer fired pistols is a "weakness" of their design. They are older designs using older manufacturing technique and materials. The 1911 production has been greatly automated vs what it was in 1911. The BHP never got that upgrade. It has had changes like from a forged frame to a cast one but it has never been moved over to CNC machines and MIM parts like the 1911.

S&W got out of the metal gun business because their bread and butter was taken by Glock. They could not continue to compete for the LEO market which the dominated up until the end of Gen 3 Smiths. They were the Glock of their day they basically owned the LEO market.

For FN that never happened with the BHP. The BHP in the US was always an after thought vs the govt and LEO sales in the rest of the world. They sell every BHP they produce which these days is not a lot.

Anyway I love the pistol I just know its short comings.
 
They sold that low because no one bought them at any where near MSRP. Around the same time you could get FN rollmarked Hi Powers from CDNN for $500. NIB SA or SFS were available. They were the sell off of the last FN rollmarked Hi Power brought into the US.

The Charles Daly was nothing but a FEG clone with different sights, safety and grips. It was not an improvement on what FN was offering it was just cheaper. For many the sights were a huge turnoff.
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I'm not sure what you're arguing here. Whether someone wanted the Novack fixed sights or the trigger work that Wesson did on the early guns is a matter of taste. It's a fact that the guns sold and sold at a lower price than Browning was selling theirs. The same is true of the actual FEGs regarding sales. That was the point of them. The guns sold. You could get a functioning BHP for less than a "real" one and upgrade it or use as is. They still sell today. The FM Argentine guns sell as used as well and for similar reasons.

That KBI or FEG didn't make a long term goal of it had nothing to do with no one wanting the guns. Bigger forces were at play in the marketplace. Glock, the game changer, being a major one.

tipoc
 
Ok you guys just mae my wife mad by showing an ambidextrous model. Now I will have to get one sometime soon. The thing is I have not seen one on a store shelf around here in years.
 
Ambi safeties were introduced with the MKIII pistols. There are also some later MKII pistols with them. FNs transition dates were never hard dates. There were always transition franken pistols. FN never throws away parts they just keep using them.
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That's not correct. The MkII was introduced to compete for the replacement pistol for the 1911. One of the requirements was an ambi safety. MkIIs were ambi safeties from the start. You do see Israeli surplus Mk II and MkIII imports that have had the ambi safety replaced with the old Hi-Power safety. I have no idea why that was done; but I don't believe that is a case of mix/match parts since the examples I've seen were dated only two or three years from the transition to MkIII features. That would be almost seven years after the MkII was introduced in 1982.
 
I just bought a new BHP last November.

One side is stamped "Made in Belgium" and "Assembled in Portugal". The other side is stamped "Browning Arms Company Morgan, Utah & Montreal P.Q.". It has fixed sights and an ambidextrous safety.

I looked at a CZ 75 several years ago and didn't like the feel of it, just didn't fit my hand well and the trigger reach was too long. When I picked up this BHP a few months ago it felt like it was made just for me. I have no idea what people are talking about w/r/t the trigger reset, the reset on mine is short and the trigger is very crisp. I paid considerably more than the $349 in the ad that was posted, but it's easily my favorite gun in my "arsenal".
 
First i should say that 1911's and HP's are two of my favorite pistols and i see no need to compare them in popularity. If there were 1911's available in any numbers for importation ( like the Argentine a few years back) they would quickly sell out. Just as so many are anxiously waiting for the last 1911's in army storage to be released for sale from CMP, at 10,000 per year i do not think they would last very long.
A few years back importation of thousands of Hi Powers began, at first there were some really desireable pistols available at prices far below retail for a new one. Sales have been brisk and a few short years later there are "bottom of the barrel" pistols left. Today most have been heavily blasted and parkerized as well as force matched via the electro pencil. Yet they are still selling.
There is a strong following for the HP in this country, nothing the 1911 must be concerned with but strong none the less. I cherish my Colt's from WWI and II but myHigh Powers span pre war to post war to WWII Inglis and then into the MkII and Mk III era. Tangent sight pistols are works of art and the ones marked Browning not FN have a blue that would outshine a Colt Python.
 
That's not correct. The MkII was introduced to compete for the replacement pistol for the 1911. One of the requirements was an ambi safety. MkIIs were ambi safeties from the start. You do see Israeli surplus Mk II and MkIII imports that have had the ambi safety replaced with the old Hi-Power safety. I have no idea why that was done; but I don't believe that is a case of mix/match parts since the examples I've seen were dated only two or three years from the transition to MkIII features. That would be almost seven years after the MkII was introduced in 1982.
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Yes misstated that. Ambis started with the MKII around 1982. You however are are wrong about FN selling guns with mismatched or tansitional parts. It is well documented. The Israeli guns you are referring to most likely had their safeties replaced in the field using parts that were available. Most of this guns were IDF guns and they were of various origin. Many were surplus before the IDF got them. You see a lot of strange configuration and in the field type armory fixes on those guns.

To my knowledge the MKII was simply a development in the pistol based on updating it and cutting cost which FN routinely did. I have never seen any documentation suggesting it was developed to replace the 1911. The BHP world wide was a much more successful contract pistol than the 1911. I would be interested in a citation for that claim. R Blake Stevens, Vanderlinden and Camp do not reference it.
 
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WVsig said:
In the 1911 world people like Kimber changed the game. They created a production gun with all the features of a Colt + custom work and sold it for a reasonable enough price that people choose it vs the Colt + smith route. They used economy of scale, MIM parts and modern production techniques to improve their production gun and the 1911 marketplace changed forever.

This has never happened with the BHP. People like FEG, Charles Daly & FM all tried to produce clones with limited success. None of them produced a clone which incorporated the updates people desired.
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This is exactly what I was getting at in the OP.

I have a basic WWII style 1911A1. I love it for what it is, but it is an obsolete gun if I needed a combat pistol, and that would be one of the last guns in my collection that I'd choose.

Where you can buy a 1911 from a number of manufacturers with very modern features that make it a much better combat gun. You can have it your way, right off the shelf. My Colt CCO is an example of this. It is still a relevant CCW or HD weapon. The original 1911A1 is not really, even if it could be used in an emergency.

The 1911s in mass production have evolved with the times (What frame size do you want? What kind of sights do you want? When was the last time hammer bite was a thing?). The BHP really has not, at least not in any mass production sense.
 
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Yes misstated that. Ambis started with the MKII around 1982. You however are are wrong about FN selling guns with mismatched or tansitional parts. It is well documented.
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Well, let me clarify then by saying the MkII was designed to have an ambi safety to meet the requirements for the Army's pistol selection. FN leveraged their knowledge from the British L9 program to make a number of other updates to the Hi-Power as well. My point being the production ambi safety predates the MkIII considerably and MkIIs lacking an ambi safety are uncommon in the U.S. (Or were until the flood of reworked Israeli guns).

The MkIII is basically the "lessons learned during U.S. pistol trials" update that occurred after FN lost out to Beretta. FN is generally pretty good about sliding new upgrades quietly into the mix. For example, post-2000 MkIIIs have a different slide stop than previous Hi-Powers; but the change is so subtle you have to compare them side by side to notice it.
 
The 1911s in mass production have evolved with the times (What frame size do you want? What kind of sights do you want? When was the last time hammer bite was a thing?). The BHP really has not, at least not in any mass production sense.
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That's true. The answer was provided earlier on in this thread. Basically FN never needed to or desired it. The BHP sold extremely well internationally. FN made the changes it felt it needed to over the decades to compete for military contracts and some commercial sales. There was also internationally and in the U.S. plenty of gunsmiths who would upgrade them as desired (still are). The BHP is a simpler gun than the 1911.

FN never had to produce many multiple versions of a gun that was selling (unless a part of a military contract called for it). FN has likely made more adaptations to the commercial market in it's rifles and shotguns over the decades than with the BHP. Now sales have been slumping for the BHP and FN has been producing polymer pieces to meet market demands.

It's a mistake I think to take an American-centric view of the international market for guns. For reasons discussed earlier the U.S. market for the BHP was just a piece, and not a real big piece, of FN's picture.

You can't compare it to the 1911 either. In the U.S. there is no other gun that compares to the 1911 market.

Springfield (not the federal armory the Co. that bought the name) began producing 1911 clones in 1985, so the Blue Book tells me. They sold OK. Over the next decade the market for the 1911 grew. Kimber began selling them in 1997 or thereabouts. Those first guns were masterpieces. Which compelled Springfield to step up. Nowdays Kimber is selling new guns like Nike sells tennis shoes-a new one each year and the old ones disappear. The competition in the 1911 market place became intense, due the falling rate of return.

tipoc
 
You can't compare it to the 1911 either. In the U.S. there is no other gun that compares to the 1911 market.
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That seems to be my logical mistake.

The 1911, (and more recently the AR15) has reached a wonderful critical mass where a lot of manufacturers are trying to squeeze into the market where there have been some exceptional leaders raising the bar for the others. This also seems to be a US thing. I can't think of any other guns from any other country that had such a competitive market as the 1911 and AR15.

Even though the BHP has a heritage comparable to the 1911, it never the large number of manufactures competing against each other.
 
Even though the BHP has a heritage comparable to the 1911, it never the large number of manufactures competing against each other
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Except for other makers of 13-15 round 9mm handguns. The competition was some of the best handguns ever built in 9mm. HK, Sig, Beretta, etc. In the U.S. (where da/sa guns were preferred for leos, once the transition to semis was underway.) S&W was making their gen 1 through 3 guns and selling them for less than you could get a premium imported gun for.

NATO adopted the BHP as a standard sidearm. It was in a certain configuration. It was popular.

FN did upgrade some. Saive made a da version of the gun in 1950. Other versions followed over the years. The Mk II and III, etc. It made stabs at the U.S. leo market, but no big breakthroughs there.

But the most popular 9mms to sell in the U.S. for years were the da/sa guns till Glock showed up. Even then the da/sa guns and dao have more than held their own against Glock in the commercial market. Both Sig, HK and Beretta sell well.

The last decade with 9mm being plentiful and still relatively cheap the demand for 1911s in 9mm has grown. For decades not many wanted a 1911 in 9mm. Now everybody is building them. Maybe there will be an uptick in interest in the BHP. Who knows? It would be nice to see.

tipoc
 
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