Top two tiers of Handguns for Police, Military or HD ?

[KalashniKEV]

Hopefully most posters are speaking from experience and not simply brand perceptions.

Two things about this thread that I personally don't think are helpful:

1) Racking and stacking brands vs. models. A Porsche 914 is not in the same league as a Porsche 911... nor is a classic P226 in the same league as the SIG P250.

2) Separation into "Tiers" rather than best-to-worst, or what I fear is favorite-to-least-favorite. Most of the brands listed have an obvious model that I think the posters have in mind- and that's usually their standard service pistol. These have usually been wrung out in tests, have some adoption as standard issue here and there, and should be treated mostly as "prove it out and use it."

We're all a product of our experiences, and a negative one can leave a bad taste for a long time.

My 2 CZ-75's- a B and a Pre-B have both been rock solid. To date the 75B is my best performing pistol from the 25m line. My FNS has really impressed me. The M&P didn't prove out for me, and thus had to go. I wouldn't recommend it unless you rebuild the gun with Apex/ Storm Lake parts (maybe I'm totally wrong). My HK I felt was overhyped, and Beretta is just Beretta... boringly reliable with acceptable or sometimes better results, every damn time.

[maximus83]

I recall speaking face to face with Hackathorn and he stated that CZs are nice pistols but won't stand up to "a thousand to fifteen hundred rounds per month" usage that I was doing at the time.

It would be interesting to hear more on that. For instance, was that based on his own use and testing of CZ's, which models, etc., was it based on students running them in classes, or what.

[Alpha Sierra]

Not sure what they do to their "stock" pistols.

My P-07 is completely stock, bought on July 26 and today it rolled over the 1K mark. So far it's standing up to your bogey of 1000 rounds/month just fine......

There might be a reason why CZs (the SP-01 in particular) are extremely popular among serious USPSA Production shooters (who burn through ammo even faster than you) and its IPSC equivalent.

[Mjolnir]

My P-07 is completely stock, bought on July 26 and today it rolled over the 1K mark. So far it's standing up to your bogey of 1000 rounds/month just fine...

I'll bite. You wish to make this thread about YOU.

My bogey" was none other than Ken Hackathorn. Please read more carefully. HE stated that they'd not survive that. I don't own one and probably never will.

So you've got 1,000 rounds thru it in one month. Great. It's a good start. You'll notice that I mentioned also that it was for months on end. In my case it was for three years. You have some ways to go.


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"One cannot awaken a man who pretends to be asleep."

[Mjolnir]

It would be interesting to hear more on that. For instance, was that based on his own use and testing of CZ's, which models, etc., was it based on students running them in classes, or what.

I agree. I did not think to ask. I know he's done more than I'm ever likely to ever do firearm-related and he's seen far more than I will ever see.

They seem like decent pistols (I don't care for the trigger and the slide is very difficult to grasp compared to, say, a 1911 or Glock) and I have also heard comments that they were well made. I've not run one so I'm merely passing what I got from someone who would be closer to the truth of the matter as I'm unfamiliar with them.


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"One cannot awaken a man who pretends to be asleep."

[T2C]

The only way I can see classifying LEO service pistols into two tiers, would be reliable and unreliable. User features on most pistols do not fit the physical attributes of all of the rank and file with LE agencies. User features don't always fit a particular agencies' philosophy either.

Reliable vs. Unreliable. It either works or it doesn't.

[Kain]

Me and a couple friends of mine had a discussion one time about tiering various handguns and what we would consider Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3, ect, and I broke things down this way. If I were to ever hit the lottery for a couple hundred million, we'd do a comprehensive break down of various models ranking them based on various things from accuracy to reliability, doing a full several K function test on a 5-10 model sample, full nine yard break testing with preset standards by which the handguns would need to meet, accuracy(measured from a mechanical rest as well from various shooters of known ability at various distances out to 100 meters), ability to feed all common ammo, mean failure rate, reliability, ect. Accessories was one point as well, but again became a bit of a sticky situation if a new design was brought in. But, the idea was to leave as much personal opinion out of the testing as possible, and yes basically make a chart that was as bias free as possible. Price would also be a factor, a gun that retails for $450 but requires another $150 to bring up to spec is no better deal than a gun that is $600 retail and ready to run out of the box for example.

My basic point was that the top tier would be for handguns that out of the box could be with high certainty be expected to be "duty" ready. Basically meaning that the only thing you'd have to provide would be a quality holster and at most 1 extra magazine to bring the min total of mags up to 3(One in the gun, two reloads), everything else would be useable, functional, and durable, from sights, to finish, to controls, ect with no list of addons modifications to the firearms to make it run. The next tier down would be guns that were mostly functional out of the box, but required $50-100 or less of work, to bring them up to spec to be useable, (Glock's factory plastic placeholders for example). Tier three was anything that required gunsmithing out of the box or major $100+ in work to make run. Tier 4 was the shit guns or ones that failed miserably.

But until I hit the lottery it is all dreams. Not that I think it would help much, because lets face it most people choose their guns from preference anyway and most aren't going to believe their brand of choice had a **** up even if they saw it with their own eyes because they need to believe that they have the best flawless design out there. Which is a pipedream in and of itself. There is no perfect gun.

[RWCRaiden]

Kain, you make a very valid point. You're right, there is no perfect gun. Every gun will malfunction at some point. It's inevitable.