I had initially purchased the M&P 9 with the intent of making it into a HD, SD/SHTF gun. It is, to date, the ONLY double stack handgun that I could get a proper grip on. See, I have really small hands (I wear men's extra small gloves). To give you an idea, with a high grip, centered in wrist hold on a Glock, I cannot reach the trigger safety and hence cannot even pull the trigger. Yup, that small.
Even so, the M&P was not perfect. My small hands, coupled with the rather tall height of the gun, meant that my hand wasn't consistently landing on the same spot on the gun. So I sent it off to Burwell Gunsmithing for a grip chop. The gun was now the perfect height, but the trigger was still a little bit of a reach.
Enter the Apex FSS kit. The trigger included with the kit reduced the length of pull quite a bit. But I was still unhappy. I wanted to be able to get my finger squarely on that trigger regardless of the gun ended up in my hand, and this quickly became obvious during my first handgun match. I kept getting too little finger on the trigger after the draw, and was consequently pulling my shots right.
And so my quest began anew. I was well aware that there were a few gunsmiths who did grip reductions. But none of them offered what I wanted; a reduction in the backstrap just under the beavertail, which would reduce the reach to the trigger. The fine folks here at M4C pointed me towards Diversified Firearm Concepts. I checked out their Facebook page, and was stunned at what they could achieve with an M&P. They offered exactly what I was looking for. Fast forward two months, and I finally have my M&P back, and I am very pleased with the results.
Here you can see just how much material Joe at DFC removed. He actually removes the backstrap entirely, fills it in with some sort of epoxy or liquid plastic, then grinds it into the final shape. The stippling is laser straight and grippy.
The sunlight makes the epoxy more apparent than it really is. It blends in quite well.
To Joe/DFC if you're reading this: As excellent as your work is, there are two suggestions I'd like to make. One, is that you need to warn your customers that using Breakfree CLP or Gunscrubber on the frame will make the color of the epoxy start to run. I blasted the frame with non-chlorinated brake cleaner like I always did on polymer guns with no ill effects, but in this case, the epoxy started running a reddish brown color. As far as I can tell, there's nothing wrong, except the filled in area is ever so slightly lighter. Two, I would suggest making the area of the backstrap right under the beavertail a little more rounded. It's a little too squarish for my taste, but I can fix that on my own if it bothers me after trying it out.
All in all, however, it is excellent work and I am quite satisfied. I can now reach/pull the trigger confidently with no problems. If anyone else has small hands, or is just looking for that extra edge, you can do no better than to send your gun to Diversified Firearm Concepts.
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Originally Posted by aflin
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