Best standard/sport pistol for rapid fire

[Magyar]

I am wanting to buy a pistol for rapid fire and would love some thoughts as to which pistols are good and which are not so good. Which guns point well and are balanced and have good weight distribution. Which guns are reliable and have good recoil characteristics. Also do guns which have the magazine in the grip and not forward of the trigger have any disadvantages. Do FAS or FWB style pistols cycle fast enough for this for of shooting.

[David Levene]

It is probably still too early to know which Standard Pistols are going to be the best performers in Rapid Fire. I would doubt if many people will have done more than a few months training and, of those, most will not have tried a variety of guns.

You may get "my gun is good" type comments but without competitive comparison I am not sure how valid that would be in answer to your question.

I have no doubt that all of the top end pistols are accurate enough and cycle quick enough for the event. How well they can be controlled moving from target to target is another matter.

Out of interest, what makes you think that the FAS or FWB might not cycle fast enough.

[Morini-adict?]

Hi, David L.

I think you are right. It´s too early to tell.
I hope that the new regulations for the silhuette course will bring forward some really good standard pistols, which should also feed reliably.

Most of the pistols available today, straight blowbacks they are, use heavy bolts, and relatively weak return (recoil) springs. To increase kadence markedly, I think a relatively light weight bolt combined with a progressive and relatively strong return spring is the way to go.

Just think of the moderate full auto firing rate of the US submachinegun, the M3 "grease-gun", compared to the german "burp-gun" (Schmeisser). Got the point?

The recoil-"reducing" gadgets of the FWB 93, Pardini and others will make the recovery time too long for the 4 second strings, I agree. These recoil-reducing devices are just prolonging the effect of recoil, by smoothing the recoil acceleration curve. There ain´t no way to get rid of recoil energy!

A good gun for the new silhuette course must be heavy, c.g well forward, and have a rapid recoil stroke.

A candidate could be my (hated?) MC 22. If this consept was evolved further, with a much lighter bolt, reinforced boltstop, and stronger progressive return spring, we could have a candidate. If feeding also became reliable.

Francesco, are you listening in?

[Mark Briggs]

I'll throw a word in edgewise here. The concept of light bolt/heavy springs sounds good. I have an MG-2 which has, in relative terms, quite a light bolt. My observation is that this combination works well to provide fast recovery. It certainly makes the huge mass of the S&W41 and similar guns feel very slow and clunky. I've shot the MG-2 on 4-second runs and it's certainly capable, even if I'm not. In fact, it works smoothly enough that on the first 8-second runs I shot with it I was finishing in under 6 seconds until I got accustomed to how smoothly and quickly the gun returns to battery for the next shot.

I'll contrast these comments with those made by a friend and club member who shot on the national team of one of the former Soviet republics. They used the predecessor of the AW93 (the HR-30) for Sport Pistol. In his opinion the AW93 design with its recoil absorber will likely prove a challenge to shoot in 4 seconds because it's quite slow. I have no experience with the AW93 so can only pass on the opinion of one who has.

[tedbell]

I'm (very) new to all of this, and am interested on getting involved in RF shooting. I was thinking of using the ol' Chrsitmas bonus on a new pistol for that purpose, but if there's such uncertainty in which ones will be the standouts given the recent change, how will I be able to figure out what to get? Should I be looking at a good performer, but not top of the line, for my first year or two (something that doesn't make it impossible to be competitive, but isn't Olympic material), or at least until it becomes apparant which models are winning the competitions now?

Any suggestions or recommendations whatsoever would be most appreciated!

[sparky]

I've been shooting RF with my Pardini SP off and on for about a year so far and think it's been working great. I can't really complain about how fast it cycles (it feels pretty quick), but I do agree that faster is better. I guess if you're a little adventurous (and especially if you have spare parts) and had access to a machine shop or tools, you could start lightening reciprocating parts and getting some extra strength springs from Wolff. As an added benefit, the gun might be a little more reliable, especially if you've been having some failure to feed problems.

I'd also think it would be more important that the axis of the bore was as low as possible and I'd think the gun should probably be set up at least a little muzzle-heavy.

On the other hand, I wonder if it might be good to go away from the idea of a heavy gun and move towards a lighter gun. This would reduce the amount of mass you would have to start and stop when swinging from target to target. Sure, the gun will recoil and the muzzle will rise a little more, but I wonder if the benefits would out weigh the downside? I know in the other game I play (IPSC), some of the guns are moving in this direction, and IPSC and RF have some common goals as far as gun design. It might be interesting.

Anyone know how fast the Morini CM22 cycles compared to the Pardini SP?

[Mark Briggs]

I chose the MG-2 because it is a light pistol. I've been shooting it without the muzzle weights installed, making it very light indeed (just a shade over 1000 grams). A previous poster suggested a little "muzzle heavy" might be good, but that perhaps having less mass would be easier to move from target to target. I can certainly say that with my limited experience I find the lighter pistol is much easier to move from target to target. You can get away with a light pistol if it's well designed with a good grip angle and a low bore line. The MG-2 certainly falls into this catagory. Recoil is straight to the rear with virtually no muzzle flip (from a centre hold it doesn't even pop up out of the black on a precision target).

If one were looking to purchase a pistol specifically for rapid fire then holding off a little bit is probably a good idea (if one already has a pistol to train with). But remember that "a little bit" is something on the order of one to two years. Walther won't have their new pistol on dealer shelves until at least late Q3/early Q4 '05, and any other manufacturer is likely several months behind Walther, so it's not unrealistic to think that any real RF-specific pistol designs won't be reliably on the market until at least 2006. That having been said, how much improvement can we expect over the current crop of pistols? Probably not enough to justify waiting a year or two to purchase. Just my uneducated guess...

[John Smith]

Good Morning
Lets not get so technical to that point that we seek to cover lack of practice with a better pistol
I think the real issue here will be smooth trigger release rather than recoil
Dry firing and technique training may be a sad substitute for the joy of a new Standard Gun for Rapid, but I bet I know what will improve scores more quickly. Hope I don't sound like I am ponificating .. who knows I probabilly am
Regards
John

[Richard H]

I agree with Mark, I tried the MG 2 and out of all the current pistols IMHO it would make the best rapid fire pistol. It had a nice trigger, stayed on target, and very little felt recoil. But I guess time will tell, I'm sure there will be a whole new host of rapid fire guns, as it is the nature of the beast and the limits will be tested, the best part is we may get better standard pistols to boot.

[Mark Briggs]

John Smith really hit the nail on the head. Practice, practice and more practice is what will eventually make the best shooter. The reigning Canadian RF champion could probably take the cheapest "saturday night special" pistol and achieve decent scores. The worst part is that he'd make it look so darned easy when he did it! But he also has fired many, many thousands of rounds in practice so RF shooting is now almost purely instinctive for him.

For the rest of us mere mortals, having a decent pistol helps. Having tried to shoot RF with my S&W41 I can say that it would take a lot of bricks of practice ammo before I could get "good" with it. The MG-2 and other pistols in that class have a lot of design characteristics which give them a significant advantage over the more basic standard pistols like the Rugers & Smiths. I happened to be at a point where I was going to purchase a new standard pistol anyway, and I was pleased to have been able to purchase one that would also suffice for Rapid Fire. Now all I have to do is practice with it! The best part of the new RF rules is that I no longer have to scrounge around for .22Short ammo which was getting both difficult and expensive to purchase.

[Tycho]

I remember a post from David Moore some months ago about some test they shot in Oz, and the CM22 fell out of that race in the earliest stages. He wrote that the most important characteristic seemed to be a short gun, which handles a lot better than a long one; and very front heavy guns are just not good enough in that department.

After some testing of our own in August/September, I think that the second most important thing is the lenght of the first stage of the trigger. You can lose a lot of time in the 4 sec just by moving your trigger finger for and aft.

What I heard of the test of the Swiss national team, the MG2 came out top, followed by the Pardini. There seems to be a prototzpe Pardini SP with an electronic trigger around, although after my experience with the GPE this is probably a not very well realized idea.

The MG2 theory seems to be supported by some very highly positioned sources in the Matchguns sales hierarchy, which say that the French national team is VERY interested in the MG2 and that a version with additional compensator elements would be forthcoming.

To make it short, I think that the best gun would be the CM102E, IF you can get it to run on not more than one malfunction per half match. 2nd would be the MG2, which doesn't have the sexy trigger of the 102E, but very similar recoil characteristics (except that every MG2 seems to jump to the high left, whereas the 102E goes straight up) and excellent possibilities in the grip department. After that, it's probably an open race, but I would, at this point in time, support the theory that mass absorbers like the FWB or the late Pardini are not the way to go. Point of balance and a low barrel axis are worth more, IMHO.

[Mike McDaniel]

If I had to bet money, the new RP pistols will be the old RF pistols.

Think about it.....The current leaders are the Walther and the Pardini, with the FAS a distant third. All these guns are available in SP format.

I'm betting that within a few months, Walther will be selling a RF retrofit kit for the OSP - a short barrel chambered for .22 LR, new magazines, a new bolt, and the GSP trigger unit.

The real fight, in my view, will be over the triggers. The OSP has a long, rolling release - basically, you are supposed to cue off trigger position rather than force. I'm betting that there will be a LOT of experimentation with 1 and 2-stage triggers, and I'm not sure which way things will break. A single-stage trigger has the advantage of letting the shooter go for a surprise break. A two-stage unit lets the shooter take up the first stage while transitioning between targets, but has a greater likelihood of an accidental shot between the targets.

Going to be real interesting..... :-)

[tedbell]

Is the CM102E even made anymore? I can't find anything on the web about it.

[Mark Briggs]

I'll throw another comment in here as there are several folks who've mentioned the differences in trigger systems and how they might effect Rapid Fire. One local shooter has shot GSP's with 2-stage triggers and indicates they would likely not be an advantage in rapid fire (keep in mind this fellow has been provincial champion several times so he knows how to shoot, and is currently our national champ in Free Pistol). He bases this comment on the nature of the Walther 2-stage trigger. Specifically, his 2-stage triggers require the shooter to completely release the trigger between shots so that on the next shot the shooter must pull through both the first and second stages.

I don't know much about many of the other guns on the market, but one thing about the MG-2 that I like is that only the 2nd stage needs to be released between shots. After the first shot the trigger finger is relaxed slightly, allowing the disconnector to re-engage. The shooter then has only to pull through the second stage to get the next shot to fire. While the MG-2 trigger will function with a very light (60gram) second stage, this is NOT a good idea for rapid fire. Trust me, I put two shots into a single target twice in one string! If the second stage is adjusted to a heavier release weight, perhaps something like 250 grams, the trigger will then allow for consistant use of only the second stage in the rapid fire event. Since readjusting mine I haven't done any more "double taps".

Given the info above I think we should acknowledge that even between 2-stage trigger systems from various manufacturers there are notable differences in operation. Concluding that a 1-stage trigger is superior to a 2-stage trigger or vice versa would be ill-advised without a full knowledge of the functionality of the exact 1-stage and 2-stage triggers in question.

[sparky]

What you describe below doesn't sound like a two-stage trigger to me. If you don't have to let the trigger go forward through the "first stage" before it resets, it sounds like a one-stage trigger with some take-up.

<snip>

I don't know much about many of the other guns on the market, but one thing about the MG-2 that I like is that only the 2nd stage needs to be released between shots. After the first shot the trigger finger is relaxed slightly, allowing the disconnector to re-engage. The shooter then has only to pull through the second stage to get the next shot to fire.

<snip>

[Mike Taylor]

Except, Sparky, that the "take-up" is adjustable in pull weight. There is a separate spring to control it. So it is different from the typical single-stage trigger that has some free-play or slack that you take up before the actual trigger springs come in to play. Maybe the MG2 trigger is better described as a hybrid?

[MAS]

To Mike:
I have fired a MG2 for a couple of days now. It´s different. The recoil almost straight into your hand.
The grip: a bit unusual, a very low thumb rest. But the benefit is less horisontal spread of the shot, apparently. The thumb is less able to jerk the shots off center during rapid fire.

The trigger. Unusual to. As you pointet out, it feels like a hybrid of a good mechanical and a good electronical trigger. The resistanse remains nearly constant after the sear breaks free. Thus one of the drawbacks of mech. trigger is much reduced.

It´s a relatively light pistol, with a light bolt. I have several years of experience using the FAS with the heaviest weight mounted, and the Morini CM 22. I would like some more weight up front for the Standard Pistol program.

I experienced some malfunctions that were difficult to clear. A ballpoint pen was needed to clear some empties remaining in mechanicme of the gun. Happily, this was usualy the spent case of the last round fired, though.

[Mark Briggs]

Sparky - the MG-2 trigger is very much a two-stage trigger. You pull something like 750 grams on the first stage, then hit the "wall" which is the beginning of the second stage. You're now holding the full force of the first stage spring as you ramp up pressure on the second until you reach the 1000+ grams of total trigger weight when the sear breaks and the shot fires.

Now all you have to do is to relax your finger and let the trigger move forward a little bit. You're now back at the "wall" of the second stage, holding 750 grams and again applying the additional 250 grams or so required to overcome the second stage spring and again break the sear.

On a single stage trigger, after the first shot breaks you'd need to relax your finger and allow it to move fully forward, releasing all or almost all the force before the disconnector re-engages so you can begin squeezing for the next shot.

The advantage of the 2-stage trigger is that as a shooter you only have to apply a force delta of 250 grams to fire sebsequent shots. With a single stage trigger the shooter needs to apply a force delta of the full 1000+ grams each and every time a shot is fired.

[Mike McDaniel]

Interesting.......

If I had to bet money, I would bet that the future of RF will probably be toward electronic triggers - precisely to go to a two-stage system with a 700-800 gram first stage, that does not require the trigger pressure to be released. Which effectively gives you the 200-gram trigger that is the classic RF standard.

[Tycho]

Yeah, and the only actually working trigger system in a standard pistol that can do exactly this is the one in the 102E...