Yesterday (one week after I bought it) I was able to get my new pup out to a range for the first time. For those impatient souls - it went great! For the more patient ...
My son and I went to Vandalia Range and Armory in Dayton, OH (first time we'd ever been there) and I was very impressed. It's a busy range with 15 indoor pistol and 5 indoor rifle (up to 50BMG) lanes and we had to wait 15 minutes or so for a lane - time well spent in the showroom drooling over more guns than I think I've ever seen in one place. Out on the range there were at least 2 and usually 3 RSOs for each 5 lanes and they were friendly and helpful and watchful (and armed) - I really felt safe that the only thing that was going to get shot there was targets.
My son and I each grabbed one of the magazines and started off with practice ammo - MagTech - which I know isn't one of the most preferred brands but it's what the store where I bought the pup uses and what they sold me. The pup seemed to like it well enough and it seemed to shoot accurately.
On the 3rd magazine my son had a stoppage; I was watching him shoot and could see he was limp-wristing the pup and knew he was going to have a problem and sure enough he did. I don't blame the pup for this problem and neither does he - he wasn't used to the grip nor the long double action trigger pull and had to sort of re-grip the pistol and didn't give it a solid platform to recoil against. He tap-racked and got the gun running in short order and the rest of his magazine and the 4th magazine I fired ran perfectly.
I knew we were pushing things a bit (we'd just put 4 magazines through the pup and it was starting to get a little warm) but I broke out some Gold Dots and we each shot a few.
Quite a difference between the Gold Dots and the practice ammo - both in noise and sharpness of recoil. I had found the pup to be quite comfortable to shoot with the practice ammo - less recoil than I was expecting and I could easily have shot a box or two with no ill-effects on me. The Gold Dots were a bit more sincere but I actually found them comforting. I didn't buy a pup looking for a more expensive 380 - I wanted a quality and reliable firearm with some effective firepower and with Gold Dots you know you have exactly that - this is not my mother's mouse gun!
We shot my son's 22 for a bit and I finished the range session with some more Gold Dots. Boy this thing likes Gold Dots and they are very accurate in it; surprised me - a lot - just how tight the group was. Also - how well it shoots to point of aim - I put shots on target as well with the pup as I can with anything else I own (including my favorite carry gun - a H&K P2000SK). Very comforting.
Back home I stripped the pup and did a minor cleaning (I don't have everything I need to do it properly with me). Internally things look just fine - the expected polishing along the rails and where the barrel contacts the frame in recoil but no burrs, no brass shavings, and rather less carbon residue than I would have expected - just a little in the top front of the magazine well and on the feed ramp. Reassembly is a bit more difficult than disassembly - I had to resort to the Channel-Lock trick to get the recoil spring back in which made my son go wide-eyed but worked like a charm. Have to get some tools ...
I am totally satisfied with my purchase; I feel that I have a weapon that delivers the pride of ownership of a fine firearm along with reliability, accuracy and firepower to defend myself should the worst happen. My search for the perfect pocket pistol is finally over - the grail gun found.