A long long long long long long long long time ago (in fact it was a
Tuesday;^), I promised to check back in with all ya'll (that's plural
down South for 'everyone') re: my experiences with specialty ammo
(RBCD, etc.) and other stuff. Well, the recent topic of grip tape has me ready to chime in with my two cents.
I LOVE my R9S, but have been a bit afraid of it, because of it's perceived snap in the hands and my mishandling it with poor gripping habits. So I set out on a quest to find that which meets my criteria for a comfortable handling gun. I realize that this is a last ditch (in my case first ditch too;^) weapon, and you can't expect too much with blah blah blah...
I first bought a Handall, Jr, which I liked well enough, but something bothered me about the finger groove (bulge?) and the bulk of the, um, Handall. It was good for practice, but I wanted something to improve those smooth (yet, oh so right) carbon fibre (Olde English spelling;^) grips. Then, some one here got the brainy idea to use grip tape, and I promptly found some incredible tape, but it kept wanting to delaminate the grippy stuff from the sticky stuff, and I became disillusioned with that too. Then I read somewhere (prolly here) that ol' Karl uses a slip-on Uncle Mikes rubber sleeve. So, naturally I ordered one and it came last Friday.
I must say that now I have reached nirvana tonight. This seems to be the perfect grip solution for me, just what I wanted, outside of factory rubber grips. They don't interfere with my grip when digging in my pocket, they don't obtrude (hey, I made up a new word!), and best of all, they feel great in the hand! Now I have the comfort AND concealment I've been looking for.
The sleeve is all black rubber, with checkering on the left and right side, but curiously not on the front or back. It tends to gray out (lose it's blackness) but a tooth brush can bring it back to black in short order.
So, it's cool looking, works great and it's cheap. My kind of fix...
Steve
BTW-some of you other Steve's better watch out. I was here first. Or second. One of those...
BBTW-re: specialty ammo-I bought some of that 'spendy' RBCD Performance Plus Platinum 9mm ammo, and it worked perfectly in my R9S. That's all I can say about it. That, and it costs about $3 a bullet. I'm sticking with the Gold Dot HP in 115gr. It's what works for me, and it's cheap enough when purchased in bulk to practice with it. They do say to practice with what you carry, right? If I carried RBCD, I'd be broke...
At Last,
R9s with Hogue #18000 Grip Sleeve
Yes, See even an OLD Dawg can learn new tricks it jusst takes longer.