New R9 stealth : ) Shipped to williams for light strikes/ it's back : ?

[BlueC2]

It's dangerous to let your wife look into your gun safe. The last time I let my wife look into mine she "requisitioned" this as her own:

 

Richard,

That case is astounding! Is that something you made? 132 has a very nice home.

[Richard S]

Thank you! I did not make that case. It was made by a craftsman in Michigan. And while that piece does have old ivory grips it is not "R9 132." It's a Seecamp LWS .32.  My wife saw it and said, "I want it, Darling." Now what is a man to do under those circumstances? 

_{[Edited typo.]}

[BlueC2]

At least she did not take the R9!

[Richard S]

Thank Heaven for that!

[BlueC2]

I think a case like that would be a fitting home for Karl's #R9. If you still have the makers contact info would you mind PMing it?

[Richard S]

I'll look for the contact information and post what I find here later today.

______________

Here is a link to the profile of Doug Walkner ("captains_son" on the Seecamp Forum) who made the box pictured above.  He is from Wisconsin, not Michigan as I had mistakenly recalled.  I contacted him by the e-mail link on the profile:

http://www.seecamp.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?action=viewprofile;username=captains_son

Doug's last post on the Seecamp Forum appears to have been back in 2012.  He was suffering from a serious illness at the time and I don't know his current status. It was a sad situation to see his health decline so dangerously.

Here is a link to a thread on the Seecamp Forum that discusses Doug's work and has references to other sources for custom pistol boxes:

http://www.seecamp.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1170861479/0

I hope all of this helps.

[JoshA]

***

Finally a working R9. I'm very pleased with it.

I didn't let it cool between mags either.

I will clean the lil machine and try some 115 gr silver tips so I know how it functions and then to the recommended carry much and occasionally fire off the 2 mags i have been walking around with for a while.

Sound like a reasonable approach, or should I just carry it now and forget the 115 gr? Thoughts?

***

Josh:

Congratulations. That is a reasonable approach. And your new R9 is typical of nearly every one of  the thousands that came off of the line. It is typical of the R9s that I and many others around here have been describing for years.

You say that you didn't let the piece cool down between strings of fire. That is pushing the envelope for the smallest and lightest pistol ever designed for the 9mm Parabellum cartridge. For what it is width, now that you have done that once, I wouldn't do it again if the pistol were mine. The chances of having to fire a rapid string of 50 or so rounds during a self-defense situation in civilian life are slim to none.

Enjoy your new masterpiece.

Thanks for the good advice Richard. All future firing will be more civil on the little guy.

[JoshA]

ok so I have some good news and some bad new from today's range report.

I was able to run 20 Winchester silver tips through the stealth today.

Good news: no FTE. No FT Feed. So the 115 doesn't seem to be an issue. That's wonderful even though I will likely stick with 124 for carry.

Bad news that I would like some input on: there were a couple of rounds that took multiple squeezes to get to fire. One took 3 trigger pulls. Are the Winchester silver tips hard primered or do you guys run them well through your R9's?

[tracker]

I haven't heard of hard primers on Winchester or Federal. The problem seems to lie in foreign made primers but if I had light strikes with anything it would be the end of it.

[MRC]

I can tell you what I have always been told about primers for reloading.  A lot of the makers of progressive presses and the hand held priming tools recomend Winchester or CCI primers as they have the "hardest" cups of the domestic producers.  Federal has the softest cups.  Remington is in between.

That said I have not had any trouble with  Winchester or CCI primers going off.  I do know that my R9 has the lightest strikes of any pistol I have owned.  This includes a Colt Pony and a Colt Pocket Nine which were notorious for light strikes.

To get the nice, soft, and smooth trigger pull that the R9's are famous for, you have to give up something in the "striking power" category.  Also Rohrbaugh used a very heavy firing pin spring to try and make the drop test.  This is also a contributor to light hits.

[Griff]

Josh,
My stealth has run every type of 9mm fed it except for Hornady Critical Defense, which did what yours did with the Winchester. It would fire off some rounds first trigger pull, some took multiple strikes, and some others only fired when recycled through a Glock.
I learned that the Critical defense does indeed have hard primers, and relegated it to other firearms.
Mine did fine with Winchester "white box" fmj. 
I have since decided to only use my chosen carry ammo even for practice.  I have been using the recommended Speer 124 grain Gold Dot.
After Shooting the Bull got the best results in his short barrel 9mm ammo quest with Federal HST 124 grain, I bought up a supply of it, and may switch to it if it runs well. His videos are on YouTube.
I recommend finding a good quality hollow point that runs perfectly in your personal r9 and using it exclusively.

[tracker]

I have come to the same conclusion about only shooting the ammo you carry in the R9--no extended Lawman or WWB sessions are necessary if you are confident in the Pup's functionality. I only fire about two mags every two or three months of Federal HST 124 gr. There was never any concern about 115 gr. in the R9 except a matter of preference. The Solo is the only one I know that recommends the heavier bullets.

[JoshA]

Ok, well I'm good with just running my carry ammo and that only 2 mags every month or two.

I guess the next question is...

 Federal HST,

Golden Sabers

or Gold Dot?

[tracker]

My two preferences are HST and GD.

[backupr9]

My two preferences are HST and GD.

+1