robmac
01-01-2015, 06:14 PM
Brand new shooter with a still pretty brand new CW9. Thanks to the holidays & vacation time since 12/19, I've had lots of time to learn. Since I had to research a few of these subjects myself, I thought I'd share just some of what I learned, in case it can add to this body of knowledge.
I won't give specific failure %'s, lest someone mistakenly think it was the gun, but suffice it to say, as a completely green, brand new shooter, failures to go into battery were off the charts. Was a little bummed, but figured out that it might have been me, or the ammo, or a combination of both. So I looked up all sorts of fun stuff about muzzle energy, made some spreadsheets, brought charts to my 7 range trips. I also investigated more about how a proper grip & stance help counter muzzle flip and provide necessary resistance.
Bottom line, I proved to myself at least that inexperience and poor form can make a gun fail. That seems pretty widely accepted, but apparently some doubt it. Focusing on form alone, I reduced failures by 30.6% with the same ammo as prior (WWB). Failures were still high though, so I turned next to ammo.
Once I combined more proper form and a tiny bit of experience with hotter ammo, I've had only 1 failure, and it wasn't the slide failing to return to battery. Instead, I had one instance of a Remington Golden Sabre +P get sort of stuck against the bottom of the feed ramp. So in the last 345 rounds with better form and better ammo, the gun was for me 99.7% reliable. I will still probably have my brother-in-law (uber-experienced and, I just came to find out, an instructor) shoot it with WWB to see what that tells me, to see if it fails for him, and I'll go back to the WWB to finish the analysis. I expect in time I'll also get the WWB's close to 100%. For now though, I'm satisfied I nailed it.
I also learned that WWB turns your hands (and the guts of your gun) black when you shoot it! After my first session with the good ammo (used the Speer Lawman FMJ as target ammo, & 3 other different hotter JHP rounds), I instinctively went to wash my hands, and to my surprise, found that they were clean!
As a funny side note, at the session where I tried with great success the new ammo, I heard (more accurately, I felt) 2 lanes down what sounded like a cannon. I had no clue what it was. The Kahr rep was there with what they told me was a ".45 Desert Eagle." As an aside, without even trying or knowing it, he will have been a factor in any future (and even exotic!) gun purchases I may make someday from Kahr. He also talked to me about the failures, and insisted I get in touch if I had issues, so mad props to him all around.
Anyway, at first I declined his gracious offer to shoot the .45, explaining that I was only 6 sessions and 1,000+ rounds into my first ever gun, a tiny 9mm, but the person he was with convinced me to shoot 5 or so rounds. I did, and I did fine, put them all on the silhouette at maybe 25'. He told me, "stick around, we're breaking out the .50 cal." The person he was with said, "you have to shoot it, it's once in a lifetime." Of course, I didn't have a clue what a ".50 Desert Eagle" even is (oddly, it never popped up on my search of "good first gun choices"). When they fired that, my face bones literally vibrated. My teeth shook. No exaggeration. With some trepidation, I agreed to fire two rounds (because I had overheard them tell somebody they're like $2 a round). Aimed both at the center of the silhouette, they went about 10" high, right in the neck. I think I might have rocked back on my feet a little bit, but it didn't hurt at all, and it was actually kind of smooth....maybe sensory overload and adrenaline numbed me!
I have long ass way to go, but it's comical that a newbie who limp wristed a small 9 into massive failures just a few days before walked out of there googling ".50 Desert Eagle" and wondering how far down the road that might be...
I won't give specific failure %'s, lest someone mistakenly think it was the gun, but suffice it to say, as a completely green, brand new shooter, failures to go into battery were off the charts. Was a little bummed, but figured out that it might have been me, or the ammo, or a combination of both. So I looked up all sorts of fun stuff about muzzle energy, made some spreadsheets, brought charts to my 7 range trips. I also investigated more about how a proper grip & stance help counter muzzle flip and provide necessary resistance.
Bottom line, I proved to myself at least that inexperience and poor form can make a gun fail. That seems pretty widely accepted, but apparently some doubt it. Focusing on form alone, I reduced failures by 30.6% with the same ammo as prior (WWB). Failures were still high though, so I turned next to ammo.
Once I combined more proper form and a tiny bit of experience with hotter ammo, I've had only 1 failure, and it wasn't the slide failing to return to battery. Instead, I had one instance of a Remington Golden Sabre +P get sort of stuck against the bottom of the feed ramp. So in the last 345 rounds with better form and better ammo, the gun was for me 99.7% reliable. I will still probably have my brother-in-law (uber-experienced and, I just came to find out, an instructor) shoot it with WWB to see what that tells me, to see if it fails for him, and I'll go back to the WWB to finish the analysis. I expect in time I'll also get the WWB's close to 100%. For now though, I'm satisfied I nailed it.
I also learned that WWB turns your hands (and the guts of your gun) black when you shoot it! After my first session with the good ammo (used the Speer Lawman FMJ as target ammo, & 3 other different hotter JHP rounds), I instinctively went to wash my hands, and to my surprise, found that they were clean!
As a funny side note, at the session where I tried with great success the new ammo, I heard (more accurately, I felt) 2 lanes down what sounded like a cannon. I had no clue what it was. The Kahr rep was there with what they told me was a ".45 Desert Eagle." As an aside, without even trying or knowing it, he will have been a factor in any future (and even exotic!) gun purchases I may make someday from Kahr. He also talked to me about the failures, and insisted I get in touch if I had issues, so mad props to him all around.
Anyway, at first I declined his gracious offer to shoot the .45, explaining that I was only 6 sessions and 1,000+ rounds into my first ever gun, a tiny 9mm, but the person he was with convinced me to shoot 5 or so rounds. I did, and I did fine, put them all on the silhouette at maybe 25'. He told me, "stick around, we're breaking out the .50 cal." The person he was with said, "you have to shoot it, it's once in a lifetime." Of course, I didn't have a clue what a ".50 Desert Eagle" even is (oddly, it never popped up on my search of "good first gun choices"). When they fired that, my face bones literally vibrated. My teeth shook. No exaggeration. With some trepidation, I agreed to fire two rounds (because I had overheard them tell somebody they're like $2 a round). Aimed both at the center of the silhouette, they went about 10" high, right in the neck. I think I might have rocked back on my feet a little bit, but it didn't hurt at all, and it was actually kind of smooth....maybe sensory overload and adrenaline numbed me!
I have long ass way to go, but it's comical that a newbie who limp wristed a small 9 into massive failures just a few days before walked out of there googling ".50 Desert Eagle" and wondering how far down the road that might be...