My Kahr journey so far

[Dirt doc]

I picked up a new PM9 the other day and took it home to clean it. Upon field stripping I found a gouge on the side of the feed ramp and another on the inside of the slide. Aarrgh! I decided to take it to the range before considering whether or not to return it for replacement. When I got to the range I loaded 6 rounds of Fiocchi Extrema, placed an orange 2 inch sticky dot on the target and stepped off 7 yards. Six trigger pulls yielded six successive bangs and six neat little holes near the center of the orange dot.

Now let me digress here a bit to my first experience with a Kahr. About 18 months ago I had a friend show me his latest purchase, a PM9. I was intrigued enough to spend some time researching the piece on the web and eventually put a few mags through his with mixed results. I cut my teeth on single actions (1911's and a S&W 19) so the DAO and the short grip kicked my behind. Nevertheless I was attracted by Kahr's design and features. I ended up purchasing a P9 thinking the longer grip and site radius would help accuracy as I adjusted to the long trigger pull. That started a love/hate relationship with the P9. I'd leave the range frustrated and resolved to sell it only to decide after cleaning it to give it another chance. Its reliability was its savior.

My accuracy with the P9 slowly improved to the point that I decided to purchased the PM9 for summer carry. I found the trigger on the PM9 to suit me much better than the P9 thus the results for my first mag through it. I've since put about 250 rounds through the pm with perfect function and continued accuracy. It seems the gouges are cosmetic. While cosmetics are important to me it ranks third to reliability and accuracy. I'll not return it and risk getting a less reliable or less accurate pistol. It's a keeper!

Dirt doc

[georgepittenger]

I hear SO many positive reports on the PM9 . Thanks for yours . Like u I didn't shoot it particularly well , using the range rental .

I've been pondering getting one and can't quite pull the trigger . Then i waffle , thinking about maybe a MK9 which to me is so beautiful , a metal frame . Perhaps would fit me a bit better .....

And I'm also aching to buy a Seecamp .32 . Now talk about a beautiful little gun . ;)

So many possibilities , not enough time or money .

[Girphoto]

I hear SO many positive reports on the PM9 . Thanks for yours . Like u I didn't shoot it particularly well , using the range rental .

I've been pondering getting one and can't quite pull the trigger . Then i waffle , thinking about maybe a MK9 which to me is so beautiful , a metal frame . Perhaps would fit me a bit better .....

And I'm also aching to buy a Seecamp .32 . Now talk about a beautiful little gun . ;)

So many possibilities , not enough time or money .

Go for the PM9, 14 oz, + 1.9 oz for the mag. Can carry IWB or pocket and not even know that it is there. And Yes, you can also carry OWB.

[Willieboy]

Thanks for your report and welcome to KharTalk Dirt Doc. You'll find many PM9 fans here and I'm one of them.

[harrydog]

I hear SO many positive reports on the PM9 . Thanks for yours . Like u I didn't shoot it particularly well , using the range rental .

I've been pondering getting one and can't quite pull the trigger . Then i waffle , thinking about maybe a MK9 which to me is so beautiful , a metal frame . Perhaps would fit me a bit better .....

And I'm also aching to buy a Seecamp .32 . Now talk about a beautiful little gun . ;)

So many possibilities , not enough time or money .
From firsthand experience I can recommend both the PM9 and the Seacamp.
The Seacamp is so small and easy to carry in your pocket. And very reliable.
The PM9 is great when you want something with a bit more power but still small and concealable. Even though it's small it's still very controllable and very accurate. Surprisingly so in fact. I haven't had mine very long but it is quickly becoming a favorite.

[Joe L]

I have a PM40 and a CM9 and think they are the perfect carry guns. Welcome to Kahr talk.

I am interested in trigger feel comparisons, as I may be interested in getting a larger Kahr. Which of the larger Kahr pistols have the same trigger feel as your PM9? You say the P9 is different than the PM9, I guess I expected all the Kahr pistols to be very similar, but I have only shot the PM series size pistols.

Joe

[jocko]

I hear SO many positive reports on the PM9 . Thanks for yours . Like u I didn't shoot it particularly well , using the range rental .

I've been pondering getting one and can't quite pull the trigger . Then i waffle , thinking about maybe a MK9 which to me is so beautiful , a metal frame . Perhaps would fit me a bit better .....

And I'm also aching to buy a Seecamp .32 . Now talk about a beautiful little gun . ;)

So many possibilities , not enough time or money .

guns uhave mentioned. The 32 IMO is at the very bottom of the feeding list for a good defense gun, not that it can't do the job but IMO most of the time it cannot,But the seecampo is IMO the best 32 out there, ..

Buy thye CM9, so so much less in bucks spent, same gun as the PM9 which is my personal 24/7 carry peace. The MK version is a beauty, IF ur gonna waist band carry it, then indeed it would be the wasy to go. Pocket carry, IMO NO. why add all that additional weight.

Just my two cents on ur comments. U won't go wrong on any but ur sure lowering your firepower when talking about a 32. I tend to think today tha the 32 has lost alot of is following due to the 380 which is normally the same size as any 32 and alot more firepower. I won two 380 but never carry either anymore, as my PM9 just fits so so nice for me.:third:

Damn I feel like a seasoned POLITICIAN. I danced all around your questions with answers that should confuse you, and answers that should not offended you. Truly a politicians 1st and 2nd commandment. DO NO HARM.

[Bill K]

Welcome to KahrTalk and thanks for your interesting post.

I'm relatively new to Kahrs and have just the PM9, like Joe L I I thought the Kahr trigger was the same across all models. Is there a reach difference that has you preferring the PM9 trigger?

Bill K.

[jocko]

I have a PM40 and a CM9 and think they are the perfect carry guns. Welcome to Kahr talk.

I am interested in trigger feel comparisons, as I may be interested in getting a larger Kahr. Which of the larger Kahr pistols have the same trigger feel as your PM9? You say the P9 is different than the PM9, I guess I expected all the Kahr pistols to be very similar, but I have only shot the PM series size pistols.

Joe

all kahrs, steel, polymer, cw, K, P, PM. T have the ssme elite trigger in them which is 3/8" long in pull and around 7- 7.5# poundage. on special order one can get a K9 with the NYPD trigger in it which is 1/2" trigger pull lenght. No doubt in some size kahrs the trigger "might" feel different but they are all the same... The P9 is not different than the PM9 but the size of the grip certainly could give the shooter the feeling that it is different BUT it is not.:third:


what Bill K said is dead right.

[Dirt doc]

I can only speak to the 2 I own and I was surprised by the difference myself. It is subtle but the pm is slighly shorter and its break is softer regardless of company line. I may be new to this forum but I am not new to pistols or trigger differences.
Dirt doc

[Tilos]

Dirt doc:
Welcome.
I see you have wondered into the the trigger longer/shorter/softer trigger debate in you 2nd post.
Try this, place any unloaded gun on a piece of paper and with a pencil in front of the trigger, touching the paper, push the trigger until the gun dry fires.
The length of the line drawn is the pull length of THAT gun.
Do it three or more times, measure the lines with a dial caliper, and the average is the pull length.
And a trigger pull gage will quantify the "softer" part of touchy/feely trigger evalution.
I'm not sure what will work for the usual "smooth as glass/gritty" part of trigger talk, do you have any ideas?
Tilos

[Dirt doc]

Bill K

Yes the trigger design and trigger specs for the P9 and PM9 are the same. I didn't intend to imply different designs. However, my experience is that different triggers of the same design can perform differently as do the two triggers in the Kahrs I own. All I was saying is the subtle differences in the pm9 enabled me to shoot it better than the P9 so I'm not going to return it and risk getting a trigger less to my liking. I wouldn't have kept the P9 if I didn't like it and it doesn't have a bad trigger. It is just that the trigger on the pm9 I happened to get is more to my liking than the one I happened to get on my P9.

Dirt doc

[Dirt doc]

Tilos

Thanks for the welcome. I'll try that sometime. However, I'm not trying to prove a point. Just saying I like the trigger on my pm9 so I'll keep the one I have despite the cosmetic blemishes.

Thanks again for the welcome.

Dirt doc

[Tilos]

Dirt doc:
Lots of trigger talk here...before you arrived, and discussed to death on many forums with most posts starting with "it feels" and I just like suggest a way to quantify and remove the touchy/feely stuff with testing/measuring.
It will change the "it feels different"(longer/shorter/softer) type statements to hard numbers without a lot of effort but some would rather go on and on about feel.
Thanks for the review and responding to my post,
Tilos

[TheTman]

Jocko, maybe you ought to join the ticket for vice president when Bawanna makes his run for the presidency!

Welcome to the forum Dirt Doc, glad your experience with your PM9 was a good one.
Seems to be a pretty reliable weapon from what I've read on the boards.

Regarding the Seecamp .32, it is the best of the bunch from what I've heard. I have a Beretta .32 Tomcat (much less expensive) and I don't have much confidence in it's stopping power. I only use it as a BUG or to take to places i'm 99.9% sure I'm not going to need it. It's a nice gun to throw in your pocket to run down to the mail box or run to the local market.

[garyb]

Try this, place any unloaded gun on a piece of paper and with a pencil in front of the trigger, touching the paper, push the trigger until the gun dry fires.
The length of the line drawn is the pull length of THAT gun.
Do it three or more times, measure the lines with a dial caliper, and the average is the pull length.
And a trigger pull gage will quantify the "softer" part of touchy/feely trigger evalution.

Great suggestion to quantify the trigger comparisons relating to what someone likes or dislikes as a matter of personal preference. I use a trigger guage, but never thought about putting it all together. Thanks for this useful info.

[Joe L]

DirtDoc--Thanks for the responses and for joining the forum. I certainly agree that the grip change alone can make the trigger feel different. I have seen that in my SIG P226 and P239--changed grips, changed trigger feel, pleasant improvement in my case.

My problem is that I love the feel of the triggers in my CM9 and PM40 and don't want to get a larger pistol that doesn't have that Kahr smoothness and clean release. It appears from the other posts that the mechanism is the same, and that is all I can ask for. The rest is production variation and grip size. That is good enough for me.

Thanks,
Joe

[Dirt doc]

Dirt doc:
Lots of trigger talk here...before you arrived, and discussed to death on many forums with most posts starting with "it feels" and I just like suggest a way to quantify and remove the touchy/feely stuff with testing/measuring.
It will change the "it feels different"(longer/shorter/softer) type statements to hard numbers without a lot of effort but some would rather go on and on about feel.
Thanks for the review and responding to my post,
Tilos

Tilos

Sorry I didn't respond to your idea question earlier. I got tired of pecking away on the **********. I understand what you are trying to do -- quantify a rather nebulous quality. That is difficult to do unless there is a common standard or common experience for everyone. There must be a common frame of reference. For instance, let's assume that trigger quality has only three components, length of pull, weight of pull and smoothness factor. You have already indicated that we can measure length of pull with a common frame of reference, inches (or cm). We can do the same for weight. But what is the common frame of reference for smoothness? We can create a smoothness scale of say 1 to 10 but without the common frame of reference our ratings will be skewed by our personal experiences. Let's say you have experienced a very wide range of trigger smoothness and I have only experienced the upper half of that range. You would likely rate a trigger in the middle of your experience range a 5 but I would rate the same trigger a 1 because it was the smoothest trigger I have experienced. There are probably ways to measure surface smoothness that are repeatable but I doubt many of us have sufficient experience with those or that they are transferable to measuring trigger smoothness. That's a long way of saying no. I don't have any good ideas on how to quantify trigger smoothness. It is an interesting problem to consider though.

Dirt doc

[RogerP9fan]

Here here doc, welcome. Love the CM9 after 290 rounds. Perfect little pocket rocket.