It Feels Like the Very First Time

Took the new baby to the gun range today. I have mixed feelings.

First of all, the gun shoots great. You wouldn't know it from my embarrassing shooting at 50 feet, but when I started at 7 yards, I found it more accurate (in my hands) than my adorable SW1911 in .45 ACP, which is God's Own Pistol.

Here is the first target:

The three flyers are due to me jerking the trigger, I think. I don't buy into the theory that semi-autos mysteriously fire off-POA all by themselves. Other than those shots, it was really nice. No problems with recoil, the noise wasn't bad (I had heard it was a problem with .38 Super), and the sights seem right on. Everything goes slightly to the left, but that's my personal disease, not the gun.

I realized today that the wind moves my sights. I had no idea it could do that to a pistol. There was a gusty breeze going, and I could see it moving me around the target.

Here are the second 25 shots. I believe these were actually better, but the black stickers I covered the original target with fell off, so some of the first 25 shots appear in this pattern, too.

I went back to 50 feet, and things kind of went to hell. I think I just lost patience and jerked the trigger too much.

I got out the SW1911 and cranked off 50. Not good, but not bad.

Having seen the Smith & Wesson and the Colt up close, I have to say, the Smith's quality seems to be on a completely different level. There are little asymmetrical things on the Colt, perhaps caused by the dehorning, which appears to have been done freehand. I'm trying to decide whether I want to keep this thing and have it fixed up, or just unload it and pimp out a second Smith. The Smith is total perfection. Zero defects. I'm kind of surprised the Colt works so well, given the obvious QC problems.

I think the real shooters only go to the range on weekdays. Makes sense, because it's damn hard to find your brass on a crowded weekend. Usually, everyone there sucks. Today, I thought everyone sucked except for two people, but it turned out one was shooting a bull-barrel .22 and cheating by resting his arm on a pole, so I guess only one didn't suck. It was a lady with a 4" satin stainless revolver. She was shooting better at 75 feet that I did at 50. Her gun wasn't loud. Maybe she was shooting .38s from a .357. Very easy round to shoot. Still, she was a total badass. Terrifying.

Even though I had mixed results today, I learned some things, so I'm happy. Now I have to decide what to do with the gun.