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Rguns is listing these for $275, on GB and on their own site. Condition looks good, except they had to get creative to import them. They have a slightly shorter than stock factory barrel. Best guess is they welded a tube to the muzzle for import, then sawed it off and re-crowned in the states...

Until recently, I have mostly just stayed away from .380 acp as a caliber. But, the recent surplus availability of the Beretta 81-series has changed that, for me -- I now enjoy shooting the Beretta 84 and 85 quite a lot. Since I've gotten back into the caliber, I'm wondering about the Sig P230...

I'm a fan of steel-frame 9mm's. E.g. the CZ 75, BHP, P210, etc. For my particular use, I've come to understand the limiting factor for most of them is their physical size. It's not so much that they're heavy -- that can usually be dealt with (and if not, there's always something else ready to...

These days, a newly made pistol with an old-school blued finish and wood grips is pretty uncommon, and normally finished that way as an artistic choice. And it would definitely be rare to find one as a government issued weapon, now. But there was a time when that was essentially all that was...

After winning an auction, I have a nearly-LNIB Star M43 Firestar (9mm) inbound. Scouring the internet for the last 20 years of posts in a search for well-known problems, it appears these are typically reliable, but occasionally one sees complaints of a very specific failure to extract, with the...

Back in 2015, I was one of those guys who couldn't wait to get my hands on a G43. I got one from the first shipment to my state. Finally, it was the single-stack 9mm Glock should have been making for a decade. With a techna clip, the thing is superb for IWB concealment. Already thin, but with...

Thinking about another rust bluing project. My first project was fun and turned out great. For metal prep, I sanded everything to 320 grit, and everything worked out pretty much as expected. For my second project, I am thinking about a pistol with a worn blue finish -- originally polished on...

Due to ammo prices, I'm doing substantially less shooting this year (so far), but I wanted something to occupy a bit of time, so I decided to pick up a Star BM and teach myself some techniques like rust bluing and flame bluing, without too much expense. If you have a look at gunbroker, these...

I have played around with flame bluing screws and pins, and noticed the finish is as fragile as it is beautiful. Thinking about restoring an old Star BM, to learn the slow rust bluing technique, and also may flame/nitre blue some slightly larger parts, such as the trigger (normally in the...

Someone I know has a Beretta 71 that the previous owner screwed with, before selling it off. The 71 is the most reliable .22 pistol platform that I've seen. But this one was attacked by a bubba with a dremel tool. The aluminum frame was apparently "polished" (aggressively) where it fits...

I recently chrono'd a few .32acp loads out of a Beretta 81. Generally, I'm not interested in hollowpoints in this caliber, so all these are solids of one form or another. All ammo was purchased within the last year. Ambient temp was around 80F. Geco 73gr FMJ (no advertized velocity): mean...

I have a surplus Beretta 81 that is out for hard chrome plating. The front sight is integral with the slide, so it will get hard chromed too. I'm wondering if anyone knows a way to blacken the front sight, after it's been hard chromed, in such a way that won't just immediately rub off. Any ideas?

Does it strike anyone else as important that the latest gun control push, including discussions of repealing the 2nd amendment, nationwide "mandatory buybacks" etc. comes at the same time as talk of packing the supreme court, the "green new deal," etc? The implication seems so obvious that no...

Suppose we have a blued handgun with a few spots where minor rust has gone through the finish, leaving behind a few tiny pits (now cleaned out). The concern is that the pits are potential sites for new rust, and we'd like to prevent that from happening. Basically, we'd like to fill the pits...

I'm really digging the Glock 48 for one core reason. It lets me realistically EDC (most days) my "one pistol for everything" pistol. That's new. Before the 48, my "one pistol for everything" would probably, somewhat grudgingly, have been the Glock 19, even though it's been about a year since I...

It seems like I'm perpetually in a state of annoyance about the market in new .22 pistols. The entire market for high-quality, compact(ish), SA .22's seems to have been displaced by Umarex and similar not-too-serious pistols that are basically designed to look cool. But that's my very old...

I have been waiting for a Ruger MK IV "standard" (tapered barrel) to be released in stainless, as a kind of indestructible, worry-free .22 pistol. However, it occurs to me that I don't actually know if the design is as rugged as the earlier MK pistols. To those of you who are more familiar...

I like the plastic pistols I own for their highly-useful, tool-like character. They get the usual job done, and they don't complain. There is a very real sense in which it's never been easier to get a reliable, working pistol. That's the "up" side. Yet, for this exact reason, I don't feel...