Need help, on a "Targa"

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Pahoo

New member
My next door neighbor offered to sell me a Targa, .25, imported by Excam. Just not that familiar with these and there is limited internet information. He has never shot it and is still in the box with papers. Even thou not my style, I would appreciate any and all input on this pistol. Once again, I thank you .. :)

Be Safe !!!
 
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Ruga Booga

New member
Screenshot_20180505-125550-360x640.pngI like these pistols. I have a Fie Titan and I just bought this one on gunbroker. It is a Targa. They shoot great
 
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Hal

New member
Quality of FIE Titan/Erma/Excam/Tangfolio(in that line) falls midway between Jennings and Colt....

Parts no longer exist for many of them.

I have one of that family in .380 that I've been trying to find grips for.
So far, I've spent about $50 for grips.
The whole gun is probably worth $25 - on a good day.

I hang onto it for sentimental reasons.
 
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Onward Allusion

New member
I have 3 of them - Titans made by Tangfolio, imported by the defunct FIE. They were my first guns when I lived that that city with a name that is not spoken here. Y'all know the one...some of the toughest gun laws yet highest number of shootings... Anyway, back in the days of undocumented carry, they were the go to for my wife and me until we had enough cash for a Beretta Bobcat.

Never missed a bang and never jammed. I would say they are much closer to a Colt than a Jennings.
 
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Hal

New member
Tanfoglio guns are generally pretty good guns.
Click to expand...
Operative word is - - are...
In the past, that wasn't always true.
They weren't all junk, like a Jennings - - but - - a whole lot of corners were cut.
@ best, they were on a par with --I guess - Star/Firestar would be pretty close....maybe...
I guess, bottom line, they were budget guns - more or less like Hi Point is today, only these have an Italian flair & are actually nice looking.
(As much as it pains me to admit it ----the Hi Point may have an edge in quality though...)

My first actual real cartridge gun was a Titan .25.(Tangfolio made)
I traded it on a Ruger Mk I because it was so expensive to shoot.


My second, a - GT380 (I'll have to crack open the gun safe to find out exactly who made it - - if it's all that important. I know it's not marked Tangfolio on it anywhere) is pretty low quality, but, the thing is amazingly accurate.
I quit shooting it close to 40 years ago. I only hang on to it because it saved my backside once.
 
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PSP

New member
My one and only experience with a Targa, (a .380 model), was a disaster. Bought it new and the slide broke into pieces on the first magazine. May or may not pertain to your .25 but the name "Targa" is a red flag for me.
 
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Hal

New member
Tanfoglio guns don't compare to Star. Star pistols are very well made.
Tanfoglios were crude, but worked.
Click to expand...
My M43 (Firestar)isn't really all that refined.
The Tanfoglio made GT line was actually a decent product.
It was the Excam & FIE guns that were...less than stellar.

I do admit though, my FIE GT380's only real fault is the pot metal bottom mounted mag release.
 
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Vesuvius Curmudgeon

New member
I was a biomedical engineer for a while in a big LA hospital and every Friday, full moon, over 86F and 75% humidity and right after welfare checks came out - we'd get a few 'street campers' with severe headaches in ER and I got to hold them down while they were squirming around and wouldn't hold still for x-rays.

Anyway - the guys with the biggest headaches seemed to have multiple .25 cal bullets stuck between their skulls and the outer skin on their head.

They had usually been shot repeatedly with a .25 cal. by someone trying to get an entry-level job in a street gang.

The ER had a jar of removed slugs that was mostly full of .25s.

One of the Hawthorne City cops told me that if I ever used a .25 cal for self defense, to just throw the gun at the guy since it would do more damage that a mag full of bullets.

I believe him.

Reason for edit: spellclunker strikes again!
 
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Bill DeShivs

New member
I call BS on the above post. No ER would save bullets in a jar. Any bullet removed from someone's head would be evidence of attempted murder and would be held by law enforcement.
There are lots of reports of bullets of nearly all calibers not penetrating the skull.
There are also lots of reports of death caused by .25s.
Saying the .25 will not hurt someone is irresponsible at best.
 
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Vesuvius Curmudgeon

New member
@ Bill DeShivs:

BS to you too. ER doctors and paramedics in Hawthorne Community (later renamed: Robert F. Kennedy Medical Center - long closed now because of the area and the war zone it has become) had a running bet card on the number of rounds they got on any weekend. It was better than a football pool.

The jar was kept in the Engineering Department - where I worked as a Biomedical Engineer and Unlimited Horsepower Stationary Stream Operator.

Not particularly macabre or off the wall either - just a visual statement of how violent the whole area was right next to Watts. You know about Watts --- right?

Doctors had to be escorted in and out of the hospital by the police or CHP when times were particularly violent. Nurses always had two male escorts to their cars in the fenced-in parking lot.

It was like VietNam. We were primary Triage facility for LAX and that area went over to Harbor Gen and Little Company of Mary.

As far as 'evidence' - well one or two bullets buzzing around in a street camper's head didn't matter to the police as they had so many cases of this stuff that it was a non-issue.

Before you pop off again - remember that I was there. You weren't.
 
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Vesuvius Curmudgeon

New member
Strangely enough - the head of the Engineering Department was my best friend who hired me to work in the hospital.

Yup - I had to wear two hats - I was enlisted as the only college grad in the engineering department except for the Chief Engineer who was retiring in half a year and he didn't want the job.

My sheepskin didn't actually cover 'Biomedical Engineer" so after three years of performing all the PMS and repairs, they had to hire a retired NASA Space Engineer - whom I had to train at the lowest levels of electrical theory before he felt secure enough to work on the surgical suites laminar flow and the Variacs for the overhead surgical lights.

Just because I had the boiler license, I was a shoe-in as ex-Navy for a (BT's) Boiler-Tender job. My pressure hull cert was the best ticket there though, as I had been certified to weld the hull of SeaLab-1 for the Navy when I worked in a cryogenics company in Buena Park.

Sometimes - I feel like Forest Gump. I did a lot of things in my life. Missed being a neuro-surgeon by just THIS MUCH though.

Now I have a Glock and I am learning how to use it.
 
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