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sighting in on


range of samples. Plus, today’s duty and self-defense guns are almost universally de- signed to run on JHPs right out of the box, so there’s a reasonable expectation that they


Semi-Auto Pistols: Testing for Reliability


actually will, and shooting 200 rounds of them to prove it might be overkill. Besides this, the pressures of the better part of a decade’s worth of ammunition


shortages have changed the landscape when it comes to supply. Finding 200-plus rounds of your chosen duty ammunition can be quite a feat in the current market, and even if you can fi nd that much, it’s probably going to cost you in excess of a dollar per round. T e logistics and economics of the situation alone simply make the old 200-round stan- dard unrealistic for most shooters and agen- cies today.


A Workable Standard for a New Era?


 They might all look the same, but each one is a unique individual with its own tolerances and fl aws. You need to test yours individually, and not accept generic testing results for your model.


 Put a pair of the JHPs you’re testing at the top, middle, and bottom of the ammunition stack in your magazine. Fill the rest of the space with FMJ.


60 The Police Marksman Summer 2015


So, let’s talk about an alternative—some- thing that might allow you to validate reli- ability in your modern design semi-auto pistol without going into debt over the ammo bill. We’ll start by shooting a few hundred rounds or so of FMJ ammunition through your pistol. T ese fi rst 150 to 200 rounds will allow your pistol to “break in” at a cost that you can (hopefully) accept at current prices. Supplies are still pretty tight right now, but you should be able to fi nd some kind of FMJ to make this part work, and it will allow you to work through the early hiccups that some pistols have straight from the box (most of these will surface and then disappear in the fi rst 200 rounds or so—if they linger beyond that, it’s time to start investigating). Plus, it will allow you enough time to learn the system so you won’t be inducing your own malfunctions, by taking an inappropriate grip, accidentally interfering with the slide or controls during fi ring, robbing the slide of recoil energy due to a poor shooting platform, etc. After the FMJs have smoothed out both your technique and the gun’s moving parts, it’s time to clean and lubricate the pistol, then start shooting some of your “duty” JHPs through the gun to see how they func- tion. I’ll suggest that the best and most af- fordable way to do this is to mix them in with some less-expensive FMJ ammo. It’s important that you do this with a plan in mind, and don’t do it haphazardly. Here’s what I would recommend: 1. Mark the baseplates of a given quantity of magazines that you will use “on duty.” T is is usually at least three magazines—


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