They,are also offering a manual safety as well!!
They,are also offering a manual safety as well!!
When I was over in Glasgow MT visiting my good friend last month we went out to the range. He has a compact XD. I don't know the exact model #, but it is a newer one. After having shot older XDs and having a ho-hum opinion of them I figured this would be the same. That was not to be the case.
His little gun was actually pretty nice. Very thin, carry wise, feeling good in the hand, and it shot quite well. The thing that surprised me was the accuracy. I was shooting at 15 yards slow fire and it was chewing up the center of the target, with the sights perfectly regulated. We shot about 150 rounds through it and it was 100% reliable. I asked him if he ever had any issues with it, and he said it always runs fine. I could not find a single bad thing to say about the gun.
This new version actually looks like a reasonably well thought out package.
I dunno about a consensus, but that sure is my gut feeling. I wish more manufacturers would bring out guns in this class of size/capacity. Right now my choices are a gun with a different grip angle from everything else I shoot, a gun with an (IMO) uncomfortably light trigger with a bad company history of mechanical ADs, and a gun from a company that has worked to undermine the 2nd amendment. None of these feel "good enough" to me though the Glock 48 is definitely the closest.
My father in law and my wife both have early XD9 pistols. Both are low round count shooters, but the next time either of these guns malfunctions will be the first. In my wife's case, I took advantage of rentals at a range where I previously held a membership, as well as a variety of manufacturer special events, to try her out on a wide variety of 9mm pistols, a few .380 pistols, a few .38 revolvers, and a couple of .45 1911's. The first time she shot her father's XD9, she easily and comfortably put 10 out of 10 shots exactly where they should have hit. I bought one for her after watching her do so.
I started competing with the xdm 5.25. Gotta say if it wasn't for that package of the gun, three mags, mag pouch and holster at that price point I probably wouldn't have gotten into competitive shooting. Having the knowledge i have now I wouldn't go out and buy anything from the xd line but damned if it wasn't a good starting off point early in my shooting adventures.
Come, mother, come! For terror is thy name, death is in thy breath, and every shaking step destroys a world for e'er. Thou 'time', the all-destroyer! Come, O mother, come!
The XD has always been attractive because they are fairly “shootable” guns.
The issues have been:
Durability
Reliably
The grip safety locking the slide
The lack of spare parts and armorer support / SA wanting everything sent back to the factory.
Aftermarket parts are available from Powder River etc but not OEM.
The single stack compact, the XDS finally got a grip safety that doesn’t lock the slide.
150 rounds won’t say one way or the other if the durability/ reliability issues have been addressed. Trainers who see lots of CCW holders with XDs in class still say it’s a problem.
Regardless SA still wants everything sent back to the mother ship.
Pardon my ignorance of the various versions, as frankly I have skipped over anything to do with them. His did not have a grip safety. Plus no grip zone (I was slightly bummed about no grip zone deal, as I was going to trash talk him ruthlessly about this, when he told me he had an XD while we were planning to go to the range) I know he has under a K through it, so who knows what will happen long term.