As long as we are bashing Glocks! When I retired in 03 my Agency offered my G23 to me as a retirement token. I gently and politely told my District Manager who made the offer, to keep it. Only free gun I ever turned down. To this day I don't own a Glock.
Thank you Mr. Cartwright for your telling of the "five shot". I think they kept S&Ws doors open for decades, a properly set up one is a treasure.
Last edited by Zeke38; 05-08-2020 at 09:42 PM.
Bashing G23s doesn't equal bashing Glocks. A free G23 is a $99 conversion barrel away from being a cheap G19 which is whole other animal.
The strange thing is the G27 is slightly easier to shoot and significantly more reliable than the G23. The G23 is one of those concepts that briefed well but failed in practice.
My posts only represent my personal opinion and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or official policies of any employer, past or present. Obvious spelling errors are likely the result of an iPhone keyboard.
Getting back to the original topic, I saw Colt only briefly mentioned. Did anyone carry Colt Detective Specials or other Colt steel-frame equivalents, or was Smith & Wesson a mostly universal preference?
Glad to see you posting on this Bruce. Thank you! This place will be better with Bruce here. He is one of the very few folks from the FBI I really like. Many of their gun guys are squared away and were usually disliked within their own agency, but also the few that get along well with outside agency folks and can play well with others.
Just a Hairy Special Snowflake supply clerk with no field experience, shooting an Asymetric carbine as a Try Hard. Snarky and easily butt hurt. Favorite animal is the Cape Buffalo....likely indicative of a personality disorder.
"If I had a grandpa, he would look like Delbert Belton".
I share Mr. Cartwright’s preference for the Spegel-stocked no-dash M640 as the best steel J-frame POW option. It sat lower in the pocket than the magnum M640-1, and its DA action was a little better than the Chief and Bodyguard alternatives. Mine gave me excellent service prior to the 2004 edict. It was of much greater day-to-day utility than any of the hi-speed long guns locked in the trunk of the Bucar.
The guns were typically shot once a year for qualification on the 50-round Double Action Course, and that was about it. The issue “Plus P Plus” Hydrashok 147s (of song and story) had difficulty making minor power factor--even out of a 4” barrel--and did not beat the guns apart, so they almost never required repair. I don’t think our office sent even one five-shot back to Quantico for repair during the five-year stretch I kept track. So the loss of gunsmith support as the reason for dropping already-approved POWs rang a little hollow.
And no other approved handgun, then or now, enabled the agent working alone to knock on an unfamiliar door ready to reliably deliver a sub-one second hit from the pocket, if necessary, without alienating the resident or the neighborhood whose cooperation he was attempting to enlist. If you needed to do a car meet with a particularly-sketchy Source, a J-frame under the thigh provided a combination of control, accessibility, and safety, which no other firearm option could match. Sadly, the loss of the J-frames left a hole that has not been filled by any of the small Glocks, even though they are excellent pistols.
This is destined to be yet another great thread. Thanks for the history and insight.
Working diligently to enlarge my group size.