Handguns

If you find the range in prices for the very similar guns described in the deck above to be shockingly wide, then you had the same reaction as our staff. After all, each gun has a polymer body. You know, plastic, the material that was supposed to reduce cost. But atop each plastic grip frame is the 1911 action, and as we have said before, this is a design that requires some real hands-on work to make it accurate and smooth. Even if you replace most of the work with a machine, there is still hand fitting, and those darned CNC mills are pretty expensive as well.

At $875, the Kimber Pro Ten II was the lowest priced of our three test guns. STI, which originally stood for Strayer-Tripp International, offers designs so advanced it refers to its line of Browning inspired pistols as 2011s. The VIP model is twice the price of the Kimber at $1,725. In the middle at $1125 is the KZ45 Compact from Wilson Combat, the first series of plastic guns to come out of the Berryville, Arkansas, shop and also their least expensive model.

Given the price range of these guns and the reputation of their manufacturers, we figured it would be a surprise if any of them malfunctioned. What we were looking for was any substantial difference in performance among the three. Also, we wanted to know if polymer played a key role in the success or failure of these pistols.

For less than $100, you can change out barrels in the .30 Tokarev pistol and shoot cheaper 9mm ammo. Also, Savage's Model 12VSS sets a new standard for .308 rifles.

HK's USP Elite may be your best alternative to a custom gun, but the Para Ordnance 7.45 LDA single stack is the 1911 for every man.

The Taurus Raging Thirty, $898, could be the "Great Light Hunter," but Ruger's .30 Carbine is a bargain at $415. The Taurus $898 Raging Bee is pricey, but it's also a kick.

Nearly equal on paper, these three rimfire pistols have very different personalities. Which one is the right pick for you?

The words "mouse gun" (usually uttered with a sneer) commonly refer to smaller-caliber semi-autos that measure about the same size as the average adult hand. But what would you call a pistol of similar dimensions if it were filled with .45 ACP rounds? Mighty Mouse?

Designing a small semi-auto has always been a tricky proposition. Given the reduced mass and shorter top end, anyone who tries to build one is faced with the challenge of getting the slide to gather and eject cartridges within a very small window of time. To see if current technology had conquered the obvious pitfalls, we decided to take on three production pistols that appear to be miniatures of John Browning's 1911 Government model.

As a subscriber-supported publication, it is reasonable to believe that Gun Tests readers are passionate about guns. This means they have an active interest in collecting, shooting, participation in gun sports, and of course, self-defense. While it is easy to appreciate the most expensive firearms such as the Korth revolver (July 2002), each of us know that nearly any reliable handgun can be used to stop an act of aggression. In fact several people among our staff and associates became interested in firearms not from a family member nor via the NRA, but after playing the part of the victim wherein a handgun might have changed the outcome. It is easy to be reminded of this whenever we see a movie that begins with a horrendous or unspeakable crime against a defenseless victim. For example, in Jean Claude Van Damm's The Replicant, a serial killer enters the apartment of a young mother and brutally kills her. She is aware of his approach but does nothing. We find it amusing that this representative film and so many others could be shortened to approximately three minutes if the intended victim had merely lifted an unadorned .38 Special revolver and fired. But then we would have been denied the pleasures of so many more movies by the "muscles from Brussels."

Smaller guns have always had a certain appeal. In some cases it was just the aspect of miniaturization that captures our imagination. In other cases it was the reassurance of a highly concealable weapon. One niche of such guns were semi-auto .380s, which have long been popular sidearms because of their flat, short footprint and sufficient, if not outstanding, power.

The words high-capacity and revolver are not often used in the same sentence. However, eight-shot revolvers have been on the scene for a number of years now, and the list is quietly, almost secretly, growing. In the last year, Smith & Wesson has released two new models, one in .38 Super and another blued-steel model with old-fashioned (nee, classic), two-piece wooden grips, to replace the Model 27. In this test, however, we'll focus on the two revolvers that started it all, the Taurus 608 and the S&W 627PC.

While older designs, such as the double-action revolver and the 1911 semi-automatic pistol, continue to prosper through new materials and manufacturing techniques, the polymer-framed pistol may be at the forefront of pistol development. The .40 S&W is the leading round chosen by today's local and federal law-enforcement professionals. Compact .40s (3.5- to 4.25-inch barrels) bridge the gap between plainclothes duty and civilian concealed carry, and of these, the lightweight "plastic" pistols lead the way. And the Glock line of pistols is perhaps synonymous with the word "polymer."

Fourteen hundred feet per second from a pistol in 1930? Make that 1896! In the late 1800s Hugo Borchardt designed a pistol, and a cartridge for it, that became the Model 1893 Borchardt pistol. Borchardt was an American, but his pistols were made by Loewe in Germany. (The Borchardt pistol evolved into the Luger pistol, which used a shorter, less-powerful .30-cal. cartridge.) A hotter loading of Borchardt's cartridge was adopted by Mauser for his 1896 pistol, known as the "broomhandle." Velocity was in the 1,400 fps realm, and it was the fastest handgun cartridge around for many years.

With so many new compact and subcompact semi-automatic pistols on the scene, we are not hearing as much about the snub-nosed revolver as we used to. A snubbie is generally defined as a revolver with a barrel length of 3 inches or less, and, traditionally, this term is applied to smaller-framed guns.