I'm alive and back with a mod for Black Trident Quasimodo holster

I will at some point do a recap on my hiatus, but long story short I was busy trying to survive and did not really had lot of energy left for anything else. Anyway, recently I was looking for things to write about and I was in need of IWB holster for SFP9 (VP9). I was looking for something comfortable to use as both AIWB and IWB holster in "front quarter" (in my case 9 to 12 o'clock position) carry. 

My attention went to Quasimodo holster made by Black Trident from Austria. What piqued my interest was very clever way that Black Trident uses holster geometry to have good gun position without any additional claws or wedges added to the holster. Also, as a bonus, while I ordered holster for HK SFP9 (VP9/VP40), and it accommodates all sizes (yes... even SFP9CC aka VP9CC fits, but looks like in pants from older brother) it also fits my old and trusty HK P2000SK. 

However, as we live in unperfect world, this holster natively does not allow tucking shirt between gun and a belt, as it uses Discreet Carry Concepts Monoblock Clip. This was not a deal breaker, as 90%+ of time I'm casual with shirt or hoodie. But for this times, when I suit up full bussines, I would like to be able to tak jacket off and not show a gun to everyone. To facilitate this need I ordered an option - UltiTuck clip from Ulticlip. It works, I guess, and clip being hidden under the belt (clip grabs pants edge). But good things end here. Tucking shirt into this clip is a PITA and you have like an inch of space here, so shirt doesn't go in deep. 

Other solution was to use additional mounting points provided by Black Trident for single IWB clip. I put single DCC HLR Gear Clip in this point. OK, so problem solved end of rant. Not so fast! While single HLR clip provided option to easily carry with shirt both over or tucked, as immortal Robert A. Heinlein wrote "there ain't no such thing as a free lunch". Single, narrow clip, even as good as DCC HLR (best clips I ever used!), is not providing good vertical stability for holster. One minute holster is canted forward, next minute is canted backward. Damn thing does not want to stay straight as I want it to do. 

This made me think, that best vertical stability comes from double clip holsters. But they have problem of really being position specific. I needed to come up with some solution, and I started thinking. I came up with number of more (most) or less (least) stupid solutions until quite simple idea come up to me. Then I needed some material, some tools and behold! 

Montrala's Mod for Quasimodo!

What I did, was to take a piece of polymer bar from DIY store, cut it to size and drill 4 holes. They I used 2 DCC HLR clips with mounting hardware from original clip and additional Ulticlip one to convert my Quasimodo from single-clip design into tuckable, double clip design. Now holster is both as stable as it was with wide DCC Monoblock and has full tuckable functionality of using narrow DCC HLR. All this without loosing comfort and concealability of great Quasimodo Holster.

If you like Quasimodo and want to give it a try, but want also tuckable version, now you know what to do.

HK P2000SK and Shield RMSc goes IPSC

I was recently tinkering with my P2000SK to make it a bit more "modern". With help of my local gunsmith (Top Gun in Warsaw) it got slide cut for Glock M.O.S. plates (it was done long before HK presented OR plates and I used adapter plates to be able to test different RDS). Basically changes are:
.
1. Shield RMSc 4MOA plus M.O.S. adapter on loan from RWS Cetus (Shield distributor in Poland)
2. LEM V4.1 trigger
3. HK45C magazine release
4. Talon Grips in rubber black provided by Talon Grips (https://talongungrips.com/pistol-grips/hk/p2000sk.html)
5. Viridian C5L

This was part of my project to make modernized sub-compact carry pistol. One of things to asses is how good it works "on the clock". Shooting drills on training is one thing, but shooting competition puts more pressure. Since IPSC allow now guns wit RDS into Production Optic and Production Optic Light divisions I entered L1 IPSC match with my P2000SK. I used 10 round magazines (rules allow 15 rounds loaded in magazine) and removed laser/light to comply. How it worked out you can see on video below. Some remarks on lessons learned are put in video desctiption. Tell me what you think!

UPDATE: My result was 65% of division winner.

Leviathan Awakes

No, this post is not about excellent Sci-Fi series The Expanse and neither about book with this title. It is about what apparently happened recently to Heckler & Koch.

Obviously one of things that happened is HK433. Still behind the glass, still in late prototype stage, still confirmation on expected prices, but it is here. But that is not all. Far from it.

Second glass box on HK booth at Enforce Tac fairs hold short barreled
versions of G36 and HK416 in .300 Whisper aka .300 AAC Blackout. Yes. Finally HK joins the band and better late than never. But this is not all. Far from it.

Is Polish MSBS rifle is as good as dead?

This is not factual information, but opinion piece based on my personal assessment of future of MSBS rifle program. Please take it with grain of salt.

MSBS program is in place for over 10 years already. It should be enough to design and start manufacturing of 2 or even 3 designs. What we have after this time is:

1. 100+ MSBS straight pull repeating blank firing rifles delivered to Ceremonial Company of Polish Armed Forces.
2. Some prototypes of MSBS delivered for informal testing by Border Guard and Prison Service.
3. MSBS in military certification trials scheduled to end later this year (those are not acceptance tests!)
4. MSBS bulpup is even no longer presented by FB Radom on trade fair exhibition.

This of course does not outright mean that program will be canceled or rifle will not be adopted. But there is one big nail to MSBS coffin:

Trijicon HD sights on my HK45C

Yes, I'm alive! Sorry for long hiatus, but "real life" come in way. Happens.

Anyway, Santa come little earlier this year with nice set of Trijicon HD sights for my HK45C. I used first opportunity to install them. It was not easy, but they sit in place. Then I went to verify zero on the range. On picture you can see two 25 round groups. First was on 15m (some 16+ yards), second on 25m (some 27+ yards) - I think it is easy to tell them apart on first glance. POA was top of front sight "slice" bulls-eye in half (at least I tried to keep it there). Both shot offhand with two hand grip, slow pace (and breaks to change/load magazines every 5 rounds). Looks like I need to adjust POA a little, but overall I'm really impressed with this sights. They do agree with my eyes. I will see how they work on some IDPA matches at first opportunity, but I expect them to do just fine. Previously I used Heinie Straight 8 sights, but those did not work good for me. I did not care much for dot over dot alignment and POA/POI relation was completely of for me with POI much higher than on stock sights. Finally I went back to stock HK sights. But looks like Trijicon HD sights will stay here for good. I also need to replace my aging Meprolight sights on P2000SK and SFP9-SF will need nice set of sights, when I get one in my hands.

New Aimpoint Micro T2

I just got info that Aimpoint is going to show new Micro T2 at Eurosatory fair.  It has updated body, with flip-caps, ability to ad anti-reflective device, shielded turret and increased body ruggedness. There is also new reflective coating on lenses to improve quality of view, delivers 5 years on one battery and is water tight to 25m. Basically this is all that was revealed for now. I must say it looks slick. Can't wait to put my hands on one and look trough it. (picture: Aimpoint)

IWA 2014 - Minox ZP8 Tactical 1-8x24

One of most interesting things I noticed on IWA was new 1-8x tactical scope from German company Minox.

IWA 2014 - Walther CCP

On IWA I had my first opportunity to see Walther CCP 9mmx19. Pistol actually makes good impression. Fits hand very nice, slide is easy to operate and trigger is decent.

IWA 2014 - HK news in civilian products

I've seen several interesting things today, for example new Walther CCP with HK P7 style piston system, but now I want to cover some more HK stuff.

IWA2014 - HK at EnforceTac

Today I visited EnforceTac exhibition as prelude to IWA 2014 fairs. Managed to talk a little at HK booth and got some news. Unfortunately, looks like striker fired pistol (HK SFP9) will be delayed more. They have prototype at the booth but not for open play or taking photos. But this delay might actually lead to good news, because they want to refine some aspects of pistol. Other news will be presented soon (hopefully tomorrow - I will believe when I see it) - new version of civilian HK416, named HK MR223A3. It is supposed to have (or at least mimic) features of HK416A5, including ambidextrous layout.

Glock 17 Gen2 ends its career in style

My friend had and Glock 17. It was Gen2 (CNM series), that he bought used some10+ years ago. It was not used a lot by security company that owned it, they mostly carry, rarely shoot (even for training). But my friend, he shot it a lot. And he shot it good (he is one of best IPSC and IDPA shooters in country). He even cleaned it... once a year or so. (Pictures inside!)

HK P30/P30L short travel LEM (CDA) trigger V4.1 aka V4 CH

For last month or so I'm testing reduced travel LEM (called CDA in Europe, for Combat Defense Action) trigger, that I call V4.1 (internal HK designation V4 CH). What this trigger group does is reducing pre-travel  on P30 LEM trigger by roughly 1/3, from 15mm (0.590")  to 10mm (0.393") measured in middle of trigger height. After initial pre-travel there is 1.5mm (0.059") of sear engagement travel (think of it as second stage in 2-stage trigger) and 1mm (0.039") of over-travel. Sear travel and over-travel are same for all variants (V4.1 does not change that) except for V6, that is "real" DAO trigger. Reset is same as standard LEM trigger at 7.5mm (0.295"). 5mm (0.196") of reduction may not sound a lot, but in real life it make big difference. It no longer feels like eternity to take up LEM trigger, so there is less tendency for trigger jerking during fast shooting. Overall feel is very good.

For those wondering how to get this trigger, nice guys from HK sent me conversion chart for every P30/P30L trigger variant and give green light to share it.

Pointless HK P30L endurance test

Recently I received from HK set of factory parts for my P30L. Those parts are V2 LEM trigger with slightly reduced trigger travel. Reset distance remains same. Anyway, installing this parts (drop in without any need of fitting - HK standard) was opportunity to clean up my P30L. Actually field stripping it, made gunk just drop out under own weight. I did not do detailed cleaning, but removed most of what could be removed with soft cloth and paper towels. Put some oil on it and assembled. I decided, that this is opportunity to see how good my P30L works. So from now on I will keep record of rounds fired, add some oil when I feel it really slows down and clean when it starts to malfunction or I got bored (whatever comes first).
Last weekend was opportunity to log 243 rounds on Steel Day organized by Shooting Academy range. Below is video from this match.

How to mod H&S Speedsec 5CW HK USP speed holster to work with HK P30, P30L, HK45 and HK45c

When I got my first P30, I hand on hand my first IPSC speed holster for HK USP: Hoppner and Schumann Speedsec 5CW. I modified it to work with P30 using Dremel tool with cylinder shaped milling bit and hand file. 5CW is made from polymer so use low speed and work slowly to not overdo. Modified holster still accepts HK USP, but also works with USP Compact, P2000, P2000SK, P30, P30L, HK45, HK45C and even HK P7.

IO Aimpoint Micro cover finally arrived

When I first learned about IO Aimpoint Micro cover, I was very excited. Actually I backed this project via Kickstarter service.

Since shipping cost to Poland would probably beat manufacturing cost, I provided address of my friend in US (with his permission) for shipping my Kickstarter "backer kit". But when cover arrived my friend already forgot about it. When he got package he was all "what kind of s..t is that, I do not even own Aimpoint Micro and never ordered such stuff" and he was ready to trash it. Fortunately on same day I asked him if he received my IO cover yet. That was close! But then cover waited for opportunity to be sent to me. This opportunity presented itself, when my daughter turned 1 and friend wanted to send her birthday gift. So now she plays on nice set Skip-Hop floor tiles, I have my IO cover and we both are happy campers! Happy End!

(on photo IO cover spreads it's love over Aimpoint Micto T1 mounted on wz.96 Mini Beryl 5.56 SBR)

HK45 and HK45C returns to Europe

On IWA 2013 HK announced that they plan to restart production of HK45and HK45C pistols in Germany. Both pistols will be available for civilian sales as well as of mil/LE customers. HK plans to offer each model in 3 frame colors: black, OD Green and FDE. Great move HK - keep up! Guns presented on HK booth were still of US production.

HK416A5 - newest evolution of famous assault rifle

During my recent wisit at HK factory in Oberndorf I had opportunity to see and shoot newest installment of HK416 assault rifle, designated HK416A5. While HK has something more in works, this version is to become new standard for some time.

While every year some manufacturer comes up with "HK416 killer", this child of M4 and G36 seems to still be alive and kicking. HK416 is in worldwide use by military (including or mostly by special forces units) and law enforcement. Those users give HK feedback or request some features. What HK want to accomplish is to put most of this requirements in one, standard package, called HK416A5. Most of this features come from M27 IAR, HK416"Norway", G28 or IC candidate, but of course has all previous features like firing pin safety and Over The Beach capability. In next paragraphs I will try to describe this features.

MSPO 2012

This week in Kielce, Poland, there were MSPO 2012 (21st International Defence Industry Exhibition). Some interesting things were presented. I will prepare separate review on new Etronika themal vision monocular. But here some other stuff:

MSBS-5.56 New assault rifle for Polish Army

Fabryka Broni from Radom, Poland (FB Radom) presented yesterday latest prototypes of MSBS assault rifle. This rifle, designed together with Military Technical Academy in Warsaw is proposition of next generation assault rifle for Polish Army.

Hera MPSS 45 and 90 degree selector tested

Update on Hera MPSS safety for AR-15 style semi-automatic rifles/carbines/pistol.

I mounted kit and tested it for some time, including on competition. Safety is very well made, with very good finish. Cut outs for safety plunger are very well made. Previously I used 45 degree safety from Oberland Arms, that was very poorly made and plunger cuts were made in way, that safety was impossible to switch without additional milling to make it work. No such case with Hera stuff. Also (polymer) levers are made good. They fit safety without any play.