Sullie

I see that the 9mm now is available with an external thumb safety. Anyone know if it is possible to install this safety on a gun that didn't come with one? If so, is it easy enough for the average guy to do? Are the parts available? Or is this a gunsmith only operation?

I find that canting the gun is useful when shooting around the left side of a barricade (since I am right handed) and using the barricade as cover in IDPA.

Thanks, this helps a bunch!

Thanks for all of your responses. Here are a few more questions: why are the mags so stinkin' expensive? STI mags look like they are $60 apiece, but from what I gather, don't work well unless properly tuned. STI offers tuned mags for double the price. Why does STI offer the $60 mags if they don't work? What's involved in tuning mags? Can I do it myself?

Exactly!!

I understand that many load long for feeding reliability. However, I am a little confused about some of the statements above. Someone said that loading long allows you to get "softer" felt recoil. Sure, with the same powder load it would make for softer shooting because of the lower pressure, and therefore lower velocity and lower power factor. You can accomplish the same thing by keeping the OAL the same and lowering the powder charge. However, in order to keep the same velocity and pressure between two rounds of different lengths you would have to change the powder charge, no? This would require more powder in a longer loading to make power factor= more powder equals more money sent down the barrel. So it seems to me, unless I am missing something, that the only reason to load long is for feeding reliability if that is what your gun likes. Coco, you made it sound like by loading long you could use moly/poly bullets when you couldn't otherwise......why is that?

So this is common? The reasons I ask are two fold: 1) I don't see why the slide locking back when the gun is empty would be undesirable. I understand that the goal in USPSA is never to run the gun dry. If you forget to do a speed reload where you planned to and eventually run dry then the gun's indication is that it goes click instead of bang. This necessitates a reload and rack the slide to get back in the action. If the slide locked back it would indicate you were empty and could then do an emergency, or slidelock, reload. Which is faster than the first scenario. 2) The other reason I ask is because when I buy my new gun I want to use it for IDPA also. The goal in IDPA is to only do emergency reloads whenever possible, because otherwise you must retain the ejected magazine= SLOW.

I am considering buying an STI 2011 gun, probably the Eagle. A couple of questions: I have heard that they will only feed rounds that are loaded pretty long, is this true? Also, it seems that many USPSA shooters' guns don't slide lock after the last round is fired. Is this set up this way on purpose? If so, why? Is it a function of the gun itself or the magazine?