Bongo Boy

Deleted for being just plain dumb.

I know this is an old thread, but I think the topic of springing the Hunter is one of current interest--if only because I now have a Hunter. Someone over on shooter's forum recommended a 24 lb Wolff to me, but I have not tried one and all that's even listed at Midway for a standard Witness is a 22 lb spring. But all that aside, I'm really curious what symptoms you're experiencing (ronemus for example) that tells you the 25# spring isn't strong enough. Is it what you feel, or what you see when you inspect the gun? Also for Ronemus--did you REALLY mean 3/8"...no typo there? Just checking because the total length of exposed ejector with my slide fully retracted is about 3/8", barely.

Congratulations!!! My understanding, gained from photos and description at, I believe, the Tanfoglio web site (Italy), the 45ACP model does not have the slots in the slide while the 9mm and 40 cal do. In other photos floating around the internet of the 45ACP model there are no slots in the slide. There was a Bullseye model at gunsamerica that I missed by about 5 days--when I was ready to pick up the phone and do the deal, it had been sold. No where in any of my research on the gun did I ever see (or at least notice) it was a chromed gun--I thought it was stainless. I would have been horrified to find out the hard way, as my plan all along was to send it off straightaway to be melonized throughout. Wow--THAT would have been a Sev 1 screwup on my part. In any case, what a gorgeous target gun. I also had no idea there was, essentially, a .22 'conversion kit' for it...that's all new to me not being familiar with the line. I'm happy to say I have the Witness Hunter on its way in 10mm...can't wait to heft its massive splendor and get familiar with it. Congrats again on the magnificent Gold Match.

I swapped mine out immediately, but nothing to do with POI...I just don't like FO. If I were a better shooter, had a coach or was more patient I'm sure it would have worked out well, but it was just too radical a departure from the picture I like to see. I don't 'get it' when it comes to having a big green flashlight in my eyes when I'm trying to find the sights.

I can't say for certain if you'll have to change the spring. My impression so far of both the MP40Pro and the MP45c is that they are very forgiving when it comes to load range, and seem to handle just about anything. For the really wimpy loads, however, I did change out the MP40 to a 13#. I also believe the stock spring is 16#, and IMSI offers 13, 15, 17 and 20# springs (Brownells is one source). I finally worked down to 3.0gr of Solo 1000 under the 180gr TC lead bullet, and I find it sweeeeet. Others might find it a big sluggish, I did initially, but now I rather enjoy it. Seems to be cuttin' it kinda close though at about 127PF, but OTOH it seems consistent with an SD of around 15 or so as I recall, and that was a bad day for the chrono. I've got about 5,000 rds of lighter loads through the Pro using both the 13# and 15# springs--no hiccups.

Not having the slightest clue as to which stage, if any, is a classifier is probably a help for me, then?

From the Alliant web site: 'Best' load may mean different things to different folks. Bullseye target loads in an M1911 vs IDPA loads in an MP45c, for example. Or say you want to load these to simulate your personal defense ammo in terms of 'feel'--or maybe you just want a load that is a factory published, presumably safe load and other than that you don't care. Often these little details of what you're really after can make a big difference in the answer.

I took a quick inventory out of curiosity. In 40SW I have: Federal R - P Speer Winchester PMC Blazer *I* [no idea what this headstamp is] CCI In 45ACP, I have all of the above plus Fiocchi, HSM and WCC Match. I have about 4,000 45ACP cases and about 2,000 40SW, very roughly. I've reloaded the 45ACP too many times to count, but it's all been reloaded about 5 times. The 40SW has almost all been reloaded 3-4 times I'd say. I have not found any significant differences between any of the brass listed--actually I haven't noticed any differences between them. In the 25,000 or so reloads done with this brass, I believe I've thrown out exactly 3 cases for neck splits, about 8 that were Berdan primed (and of course broke my decapper pin), about 20 that I've crushed in the press, and about 50 where I crushed primers on seating them, over-seated bullets or suspected I'd double-charged but wasn't sure--nothing wrong with the brass in other words. The only time I've had trouble with primer seating (where my failure to keep the press clean was not the fault) is when using Wolf primers, which I don't do anymore. I don't lube anything, have never reamed a primer pocket and will likely stop bothering to tumble the brass as well. I've started putting a fairly heavy crimp on the 40SW, so I expect I'll see that brass start to crack sooner than the 45, which I expect will easily last the rest of my life. If I should somehow get a steel case in the box and I can decap it, I'll likely let it run through the press too, just so I can say I did it.

Dry fire practice, for the problem and conditions you're describing. Each time I invest time in dry fire practice, I get significant and very noticeable improvement in my precision shooting at the range. By 'precision' I mean relative slow fire with the intention of placing tight groups.What I believe you're describing is addressed best through LOTS of dry fire practice, then an intent on your way to the range to repeat what you practiced in dry fire. When you are actually AT the range, just DO what you did during dry fire--assuming you were successful in dry fire. You can (and will) blink, and pull and everything else during dryfire, too. Dry fire simply allows you to address the problem by making it easy to see. You still have to learn to keep your eyes open, press the trigger and follow through. When you can do that well and consistently, the challenge is then to do it at the range during live fire. You will succeed in that, with practice, and you will see your group sizes cut in half, or more, the first time you succeed. As mentioned in this thread above, during relatively rapid fire sequences, if you break a shot on an empty chamber, a dummy round or a round that fails to light up, you'll likely see a noticeable muzzle dip. At least for me, this happens even though I'm drilling tight groups into the target and hitting exactly where I want to. It's not a flinch--different situation.

I have to wonder if it's the ".22" or if it's the external observer. Twenty years ago...oh wait, it was thirty years ago, damn! I had a professor subjected to a question from the student, thus,"Uh, professor, what's the difference between a 'good student' and a PhD?". The professor, who I respect big time to this day, responded, "The PhD is able to find his own mistakes." The difference between those of us who aspire to be 'pretty damn good' and those of use who are 'great' is a very, very big difference. Some folks observe others and emulate, and do fairly well. Some just seem to 'have it'. I believe, in my heart, those who just 'have it' observe differently, and that observation and sense of observation is just inherently different. What they pay attention to is different, and the degree to which they pay attention is different. They don't watch others and emulate. They watch performance, and improve. They aren't 'natural' tennis players, not natural golfers, not natural baseball or basketball or football folks. They're consumed not with 'being the best'. They somehow, god bless 'em, improve themselves toward some end. This seems a no-brainer. But I'm convinced it's not a 'no brainer'. It's a matter of a perceptual ability and little more. We'd all like to think we have this ability...we don't. I believe very few of us, in fact, have any ability whatsoever to improve ourselves. We're just pretty damn stupid, actually. We all have the ability to observe poor performance and we all can get damaging to ourselves (our egos damage us, that is) and so on. I'll speak for my own self here now, and not project onto others: I think my performance is absolutely a direct result of my ability to observe and root out cause. I'm a poor observer, and my performance is a direct result: poor. I say again, the .22 has little or nothing to do with what's going on here.

That's a definite 'hit' there, pal. I have to think that, while 80% of why I suck is because I don't shoot matches, the other 20% has to be because I read about how to get better on the internet.

Both my M&Ps are 'rough' when it comes to locking up. Very, very rough. Compared to my SIg or my 1911, the last 1/8" of forward slide travel on the MPs seems to be a real geometry issue. I have to think a lot of energy is needllessly absorbed by poor geometry--I feel a lot of clinking and clanking to achieve lock/battery. But, OTOH, I'm also impressed by the ability of the guns to function with an incredibly broad spectrum of loads. With stock spring, the MP45 handles my 255 gr bullet/3.2gr Clays loads flawlessly, AND handles my Speer Gold Dots just as well. I've not seen a single setup do this bofore without issues. Hard for me to imagine an 11 lb recoil spring on a full size MP frame, with any load. I'm running the 13 IMSI spring with no issues and minor PF loads. But, not sure what the motivation would be to go lighter. I feel it may be getting to the point of 'sluggish', and with that big Pro 5" slide, you need some spring in there to get things done quickly, no? So, I think if you manually cycle the guns, you've got to agree: lock up is pretty nasty. It's just something going on that feels wrong. Lots of room for improvement here.

I work in a company culture that chooses to use 'outcomes', or what I call 'end state metrics' almost exclusively. We use no 'in process' metrics that I'm aware of. This leads folks, IMO, to focus on the end game to the exclusion of improving the steps taken to get there. This behavior translates to shooting, in my mind at least. Many of us, from time to time, go to the range thinking "I want to shoot better", or "I want to shoot tighter groups" or, far worse even, "I want to shoot as well as that guy...". It's a focus on some desirable, ego-satisfying outcome. I find that such a focus is almost always detrimental. Whether that outcome is 'good' or 'bad, either way, ego gets involved and is either puffed up or deflated. In each case, at least for me, performance immediately drops. It isn't a reward that causes us to recall what we did to get the 'good' result, and it isn't a punishment that causes us to correct what we did to get the 'poor' performance. Likely, we don't even know what we did because we were focused on the outcome. Often, my very best shooting results come when I can't see those results; when the lighting, target and background all conspire to completely obscure my hits and all I see is black paper. When this no longer matters will be when only the needed parts of my brain are involved in shooting, I guess.

I carry the MP45c. I tried a few compact .45s at the club including a Sig and a Glock and much prefer the feel and operation of the M&P over the other choices I had. I've used it in a number of IDPA matches also, and it did its job. I find it to be a 'perfect' balance of size, weight, capacity and caliber. I built an IWB holster patterned pretty much after the CompTac. I find it's quite concealable wearing just a T-shirt, and not a huge baggy one, either. I also used this holster at the local IDPA matches, and it worked well, although I chose to tuck the shirt in tight and use a vest at the match. This was just for general safety and to reduce the stress levels for everyone around me. No dislikes at all, really. I do find that will full-power SD loads (I run Gold Dot 185s), a magazine or two worth of shooting will yield some serious discomfort at the big knuckle middle finger where it jams up against the trigger guard. I've rounded and polished that tight corner of the trigger guard where it turns into the grip, just at the mag release, and that has helped somewhat. For my standard powder-puff match loads, I've shot over 400 rds at one time at the range with no issues. I had no experience at all with 40SW when I bought the gun, and wanted to stick to .45ACP rather than proliferate calibers to stock and load, etc. But, I ended up buying an MP40 Pro anyway, and now I'm loading and shooting 40SW 90% of the time. My No.1 choice of CCW would now probably be the MP40c, but certainly no reason for me to give up the MP45c since I have it. The MP40c would, in my mind, be an even 'more perfect' balance, with arguably some added 'firepower', if that sort of thing appeals. I'm still of the mind that 8+1 is enough for the fella who keeps his head up and looks around. If I had one single thing to ask of the design, it would be that they include sear block removal as a field-strippable operation. The roll pin that holds it in would be better as a pin removeable without a tool. That would be very cool.

There's nothing convenient about doubting everything. Belief is convenient. Doubt is all about reflection. I conclude Poincare was a freeking idiot. Doubt is, to my mind, the heart of knowledge. We simply don't know shit until we question everything. If we DON'T question everything, we begin to regress/degrade into belief and of course the evil curse of Religion ensues. Not only do we believe, but we kill others who don't believe the same way--my definition of Religion.Wasn't there some French guy who invented the microscope? Jeeeez. There truly was a Golden Age in France. And lordy be...that age came into existence because folks suddenly cast off the shackles of 'belief'. Doubt is the painful magic of human existence. Belief is its comfortable curse. 'Infidel' as a scream to the sky is an angry moment when a man says you do not believe as I do. And it's at this moment when any reasonable man raises up the weapon he's been granted the right to wield, and splashes that awful shit's head into space with a round of freedom...there is no set of rules, or religion., that OWNS me!!!! f*#k you!!!!. Give me liberty, or....heh...die you a_-hole! That's the whole deal with our friends who love their religions. No GRAY. And this is why we have so much slaughter--religious black and white.