My Girl needs a Limited gun!

[Shawn Knight]

Alright my girl has decided she wants to move to Limited. I have let her try several different pistol designs and she has settled on a Tanfoglio/Witness in 40. I need to figure out how much this is going to cost me. I am looking for Prices on a Tanfoglio Limited Custom or a Witness Elite Limited.

Most of the information on the internet is hard to follow.

Henning, Do you sell the guns themselves?

Edited June 26, 2010 by Shawn Knight

[chbrow10]

I'll tell you where I am at right now on my Witness Match build:

Used Witness Match from gunbroker, shipped : $425

Canyon Creek Magwell: $120 shipped (on sale now)

Welding for the magwell: ~$50 locally

The gun came with 2 magazines, so I'll convert those 21 reloadable via the Hennings kit, $50/each, $100 total

Additional mags, $90 each

Hennings Conefit Guiderod (so the frame won't peen) $35

Holsters start at $65 (Bladetech DOH)

competition belt: $50-60 new

mag pouches: ~$35/each

I chose to go the "upgrade match" route, some folks prefer to spend more (2X?) and start with a Limited so they already get the magwell.

Edited June 28, 2010 by chbrow10

[RIIID]

She would probably like something like this.

[DarthMuffin]

I would start with the Limited, and then add:

Henning's aluminum grips (essential for smaller hands)

4 of Henning's mags with extensions (or buy extensions/followers/springs for your current mags).

Henning's 10.75lb recoil spring (assuming you're running reloads that are near 165PF and not factory ammo)

Belt and mag holders (your choice, I use CR speed)

Blade-tech DOH holster

Optional would be Henning's flat trigger, depending on the size of your lady's hands. My wife needs it on her gun.

Season with grip tape to taste.

On the "short list" of improvements after the initial gun is together and she likes it:

13lb hammer spring

Henning light firing pin

A full length pass-thru type case sizer for reloading use.

Once she gets into it you can start looking at other things like magwells (stock still working fine for me), flat triggers, hammers, sears, conefit guiderod (for wear, you'll be OK with the stocker for several thousand rounds and should know by then whether she'll be keeping the gun).

Edited June 28, 2010 by DarthMuffin

[Marv Z]

I have a package for sale if your interested. See attached pic and PM me.

[RUSHARP2]

I have a package for sale if your interested. See attached pic and PM me.

Not to jump on Marv's post, but I know the former owner of that package. It is a real shooter, the guy took real good care of it. Depending on the price, it should be a good deal.

I actually bought the matching package that my buddies son used.

FWIW...I upgraded from a Match to the Limited, but kept the Match.

My wife seemed to think the Limited was a little heavy for her to do a little dry firing. But I love it.

Matt

[CHA-LEE]

I built a Limited .40 Minor gun for my wife to shoot and the main requirement was that it shoot really soft. I had 1oz taken out of the front of the slide and use an 8lb slide spring. Then I use 200gr FMJ Montana Gold Bullets with 3.5gr of Clays with an OAL of 1.225. It shoots VERY soft, like .22 soft, and she loves to shoot it. Sure the gun has a bunch of other aftermarket parts and modifications but I don't think that would make much of a difference to her verses having it shoot really soft. Build up the right load so your lady feels comfortable with shooting it first then worry about the other modifications. If she does not want to shoot it because it recoils too harsh it does not matter what other modifications you make to it because she won't want to shoot it.

[Shawn Knight]

My girl says shooting softly isn't as much of a problem as having the gun fit her. An XDm40 would be a good choice but I don't like the accuracy potential from the gun nor do we think going a "cheap" route is in her best interest. I have had her hold a Witness Limited Elite and she liked the feel of that gun vs my S_I gun. That is one of the reasons we are going with a Witness/Tangfoglio framed gun. Major 40 recoil doesn't seem to bother her at all.

[RIIID]

My girl says shooting softly isn't as much of a problem as having the gun fit her. An XDm40 would be a good choice but I don't like the accuracy potential from the gun nor do we think going a "cheap" route is in her best interest.

I take it that you don't want an accurate gun and a Custom XDm costs just as much as a Tanfoglio so that would make it a "cheap route" also.

Not a dig just an observation.

Rich

[Doodle]

My girl says shooting softly isn't as much of a problem as having the gun fit her. An XDm40 would be a good choice but I don't like the accuracy potential from the gun nor do we think going a "cheap" route is in her best interest.

I take it that you don't want an accurate gun and a Custom XDm costs just as much as a Tanfoglio so that would make it a "cheap route" also.

Not a dig just an observation.

Rich

Hello! So I'm the "girl."

I actually shoot production right now with a XD9 and I love it. For a while I was reading about the XDm and what it would take to make it a competitive limited gun. I have little hands and I'm kinda weak right now, but I've started working out again to fix that. I love the way the XD feels, but after talking to other people and reading a lot I thought I'd try out a 2011 platform. I couldn't find anything that really felt comfortable. From the thumb safety, to the mag release and the grip circumference... It just felt really unnatural. We happened to be at Cabelas and they had a .38 super Tanfoglio Limited Custom and it was magical in my hand. We talked about buying it and converting it to .40 because I didn't want to be shooting minor in a sea of major. I think it's a beautiful gun, I love the way it feels, and I like the idea of having a gun out of the box that I can compete with, although for me the XDm has certainly been in strong consideration. I think the "cheap route" comment was just in reference that it would initially be less expensive, and then we could make the mods as the funds became available.

Lindsey

[Skydiver]

Welcome to the BE Forums, Lindsey!

I'm shooting Limited 10 with a Witness Match .40 that I've been doing upgrades. I started out with the Canyon Creek magwell that I JB Weld-ed on. I had to get new base pads from Henning because of the deeper magwell. I also went with the Henning aluminum grips because they are thinner than the factory grips making it easier on my small hands to not have to shift as much when hitting the mag release. Since I was doing the order, I ordered Henning's iFiber sights as well.

Out of the box, the gun came with a nice trigger. Polishing the internals just made it even better.

My original plan was to stick with the stock sear and hammer and only upgrade when those got worn out, but I ended up doing the upgrade early because part of the sear chipped off where it engages the hammer. (I didn't want to have to wait to send the gun to EAA to have it fixed.) If I was going to replace the sear with the longer lasting EGW sear, I may as well get the matching EGW hammer, so I did that upgrade several months ago.

My latest upgrade was a conversion over to use Henning's flat trigger. I had gotten really frustrated by the song and dance that needs to happen to reinstall a trigger after doing a detailed strip of the gun. The flat trigger system makes this operation a snap. If you like to tinker like I do, then I do recommend this upgrade. If you have small hands, then the flat trigger brings the trigger much closer to the grip and I'd call this a must have upgrade. If the trigger distance/position on the stock gun is right for you, then consider this an optional upgrade.

Just so that you know, there are a couple of downsides to this gun mostly centering around lack of after market parts. If you don't go with the BladeTech DOH holster, and try to use a GhostHolster, a World Shoot Match II, or the new Double Alpha holster, these holsters don't fit the Witness match. It looks like these latter holsters are made for the Witness Limited with the square trigger guard, rather than the rounded trigger guard of the Match. (If you do a search through this forum, there is a thread or two about how to modify a WSM II to handle the rounded trigger guard.) If you choose to go with the Versa mag pouches, you'll have to use some washers, or build yourself a shim for the pouches to grip the mags properly. (As I recall, there a was a thread here with pictures of somebody's home made nylon shims.) I'm still in search for replacement rear sights for the Match because of the non-standard dovetail size. I think that the Limited has great sights to start off with, so there's no need for a replacement. If you can get your hands on a pre-2007 Witness Match, they also have the great sights on them.

Overall, I've been really happy with this gun!