armedpeasant
November 18, 2001, 17:38
Took the new TZ-99 to the range, today, and I have a mixed review.
First, the good.
The pistol was at least as accurate as my Glock 17. With my target placed half of the way down the pistol range (however far that is), I was able to keep all of my shots in the black circle of a standard slow-fire pistol target, with most of the shots going into one, big, ragged hole. That is as good as I can shoot, so the pistol seems capable of better accuracy than I am. The ergonomics are very nice. I have medium-sized hands, and the gun fit them very well. I didn't find myself shifting my grip in order to find a more comfortable position. The single action trigger seemed crisp and light, but I don't have any other DA/SA semi-autos, so I really don't have much to compare it to. I would rate the recoil as being similar to my Glock. The pistol really fills up a medium-sized hand, and that probably helps with recoil control.
Now for the bad.
One of the mags failed to engage the slide lock after the last round was fired. This happened the first two or three times that I used that mag. For some reason, it worked fine after that. If anyone has any thoughts on why that happened, I'm all ears. The pistol has a tendency to chuck its empty shells back at your head. Anyone who shoots a Glock should be familiar with this situation. I like to tell myself that getting hit in the head with empty brass, while shooting, conditions me to be able focus on the shooting through distractions.
The big problem was the three failures to extract, out of the 150 rounds I fired. Each time, the mouth of the empty case was still inside the chamber, with the rest of the shell sitting on top of the live round in the magazine. I was using Wolf 115 gr FMJ. I don't know if the FTE's were caused by the ammo, if they were the fault of the gun, or if they were caused by a combination of the two. The extractor claw did not look damaged or worn, and it did not look as if there was any build-up or plating on the claw that would cause this.
The next time I go to the range, I'll put some more Wolf through it, and see if the FTE's continue. I'm hoping that it just needs to be broken-in, or that it just doesn't like Wolf. If the initial bugs go away, I will consider this an excellent purchase for the $270 I paid for it, as it is a nice, comfortable, controllable, accurate shooter. We'll see.
First, the good.
The pistol was at least as accurate as my Glock 17. With my target placed half of the way down the pistol range (however far that is), I was able to keep all of my shots in the black circle of a standard slow-fire pistol target, with most of the shots going into one, big, ragged hole. That is as good as I can shoot, so the pistol seems capable of better accuracy than I am. The ergonomics are very nice. I have medium-sized hands, and the gun fit them very well. I didn't find myself shifting my grip in order to find a more comfortable position. The single action trigger seemed crisp and light, but I don't have any other DA/SA semi-autos, so I really don't have much to compare it to. I would rate the recoil as being similar to my Glock. The pistol really fills up a medium-sized hand, and that probably helps with recoil control.
Now for the bad.
One of the mags failed to engage the slide lock after the last round was fired. This happened the first two or three times that I used that mag. For some reason, it worked fine after that. If anyone has any thoughts on why that happened, I'm all ears. The pistol has a tendency to chuck its empty shells back at your head. Anyone who shoots a Glock should be familiar with this situation. I like to tell myself that getting hit in the head with empty brass, while shooting, conditions me to be able focus on the shooting through distractions.
The big problem was the three failures to extract, out of the 150 rounds I fired. Each time, the mouth of the empty case was still inside the chamber, with the rest of the shell sitting on top of the live round in the magazine. I was using Wolf 115 gr FMJ. I don't know if the FTE's were caused by the ammo, if they were the fault of the gun, or if they were caused by a combination of the two. The extractor claw did not look damaged or worn, and it did not look as if there was any build-up or plating on the claw that would cause this.
The next time I go to the range, I'll put some more Wolf through it, and see if the FTE's continue. I'm hoping that it just needs to be broken-in, or that it just doesn't like Wolf. If the initial bugs go away, I will consider this an excellent purchase for the $270 I paid for it, as it is a nice, comfortable, controllable, accurate shooter. We'll see.