EXPLORE Most Read Articles on Recoil Presents: Concealment

1 NITECORE EDC37 FLASHLIGHT URL: nitecore.com MSRP: $140 NOTES: Nitecore has always made great lights, but their latest releases keep pushing the envelope on usability, ergonomics, and output. The new EDC37 is part of their line of everyday carry lights with a flat form factor, making them more comfortable and convenient to pocket carry than a comparable cylindrical flashlight. This one, while flat-ish, is seriously chonky with output to match — 8,000 lumens and 44,000 candelas out to 420 meters in so-called Lumen-Shield mode. You can ratchet it down to just 15 lumens in ultralow mode. The EDC37 features a super-convenient physical lock-out switch, two dual-stage tactical tail buttons, various configuration options, and a small OLED display. The battery is rated at 8,000 mAh, with a USB-C port for charging.…

1 CRKT PUP WEIGHT: 1.2 ounces URL: crkt.com MSRP: $70 NOTES: This gentleman’s knife is ideal if you need a tiny, edged tool that fits in almost anywhere, from a board meeting to a boy’s night out. Why? It starts with form. With rounded handle corners, a simple-yet-sophisticated aesthetic, and a short 5.11-inch overall length, the Pup isn’t a tactical pitbull. Don’t get us wrong, though; even a rat terrier has teeth. The sharp 2.09-inch blade, made of quality AUS-10 stainless steel, flicks open quickly thanks to its flipper tab and IKBS ball-bearing pivot. The liner lock ensures an easy one-handed closure. And the sturdy tip-up pocket clip is reversible for both righties and lefties. Petite, portable, and affordable, the Pup has a solid bite despite its runt-like stature. 2 STREAMLIGHT MEGASTREAM…

Radian Weapons made their name with high-quality, innovative AR-15 parts quickly followed by complete rifles. In 2021, they released their widely successful compensator and match-barrel combo, the AFTERBURNER + RAMJET first for the Glock 19, and then followed with other guns. (Radian has a penchant for GOING ALL CAPS with their product names, but here we’ll refrain to not needlessly yell inside your head). Instead of traditional threading, Radian uses a tapered locking screw to secure the comp to the barrel, making the Afterburner + Ramjet legal in all 50 states. One of their newest in the line, and the subject of this piece, is for the Glock 43X, one of two for slim-frame Glock pistols (the other being the SKU for the Glock 48). Also for the G43X and…

We first got word of the HS Produkt Kuna on a factory visit to Croatia, just before the world lost its collective marbles due to a Chinese lab leak. Since then, the design has been refined, and Springfield has added it to their considerable list of SKUs, importing it for the general public as a large format handgun. Why then should you consider this particular wannabe subgun versus anything else out there? Glad you asked. DESIGN When looking at the 9mm carbine scene, there are essentially three main operating systems available to the end user. The most basic — straight blowback — has the advantage of being inexpensive to manufacture, but comes with the downside of a heavy bolt and more recoil than the 9mm Luger cartridge has any right…

It was only 2024 when we first featured the Diamondback Firearms SDR in CONCEALMENT Issue 38. That polished stainless steel piece puts six rounds of powerful .357 Magnum in a package roughly the size of a five-shot .38 Special J-frame. Then, they followed up with a 9mm model chock full of ballistic surprises we detailed in Issue 46 (that one was liked so much it quickly became a carry piece). Now Diamondback is back again, fulfilling their promise that they are dedicated to the revolver space with the new SDR-A. What you see here on the page is technically a pre-production prototype, but only technically — Diamondback doesn’t anticipate a single change between what we’re writing about and what’s going to be on the shelves by the time this issue…

When Diamondback Firearms released their 2-inch Self-Defense Revolver chambered in .357 Magnum back in 2024, we were impressed. Impressed enough that the .357 actually gets used and carried. Impressed enough that we asked them for more. And when we did, Diamondback assured us they would oblige, declaring their commitment to the revolver space. Here is our next taste of more, the SDR chambered in 9mm. Well, not just 9mm. They also have a 3-inch .357 Magnum model to better take advantage of the ballistics, as well as versions of each in a muted glass bead stainless and a hard black nitride, some paired with a Hogue wood grip instead of soft rubber. But here, where beauty doesn’t reign supreme but definitely counts for something, we went with a 2-inch barreled…

We’ve optimized a lot of guns in this column. But why stop there? We decided, for this installment, we’d look at one of the most critical pieces of gun adjacent equipment: the holster. In most cases, the ability to upgrade, or add and remove features, is essentially non-existent. Open box, remove holster. After that, what you get is what you get. Then again, Safariland active retention duty holsters are no ordinary holsters. Featuring scalable and combinable locking mechanisms, manual tension adjustment, and accessories all its own, Safariland’s line has become the de facto gold standard for law enforcement holsters and tactical holsters. While they don’t really fall into the category of concealable, they are ubiquitous among both armed professionals and training junkies alike, and perhaps the only holster line with…

1 5.11 TACTICAL INDUSTRY PANT COLORS: Brown duck, Mushroom, Ranger green, Volcanic URL: 511tactical.com MSRP: $98 NOTES: 5.11 Tactical makes great clothing, and their new Industry Pant has cemented a favored spot in our daily rotation. They’re hard-use pants for folks putting in an honest day’s work, whether military, tactical, on a work site, in a shop, or just at the office. With a straight-fit cut, these pants are neither skinny nor baggy — they’re just right. The thick 98%/2% cotton/elastane blend is durable, stretchy, and very comfortable. Seams and belt loops are all reinforced, and stretch gussets and articulated knees make for great mobility. 5.11 says there’s nine pockets, but we actually counted 10, discreetly located on the front, back, and thighs. As another unadvertised bonus, the Industry Pant also…

You can be forgiven if you don’t know that much about revolvers. Modern gun culture, not to mention movies and television shows, is quite heavy on black guns and semi-automatic pistols these days. This isn’t surprising, given the firepower and cool factor they provide. Revolvers, on the other hand, first became commercially and militarily successful in the 1800s. But you needn’t be a cowboy to appreciate them, or even use them, in the modern day. Revolvers are multi-shot firearms featuring a revolving cylinder with multiple chambers, each holding a round of ammunition. The cylinder rotates to line up with the barrel, at which point you can release the hammer to shoot. Single-action revolvers require you to manually cock the hammer, which also rotates a new round in place. Then, you…

For almost the entirety of the 19th century, “repeating handgun” effectively meant “revolver.” Toward the close of that era, however, various mechanisms were employed to harness the energy of a fired cartridge to eject the spent case and feed a new one into the chamber in its place. Considering that the single most prolific originator of those mechanisms was one John Moses Browning, a citizen of the United States, it’s a matter of high irony that the U.S. domestic handgun market largely remained revolver country until well into the 1980s, nearly a hundred years after Browning ironed out his basic self-loader mechanisms. A large part of the reluctance of domestic shooters to wholeheartedly embrace the semiauto was because of Browning’s most iconic design, the M1911 (known in its civilian guise…

For years we’ve been told we can’t make things here anymore. That American buyers are monogamously married to only the cheapest Chinese crap. The world of firearms has some exceptions, but many of these are due to import regulations rather than market forces. One such exception is optics, but that world has always been a bit bipolar. It’s one of the few places where you [used to] get what you pay for, but in the last decade the gap between the top-end German and Japanese glass and the great gray middle has been decidedly dwindling and the lower end of the market has long been a race to the bottom to see which American “manufacturer” can best wrap their product in pretend patriotism to undercut everyone else the most (until…

Back in 2017, SIG Sauer made headlines by winning the U.S. Army Modular Handgun System (MHS) contract with their P320 pistol. This program would not only replace the aging Beretta M9s in inventory, but also represented a fundamental shift in how pistols were employed by the military. This big win was followed up in 2018 with SIG’s release of the P365 changing the concealed carry game with the inclusion of a modular chassis and, importantly, its high-capacity stagger-stack magazine. Most CCW pistols that have been released in the intervening years have been copying and aping those features as best they can. While there have been shorter and more-compact P320s and also longer-barreled P365s, there was still that gap between the two worlds. SIG made the P365 X-Macro to spackle it…

The Browning Hi Power is one of the most successful handgun designs of all time. In the course of its near-century of production, it has been made not just by FN in Belgium, but also across the globe, often under license from FN, but also by simply ripping off the design. One licensed manufacturer was FM (confusing, we know) of Argentina, which produced a chopped version of the Hi Power with a 3.9-inch barrel that they named the Detective. Both the complete gun and the shortened slide assembly were available in the United States until the early 2000s, and a small clique of devotees sought to produce what they deemed to be the ultimate carry gun by teaming an FN aluminum frame with a short FM slide. But let’s not…

When it comes to responsible home defense, you have to see it before you shoot it. Which means your home-defense gun should have a light on it, or you should be able to hold a light while you use it. If you’re using the classic pump gun, however … well, this whole “put a light on it” is most often just no fun. There aren’t many good places to put them, the recoil gives little leeway to poor quality and bad design, and the ergonomics are usually awful. It’s for this reason that the best solutions here are always dedicated solutions. Hell, this is how SureFire first became well known. Back then, they were called “Laser Products,” and their premier product was a shotgun forend light LAPD procured in advance…

Fast as a flash, a masked man presses a pistol into your face as another entangles your arms. A short scuffle ensues, but you’ve been snatched off the street and forced into a van. Zip ties. Gags. Blindfolds. Like a scene from a movie. What the hell just happened? How the hell did this happen? Who are these people? What happens next? This was a kidnapping. Fast. Violent. Overwhelming. Real kidnappings aren’t always so dramatic and cinematic, but in a world of 8 billion, that very rare thing isn’t all that rare. DEFINITIONS Kidnapping is the unlawful taking or abduction of another by fraud or force. The victim may be physically carried away, enticed, taken hostage, or coerced. The clue to the most common victim of kidnapping is right in…

When SIG released the P365 in 2018 we entered an entirely new era. That small SIG stagger-stack shifted the compromise between concealment and capability forever in our favor. All subsequent successful semiautomatics designed with carry in mind would follow their form factor. The P365 may have started life as a carry gun but now it’s an entire ecosystem. That SIG encourages the aftermarket only adds to this; there are literally thousands of possible combinations. We’ve seen it get longer grips and barrels with the P365XL (see CONCEALMENT Issue 15) and XMacro (Issue 29), but nothing has narrowed the gap between the full-size P320/M17 and the original little P365 than the new FUSE. You can safely see the FUSE as the monkey-in-the-middle, one that feels greater than the sum of its…

1 BENCHMADE KNIFE CO. 533 MINI BUGOUT benchmade.com HANDLE MATERIAL: Blade CF-Elite, Orange Grivory, White Grivory MSRP: Starts at $150 NOTES: This Benchmade folder’s moniker comes from the fact that it’s the baby brother to the popular Bugout model. With an overall length of 6.49 inches, it’s a “big” small knife or a “small” medium knife. Either way, it’s ideal as a lightweight, compact everyday-carry (EDC) tool. The business end features a sharp 3.24-inch drop-point blade made of S30V, a premium stainless steel that balances strength, toughness, and corrosion resistance with edge retention. The simple-yet-comfy handle has CF-Elite scales, a polymer that incorporates carbon fiber to reduce weight but increase stiffness. (The knife weighs just 1.5 ounces.) And the ambidextrous Axis lock is easy to use while providing secure lockup…

Handgunners tend to gravitate toward certain brands — maybe it’s due to decades of proven performance or perhaps it’s a personal bias — and that can leave some viable options out in the cold. Canik Firearms is a brand that’s relatively new to the market, at least when compared to longtime manufacturers like Ruger, Glock, and Smith & Wesson, but that doesn’t mean it should be ignored. Just over a decade has passed since the Turkish company’s guns hit the U.S. market, and if you haven’t tried one yet, it’s time. The precursor to this pistol, the Canik Mete MC9, was first featured back in CONCEALMENT Issue 32. But if you’re unfamiliar, here’s why making some room for the little-bit-larger Canik Mete MC9L in your gun safe — and on…

1 PAYNE LEATHER & TOOL DOUBLE-SIDED STROP PADDLE payneleatherandtool.com MATERIAL: Solid Red Oak MSRP: $85 NOTES: You’ve got some nice knives — everyday folders, a beast for the woods, and likely a decent set of blades for the kitchen. Guys who know how to take care of a knife use a strop. It’s normally the last step in deburring and setting the edge of a blade. But a strop used with some embedded abrasive compound will hone an unabused edge back to razor sharp without taking off as much metal as a stone or file. Payne’s handmade strop is wide enough to make easy work of full-size kitchen knives and is pre-impregnated with green compound on one side for aggressive honing and has natural leather for final stropping on the…

The American gun market, in the face of increasingly accurate and reliable drastic plastics, has seen a great surge of interest in legacy designs. Reviving the classics isn’t always a great idea; just under a decade ago Remington brought back the R51, and while hand-tuned preproduction samples generally ran well, when they hit full production any veneer of quality control and reliability went out for cigarettes and never came back. While not every gun is war-ready, nor should we expect it to be, expectations were set high by glowing reviews. But to be honest, most of the retreads have been pretty darn good — at lower price points to boot. The snake-series of quasi-custom Colts, the Python and Anaconda, live up to their legacies. 2011s, once considered finicky firearms, largely…

Walther’s PPS was introduced to the American market in 2007, and despite being a creditable design, never got the kind of attention it deserved. Once the Smith & Wesson Shield hit the shelves, followed by the fast-becoming-ubiquitous G43, it became about as noticeable as a middle child with braces. Which is a pity, as it’s actually pretty damn good. Responding to the market’s lack of empathy for the design, Walther relaunched the PPS as the M2 version in January, making a number of changes calculated to endear it to U.S. shooters. Gone is the Euro paddle mag release, replaced by an apple pie button at the rear of the trigger guard. The frame got smoothed out and rounded, losing some of the original’s Teutonic blockiness, and its trigger mechanism was…

We carry guns because we expect that at some point we may need to use them. We don’t want to be caught unprepared when a bad guy is doing bad things to … whom, exactly? Using lethal force against another human being is a serious undertaking. Using guns defensively requires us to buy and learn how to use one, to carry it with us even though it may be inconvenient or uncomfortable, and to understand the legal consequences that may result. The costs — monetary and otherwise — can be quite high. Even a justified shooting can still result in getting arrested, needing to hire a lawyer, and having your name and face in the local news as “that person who shot someone.” This isn’t a positive for you or…

For most of the 20th century in the U.S. of A., good guy handguns came in three flavors. For uniformed military personnel, there was the Colt M1911A1 Government Model. For law enforcement officers, security guards, and others who carried their handguns openly in a holster on a basket weave leather belt, there was the Smith & Wesson Model 10 Military & Police revolver, based on S&W’s medium-size six-shot .38 Special “K-frame.” Finally, there was the diminutive five-shot .38 Special S&W Model 36 Chiefs Special (note that there’s properly no apostrophe in “Chiefs”) on the smaller “J-frame” for detectives, plainclothes cops, and the rare private citizen who had a toter’s permit in those generally more-restrictive times. Smith still makes plenty of Jframes, but they tend to be one of a host…

Thin pistols are easier to conceal and more comfortable to carry than thick ones. It should be no surprise, then, that the slimline series of GloGlocks — namely the 43, 43X, and 48 — have been extremely popular choices for everyday carry. However, SIG upstaged them with the P365 and its healthy magazine capacity, soon followed by many other manufacturers — all using more space efficient metal magazines. The Achilles’ heel of the slimline Glocks has always been its thick-walled, lower capacity polymer magazines. Still, people love and/or trust Glocks so much that many either accept this or use higher-capacity aftermarket metal mags like those from Shield Arms. What if there were a Glock-pattern slimline pistol that was designed from the factory to feed from metal magazines? Well, indeed there…

The coach gun isn’t a new addition to the defensive equipment lineup. It’s a tool that’s been around for as long as we’ve used wheeled transportation with items or people to protect. As times (and coaches) have changed, the coach gun has also evolved. The coaches most of us think about are the Old West coaches and their armament. When Wells Fargo shipments were transported on horse-drawn wagons, the employees assigned to security were issued break open, double-barreled shotguns. Why a shotgun, versus carbine or rifle of some sort, would be speculation on my part. Since a business ran those coaches, and the guns were issued, perhaps it was a decision based on budgets rather than effectiveness. We could run down the rabbit hole of why, but that isn’t the…

Shootability” isn’t a real word. Your high school English teacher, Mrs. Prochowski, would have a coronary if she heard you using such a goofy, made-up word. But gun people use the term “shootability” frequently to represent the overall feel and experience of shooting a particular firearm. It’s shorthand to encapsulate key characteristics of what it’s like to shoot a specific gun — its ergonomics, handling, trigger, recoil impulse, what it’s like to shoot multiple targets and transition between them. The ergonomics and handling of a gun are important — how well does it fit your hand and how easily can you manipulate it? Having a good connection between your hands and the gun is key to exerting maximum control over it. The design of controls, contours, and textures all contribute…

Covert Physical Surveillance (CPS) is a powerful tool often employed by government agents and law enforcement to gather intelligence, monitor suspects, and pursue criminals undetected. But these techniques aren’t exclusive to the good guys — increasingly, CPS is leveraged by criminals to stalk, intimidate, and even victimize unsuspecting targets. Understanding how CPS operates — and more critically, how to counter it — is vital not only for those in government service but for civilians, too. This threat isn’t just hypothetical. According to the U.S. Department of Justice’s Stalking Victimization Report (2019), about 1.3 percent of individuals aged 16 or older — equating to 3.4 million people — were victims of stalking that year. Disturbingly, only 29 percent of stalking victims reported the crime, with women affected at twice the rate…

There’s an entire contingent of people who will tell you to simply walk away when faced with an angry [insert offender here]. The thing is, sometimes if you do that you’re just as likely to catch a beer bottle to the head as you are to walk away unharmed. Turning your back on someone who’s more than slightly displeased with you is rarely a good idea. So, what do you do in scenarios where it’d be flat stupid to turn your back, but it’s also not reasonable to draw your gun? Here’s a hot tip: de-escalate. WHY DE-ESCALATE? We’re all familiar with the concept of escalation, and you probably understand introducing a firearm into the mix is generally not considered a way to calm things down. Every so often it…

TIER 1 CONCEALED APX HOLSTER URL: tier1concealed.com FITS: Wide variety of fitments; check website for details MSRP: Starting at $150 NOTES: Tier 1 Concealed is known not just for their holsters but also the amount of training and shooting that the team at T1C does, with an ammo stash to aspire to. And it shows in their products. Their latest holster is the APX, pronounced “apex” (like a proper racer) and developed with Donovan Moore of Point 1 Tactics. Moore is a USPSA Grandmaster and runs his appendix concealment rig during matches. The APX is based on T1C’s popular Axis Elite side-car style inside-the-waistband holster system, with holster and magazine carrier linked as one unit. With competitive shooters as well as extremely picky users in mind, the APX has been…

For many years, it seemed like hammer-fired handguns had fallen out of favor, with striker-fired guns getting the lion’s share of the love. The former describes pistols, such as the 1911, that utilize a hammer (often external but sometimes hidden) that’s retracted by cycling the slide and then dropped when you press the trigger to ignite a round. The latter design includes pistols, like the Glock, that instead use an internal spring-loaded striker that’s released in order to send a round downrange. However, hammer-fired guns — and 2011-style pistols in particular — have proliferated in recent years as they’ve enjoyed a resurgence in popularity. These days, it’s not just gun boomers and competitive shooters who appreciate hammer-fired guns. There are some key advantages to hammer-fired guns. Single-action pistols require the…

We all make mistakes and assumptions, and here the first mess up was thinking of Sarsilmaz like just another Turkish gun company. You might know the type: the ones churning out strange shotguns with questionable-at-best quality. Plastic pistols that feel like their frames were formed from melted yard flamingos and Faygo bottles. Yes, there are many that don’t care if a gun gets bungled or a bundled optic fails on the fifth shot or even works at all — just so long as it costs next to nothing. Pity the person who doesn’t know the difference, because shady gun shops pay their bills by bilking them. It is true several Turkish companies have come a long way (looking at you, Canik), but prior to this piece I didn’t have…

The great thing about improving your skill at presenting your handgun from the holster is that it’s a skill you can measurably improve without firing a single shot. Of all the defensive handgun skills you can use dry-fire to develop and practice, presentation is the one where home practice can provide the most improvement. You can break the process of handgun presentation down into four steps. They include prepping the draw, establishing a firing grip, clearing the holster, and sight acquisition. Let’s dissect each of these so you fully understand the draw stroke process. STEP 1: PREPPING THE DRAW Before you can draw your handgun, you need to be able to get to your handgun. This is of particular importance if the gun is concealed. The method will vary a…

It’s late on a Friday night (early on a Saturday morning, if we’re being honest). You’ve been hanging out with a few friends from the office at a local watering hole in the nightlife district to celebrate finishing up a grueling end-of-quarter report. Leaving the bar and heading for your car that you left in a pay-to-park lot with a live human attendant, you decide to take a shortcut down an alley. It’s late, it’s cold, it’s only a half a block off the main drag, and it’s a pretty good part of town. As you walk down the alleyway, a very sinister-looking dude with a drawn handgun held at his waistline rolls out away from the wall so that he’s facing you squarely from 21 feet away. Rather than…

Colt has always had a thing for snakes, at least when it comes to naming revolvers. When you look back to the glory years of Colt’s revolver manufacturing, it can be hard to tell if you’re visiting a serpentarium or a production catalog. In recent years they’ve reintroduced some of these classic models, or at least the names, with varying levels of success. These include the Cobra, King Cobra, Python, and Anaconda. But that’s little more than half of their legendary Seven Serpents. In 2024, Colt released their newest Snake Gun: The Viper. This is a small-frame, six-shot, .357 Magnum stainless steel, double-action revolver with fixed sights. It differs in a lot of ways from their original incarnation, which dates from the late 1970s. Let’s check it out. THE OG…

Sometime in the middle half of the ’90s, my friend Norm was getting excited about a new pistol coming to the market. He was a casual hunter, fisherman, and worked on engines — and his idea of an expensive handgun was anything over $200. The gun he was excited about? A 9mm Jennings. Norm wasn’t exactly a gun guy, but he had enough information to know better. I hadn’t seen, heard, or thought much of Norm in close to 30 years, but coming across a chrome-plated Bryco Jennings for $121 involuntarily invoked this mullet-sporting mechanic once again. HISTORY When most of us think of Jennings or Bryco, we think of cheap, essentially disposable blowback semiauto pistols that retailed for under $100 back in the 1970s through the 1990s. They were…

Shooters continue to look to wring more performance out of their guns, even those used for concealed carry. Radian Weapons is well known for their line of carefully crafted rifles and accessories, and they’re only too happy to oblige with their new line of parts and accessories for the SIG P365. In particular, the popularity of compensators keeps rising; SIG and many other manufacturers are now offering an array of compensated pistols straight from the factory. A few years ago, Radian introduced their Afterburner compensator and Ramjet barrel system for Glocks. They’ve now brought the system to the P365, so you can put together your own compensated P365. When you fire a round, the primer ignites the powder in the cartridge, and the projectile and propellant gases exit the muzzle.…

Set the controls on the Wayback Machine to Y2K, Sherman. We’re going to the old GlockTalk.com forum to see what the most hoped-for new pistol from Glock was among its most rabid fans back there in the day. While either bitrot or a blown software upgrade erased the forum’s actual archives that far back, some of us were there, Gandalf. We can tell you that two decades ago the most anticipated pistol from Glock was a single-stack variant of the Glock 19. After all, the newest hotness from Smyrna in those days was the Model 36, which took the basic architecture of the 10-shot double-stack Glock 30 .45 ACP compact and slimmed it down by two-tenths of an inch, by using a six-round staggered magazine. This was the middle of…

SIG Sauer’s now-ubiquitous P365 is quite the success story, from its design to the company’s business decisions. For the former, not only did SIG essentially create the high-capacity microcompact category, they designed the P365 to be modular, with a serialized fire control unit that can be removed from the grip. As to the latter, rather than mandate its own view of perfection, SIG opened its kimono to the aftermarket, encouraging companies to develop accessories for the P365. In the years since, the industry has responded with everything from grip modules to slides, filling out the P365 ecosystem. FLEX FRAME Shalotek took this to heart and developed the FLEX aluminum frame for the P365, their own modular ecosystem of parts to fully customize your grip module. You can mix and match…

Whether you want to call them double-stack 1911s or 2011s, guns like these used to live solely in the domain of gamers, paraprofessional tinkerers, and shadetree ’smiths. They started gaining popularity in recent years because of the combination of reduced cost, increased reliability, and consumer boredom with plastic pistols. There are online arguments about what exactly is and is not a 2011, but most of them are merely pedantic quibbling about the Champagne region of France. But let’s cover all the well ackchyually of it. Despite the name, the origins of the OG 1911 lay in the late 19th century. The most celebrated American firearms inventor, John Moses Browning, first put pen to parchment for this pistol in the 1890s. It was officially adopted as the mass-issue American military pistol…

Since the creation of both long arms and handguns, people have been looking for a way to split the difference. Though this has taken many forms over the years, we certainly know where Flux Defense pens the line. The goal of Flux Defense continues to be to give someone the draw speed of a handgun combined with the accuracy and stability of a subgun —all without making it as large as a rifle. This plants Flux Defense and their wares into the Personal Defense Weapon (PDW) category of the continuum. What you see here is merely the latest in a long line of continuous development. Flux’s first SIG PDW conversion, the MP17, was featured in CONCEALMENT Issue 16. The improved MP17 Raider Gen II not only graced the cover of…

Street Howitzer. Room Broom. Scattergun. Gauge. Twelve Iron. Brixton Typewriter. These are just some of the slang terms for one of the most misunderstood defensive weapons of the 21st century — the self-defense shotgun. For many younger or newer shooters, this class of firearm has been almost entirely written off in favor of short-barreled rifles, rifle-caliber “pistols,” and pistol-caliber carbines. This phenomenon isn’t without good reason. Low recoil, high capacity, faster reloads, and a myriad of aftermarket accessories make these alternatives highly attractive to both the novice and aficionado alike. When measured against pump-action guns, the rate of fire also becomes a factor. But the shotgun isn’t without its own advantages. Firepower per trigger press is going to be hard to beat. There’s also the ability to run buckshot, birdshot,…

Currently, concealed carry is all the rage in the USA. Most folks choose a handgun for CCW that is small, comfortable to carry, and most often chambered in a caliber that is easy to shoot. I’m amazed at the number of people who choose .32, .380, .38 Special, and 9mm pistols that are, in essence, pocket guns. All of these types of guns are selected by people who really don’t expect that they will ever really need one. Let’s be honest — most folks pick guns that they really don’t expect to use in a life-and-death encounter. A .32 ACP or .380 is certainly better than a sharp stick in a fight, but sadly, most of these small calibers are not always great in providing rapid incapacitation of a threat.…

It all started with the SIG SAUER P250. First introduced in 2007, and then largely abandoned merely a few years later, the P250 was one of the first, if not the first modular chassis system released by a major manufacturer. A chassis system refers to a design in which the receiver (the serialized “gun” part of a gun) is separate from both the slide and the grip. Ostensibly this means you could hot swap a chassis from grip to grip, from slide to slide, from caliber to caliber. But this wasn’t to be with the P250. SIG revised the grip in 2009, and previous magazines that worked no longer functioned with the new grip style. While some caliber and grip conversions exist, the platform never took hold like SIG originally…

1 REVENANT CORPS GROSBEAK OAL: 6 inches URL: revenantcorps.com MSRP: Starting at $110 NOTES: The Grosbeak from Revenant Corps is made entirely out of G-10. Why would you want an everyday-carry (EDC) tool made out of this type of fiberglass laminate? For starters, it’s non-metallic, so it won’t trigger metal detectors. Secondly, it’s resistant to water, oil, and chemicals. And last but not least, it has an amazing strength-to-weight ratio. The Grosbeak excels at thrusting, thanks to its modified drop-point blade profile and a tear-drop-shaped handle that’s great for a pistol grip. The drawback? Because it’s made of G-10 and not steel, its dual edge is too dull for precise cutting. Still, it makes for a strong defensive tool in non-permissive environments. Available with either a static-line or belt-clip sheath. Trainer…

There’s a reason SIG Sauer has sold a gazillion P365 pistols over the years. They basically created the stagger-stack, micro-nine category that’s so enormously popular in the ever-growing concealed carry market. These kinds of handguns are thin, easy to conceal, comfortable to carry, and pack at least 10 rounds of 9mm. Due to their size and weight, they can be snappy but are still very shootable. These days, you’ll find many options from numerous manufacturers, typically following the striker-fired, polymer-framed formula. But what if you yearn for a more traditional blueprint? A gun that’s all-metal and single-action, like Saint John Moses Browning intended, while still packing a lot of firepower in a small package? First, let’s discuss why you might want such a thing in a world of tiny, wondrous,…

When it comes to carrying a concealed handgun for personal protection, there are many things that need to be considered. The ammunition you’ll carry in that handgun is critical because the bullet it fires is what you ultimately hope will stop the fight … or end whatever attack you’re experiencing. There’s a lot of information available from manufacturers about the bullets they offer, and there’s a lot of information on the internet where users have tested them. However, for you to fully understand this information, you need a working knowledge of bullets. Understanding how they’re different and what makes them work is part of that, but so, too, is an understanding a bullet’s anatomy. BULLET BASICS Simplified, there are two types of defensive handgun bullets — jacketed and monometal —…

You know what people say about assumptions. We’re all familiar with that refrain: “Don’t assume, or you’ll make an ass out of u and me.” When we first saw some new weapon lights from a company called Nightstick that we didn’t recognize, we thought they looked like exact copies of Stream-light products. We assumed it was probably like the optics industry these days — companies touting a “brand new” product that they actually sourced and slightly tweaked from the same Chinese factory that manufactures for someone else. We didn’t give it much more thought until one muggy day in Dallas this summer. It happened at GRITR’s range and retail complex in the northeast corner of DFW. It’s a huge facility; in fact, it used to be a big-box home improvement…

Ever since the advent of both the handgun and the longarm, people have been searching for the best way to bridge the gap between the two. The tree created in this quest for compromise has many branches and brought us to entirely new categories (looking at you, PDW). But one of the easiest ways, and first attempts, to clasp hands was simply adding a stock to a sidearm. This makes a lot of sense. A buttstock increases stability and allows for better recoil management by adding more points of contact with the body. It won’t make a [typically] smaller pistol round hit harder, but it’ll make the shooter more accurate while allowing for faster fire. This is why detachable stocks were seen with some 19th century calvary guns, horseback being…

Concealed carry has been all about the micro compact, which goes hand-in-glove with improved methods of manufacturing. Essentially, you take the frame of a compact, single-stack pistol and thin out the frame so it can accept a fatter magazine with a higher capacity. This gives the shooter more available rounds while slimming down the grip for improved ergonomics and concealability. We have seen this with firearms such as the SIG P365, Springfield Armory Hellcat, S&W Shield, and a number of others. We’ve had a lot of range time with these types of pistols, noting their strengths as well as their shortcomings, and the Heckler & Koch CC9 seemed an intriguing design. The question is now, “Was it a little late to the party?” OVERVIEW According to Heckler & Koch, the…

For the longest time, whenever the name “Bersa” came up in American gun-owning circles it was essentially always in the same context: Someone will have been asking about a good, affordable gun for concealed carry, and Bersa would be mentioned. This is entirely because Bersa made the Thunder 380, which many people describe as essentially a product-improved version of the Walther PPK. Slightly bigger, noticeably lighter, and (depending on the pedigree of your PPK) much more accurate, the Thunder 380 is absolutely unusual in that it was a South American clone of a European pistol that was arguably better than the original. There were plenty around back when KelTec shook up markets with truly pocketable pistols, but long in the tooth by the time SIG did the same with the…

Dahmer, Bundy, Berkowitz, Ridgway, Gacy — when you hear names like these, it elicits feelings of horror and lots of questions. Are they monsters? Were they born without empathy, a conscience, or remorse? It’s easy to answer yes, but what we should be asking about all violent offenders is, “What made them that way?” Was it inevitable they’d commit horrible acts against other human beings regardless of their upbringing or did traumatic circumstances awaken some primal beast inside them? Society desperately yearns to know how these kinds of criminals think, if they can be rehabilitated, and if we’ll ever evolve enough as a society to proactively mitigate a murderous pathology from developing. Laura Brand has had these same kinds of questions on her mind as well and is driven to…

Deciding to get serious about personal safety and security can be overwhelming. There are so many things you’re supposed to do, so much money you’re supposed to spend, and so many changes you’re supposed to make. It’s hard to figure out where you get started, how you do it all, and when you’ve done “enough.” The answer is the same as it is for many other big tasks: take it one piece at a time, like painting an elephant. You don’t always need to pick an ideal solution, with its corresponding price tag and time investment. Buying a gun and accessories, then training and practicing enough to handle it safely and effectively might be your ultimate goal, but it isn’t the only thing that will help you. Even if you…

It’s not every day you can find any type of a SIG handgun for less than $200 (except for maybe a Mosquito, but we won’t go there). Yet that’s what happens when you find one out of production and a little outdated. SIG Sauer’s P230 was supposed to be a revolutionary concealed carry piece for police and civilians when it debuted in 1977, but does a pistol like this still hold up today? HISTORY In the early to mid 1970s, West Germany experienced a series of violent attacks carried out by terrorist organizations, political extremists, and heavily armed criminals. The police were armed with basically World War II relics and needed something to up the ante. This gave rise to development of such iconic guns like the HK P7, Walther…

If you need a better understanding of tactics — high risk vehicle stops, CQB, etc. — you need someone who has practiced and employed those skills over a period of years and carries some practical experience, ideally in the form of an ex-military operator or ex-LEO. But, by that same standard, if you want to get better at shooting, you should seek someone who has practiced and employed that skill over a period of years with some form of practical application. When it comes to the technical skills associated with concealed carry performance shooting, Gabe White meets and exceeds this standard with flying colors. His accomplishments behind a pistol are practical and substantial. Among the accolades listed in his bio, he is the only person in the world to clean…

As the saying goes, the best gun for self-defense is the one that you have with you. And you’re more likely to always strap on a pistol that’s comfortable and convenient to conceal and carry. In that vein of guns intended specifically for this purpose, the slimline family of Glocks got their start in 2014 with the Glock 42 in .380 ACP, followed by the 9mm Glock 43 the next year. Designed for concealed carry, these guns feature a single-stack magazine and put everything you love about Glocks in a very thin and compact package. However, these are quite small guns, with all of the accompanying compromises. It’s harder to shoot a small gun well than a large gun. In particular, the original Glock 43 has a short grip, making…

Concealing a firearm can take a lot of effort. You might have to try or buy new equipment, change the way you dress, or spend lots of time making tiny adjustments to find the magic setup that makes your gun disappear completely. Is all of that work really necessary? You’ll often hear that “no one will notice.” People might even tell you about an openly carried gun that “nobody said anything about.” Printing, when some part of your gun shows through your clothing, might be dismissed as too obscure for somebody to identify — certainly to spot as a gun as opposed to some other object that might be causing an oddly shaped lump in your shirt or pants. WHEN THEY’RE RIGHT Sometimes, they’re right. There are a lot of…

These days, it seems that if you’re a gun maker and you don’t offer a 2011, you ain’t sh*t. Rather than follow the crowd, Kimber decided to put its own spin on the double-stack, 9mm, single-action-only formula, and we’re actually glad they did. Instead of being wedded to the 2011 magazine, the KDS9C manages to shave off a few millimeters from its grip dimensions by being built around a metal mag designed from the outset for the 9mm Luger cartridge, rather than swaging down a .45ACP tube. It’s the same tactic employed by Wilson Combat and their EDC X9 and SFT9 (see CONCEALMENT Issue 36), only at a lower price point. NUTS AND BOLTS Up top, the KDS9C uses a some-what traditional 1911-style slide. Purists will turn their noses up…

Wilson Combat got their start back when the 1911 was king, 9mm was for weenies, and plastic guns belonged to Barbie. They quickly carved out a nice niche for themselves, producing high-quality pistols. Not a company known to bend to trends, new releases could be considered on the conservative end. But new releases they still have. We found their new Wilson Combat SFT9 advanced enough to grace the cover of CON-CEALMENT Issue 35. For the uninitiated, SFT9 stands for Solid Frame, TRAK grip, chambered in 9mm. So, the SFT9 looks like a frame with interchangeable grips but, in reality, it’s milled from a solid piece of aluminum. This allows for a thinner grip than you’d expect. With a 4.25-inch barrel and all sharp edges blended, the SFT9 is definitely designed…

It won’t win you any games of Rock, Paper, Scissors, but rubber is an attractive option if you want a target that lasts almost forever. It’s an older concept but benefits from newer materials. Essentially, Infinity Targets are sheets of kind of special rubber shaped into targets. The primary method of mounting them is with large clips. To “reset” the targets you spray paint them any color you want. Mount the target, shoot the target, paint the target. That simple. ON THE RANGE Infinity Targets are best mounted using simple clips. Each target comes with clips for mounting, but buying some extras off Amazon is a good idea since sooner or later you’ll put a round through it. Bases can be bought directly from Infinite Defense, but just about any…

The careworn and cynical among us looked sideways and snorted derisively when SIG announced their new Legion loyalty program, dismissing it as just another way to shift product in a saturated market. When the RECOIL office found out that the first Legion guns were to be the P226 and P229, the news was met with a measure of indifference, seasoned with a dash of blah. Then we learned that our friend Bruce Gray had been involved in the project from the get-go, which caused our ears to prick up. You see, Bruce has been tuning SIGs (and HKs, and 1911s) since Jesus was hanging doors for a living, and he’s very good at what he does. It’s not that we don’t appreciate the basic design — the oldest P-series gun…

The Echelon is Springfield’s answer to everyone else’s plastic-framed 9mm, having supplanted the XD series in their lineup. It benefits from almost 40 years of market feedback and product improvement, if you consider that the first commercially successful version of what everyone thinks of as “9mm handgun” debuted in 1985. In this version, the Glock 19-sized Echelon 4.0, Springfield caters to the crowd who loves the idea of a compact, high-capacity carry gun, but also finds the P365 and Hellcat to be more difficult to shoot than they’d like. There’s a reason the G19 was America’s best-selling handgun for years, and its balance of firepower and shootability still resonates with a lot of users. Since launching in July of 2023, the Springfield Echelon has been remarkably drama-free. No recalls, no…

Smith & Wesson, in partnership with major distributor Lipsey’s, unleashed a new revolver this year that’s really grabbing a lot of attention. The S&W 432/632UC (Ultimate Carry) is the current crest of compact wheelgun development, boasting one of the most comfortable grips of all time, a six-shot (as opposed to fiveshot) capacity, and a set of extremely usable sights. Chambered in .32 H&R Magnum, the 432/632UC is capable of firing shorter rounds such as .32 S&W Long and .32 S&W Short. First glance was a big “meh,” because it was mistaken for a S&W 442/642UC — a five-shot .38 Special. J-frame .38s have been around a long time, and aside from the grips and sights, there wasn’t a whole lot of anything interesting there aside from the upgrades to the…

DANA BENNER Current job title: Freelance writer Describe your residence and its occupants as it relates to protective or defensive decision-making. My residence is a single-family, ranch-style home located between the state’s largest city and rural farmland. The layout has both main entrances at one end of the home, though my wife and I have multiple exit strategies in the event of an emergency. Doors and windows remain locked. The defense zone from intruders is a 30-foot hallway between exterior doors and bedrooms. Other homes are nearby, some with small children, so munitions used must be contained within the walls of the home to avoid external damage and/or injury. How does your home/neighborhood environment affect your choice of home defense/bedside firearm and defense items? While I have my share of…

The arrival of cold weather means different things to different people. For some it means the holidays, but for those in the gun world it means it’s suddenly easier to conceal your handgun. Those extra layers come in handy for doing away with the printing issues of summer, right? And forget that micro-compact — bring on the full-size pistols! Hell, maybe even that ridiculous competition pistol. But before you get too excited and go over the top, there are a few things to keep in mind about adding bulky layers or swapping out guns. DOES SIZE REALLY MATTER? Compact and sub-compact handguns are marketed to those who carry concealed for good reason: they’re easier to conceal. Usually — although not always — concealment means the gun in question is being…

About 60 years ago, Steve McQueen played a bounty hunter armed with a cutdown Winchester 1892 lever action. It had no stock and was called the Mare’s Leg on the TV show Wanted: Dead or Alive. No such weapon had ever existed in the historical West, but it became an iconic Hollywood so-called “Western” firearm — so much so that Henry Repeating Arms produced a version of it using the same name. Their latest incarnation, known as the Henry Axe, follows this tradition but as a .410 smoothbore. The Henry Axe falls into that nebulous class of firearms known simply as “firearms.” These types of guns must be a minimum of 26 inches in overall length, are allowed a smoothbore instead of a rifled one, and have never had a…

As a society, we’re obsessed with the newest and shiniest trinkets — if it’s not this year’s model, then it can’t be any good. This thinking sometimes extends to our CCW pieces, and we’re often led to believe that a carry gun has to have a freshly minted polymer frame and fashy advertising campaign to be worthy of place in our armory. This is kind of like saying that because an Aston Martin Vanquish rolled off the production line in 2001, it’s no longer an ass-kicking vehicle. For those of us with families to support and bills to pay, the latest and greatest pistol might not be such a great purchase, if by so doing we’re left with nothing in the budget for quality defensive loads, training ammo, or a…

The cottage industry for aftermarket accessories, enhancements, and modifications for carry and duty pistols has grown to levels previously unseen in the American firearms market. Customization, personalization, and modularity are the names of the game in today’s pistol scene. While it’s unlikely that any big box manufacturer of firearms will ever be able to outpace or out-spec the aftermarket for pistol upgrades, (some) of these companies are growing more savvy by the quarter and realize that it’s possible to at least keep up. Walther’s PPQ M2 line of carry and defensive pistols have a lot going for them. They fit the industry-standard size sweet spot that makes them usable for duty issue or concealed carry. The ergonomics are commendable. The trigger is perfectly acceptable. But, as with most things, there’s…

The mongoose is a carnivorous mammal, a quick little bold badass impervious to most venoms that hails from Africa and south Asia. They’re known for adventurous attacks on dangerous creatures like king cobras and scorpions. This celebrated snake-eater once even graced the sides of quart cans of Mongoose Malt Liquor, complete with a cobra in the mouth. But this article isn’t about mammals or 8-percent ABV adult beverages, but instead the new 9mm Nemo Arms pistol caliber carbine. And while it remains to be seen if this one can eat a competitor named the Scorpion, we know that’s what the folks at Nemo are gunning for. Long before it was graced with a name, the initial concept of the Mongoose began back in the Lockdown days of 2020. The operation…

The subject of this Crapshoot came from a batch of police trade-ins from the evidence locker. Most were useless junk guns, but this Ruger New Model Single-Six was a mere $159. The reason for the low price was the barrel; a 3-inch section was thoroughly covered in rust and badly pitted. Its sole cylinder was .22 Magnum. One hell of a deal with a little elbow grease and a true crapshoot! BACKGROUND This revolver may have been one of the more popular revolvers of all time in the U.S. civilian market. It’s a single-action solid frame rimfire revolver based on the famous Colt Single Action Army of 1873. Unlike the original Colt model or Ruger’s first iteration, the New Model has a transfer bar, allowing the shooter to carry a…

In the 20th century if you wanted to put together a custom gun, the 1911 was the answer. In the 21st? It’s a Glock. There are more Glock clones out there than any other pistol by a hefty margin. It’s not hard to see why either, as all the critical dimensions have long been uncovered, and even midsize companies have access to milling machines so advanced only the likes of Ford Motor Co would have had just a few short years ago. Back in CONCEALMENT Issue 36 we updated the single-stack Glock 43, and today we’re going to take on the higher-capacity stagger-stack Glock 48. BASELINE Right from the beginning of any project you need to decide if you’re going to start from scratch or are going to modify something…

We wouldn’t be so bold as to try to divide the history of self-loading pistols into distinctly defined “generations,” as though they were jet fighters or Chevrolet Camaros. On the other hand, it’s pretty easy to divide the manufacturing techniques of semiautos into generations. GENERATIONS The earliest self-loaders date from the dawn of the semiautomatic era, at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th. At the time, most every pistol was made by taking a block of 4140 ordnance steel and machining away everything that didn’t look like a gun part. If there was a synthetic part on your pistol, it was a grip panel made of gutta-percha, hard rubber, or a similar material. For the next few decades, the pressures of global wars that…

Do you trust the government to make good decisions? Trust and government in the same sentence is definitely oxymoronic, but the sky is blue, and water is also wet. It’s frightening to think that major decisions depend on people who can’t determine what the meaning of the word “is” is. Which brings us to the government’s XM17 Modular Handgun System contract competition, or MHS for short. The M9, based on the Beretta 92FS, is at the end of its military service life, and the winner of the MHS (designated the M17 is to be its replacement). The story should end there, but there’s controversy, and the contract decision won’t go quietly into that good night. It’s hard to see anything through the fog of bureaucracy, and there are very few…