Trust but verify, P220 ready for carry, P229 .22 slide still picky

Taught my monthly N.C. Concealed Carry Handgun class today and after the students got through shooting at the indoor range at the N.G. Armory in Wadesboro, I got a chance to make a few holes myself.

My main objective was to run a few .45 ACP hollowpoints through my Sig P220 to see first if it would feed OK and second to see if the point of aim and point of impact remained the same as previously established with 230-grain FMJs.

Yes and yes. I fired three different brands, all 230-grain, two Winchester hollow points, Personal Protection and Bonded PDX1, and a magazine load of Remington Golden Sabers. All fed fine and all shot to point of aim. It ain't as pretty a group as I shot outdoors two weeks ago, but not too shabby for an old nearly blind guy indoors.

I hereby pronounce the P220 ready for carry.

I would have been shocked speechless if the outcome had been any other as I have yet to have a Sig pistol jam with any load and I have never seen different loads of the same grain weight shoot to different points of impact.

But as President Reagan said about the Russians, trust but verify. It won the Cold War didn't it? And I now pronounce my P220 ready for hot war.

My second objective was to put a few more .22LR rounds through my P229R, at left in the third photo.

I established beyond doubt at the last outing that the .22LR slide kit I bought works very well with the P229R and not very well at all with the nonrail P229 SAS Gen2, at right.

And I also discovered at the last outing that the Sig P229R .22LR slide is the pickiest about .22 ammo of any Sig in my somewhat limited experience, being only two. The other is the .22 slide for my P220, which works just fine with anything I've fed it so far.

But the P229R slide likes CCI Mini-Mags, the hottest non-Stinger load CCI makes for .22s. I ran several other high velocity brands through it, Federal, Winchester, Remington and CCI, and the Mini-Mags are the only load it consistently fires. With the others I got a lot of clicks, sometimes even on the second or third try after nonignition.

But today I fed it Mini-Mags and not a single dud. The six holes at the top of the target are from my Dan Wesson .22 revolver. I discovered the indoor lighting does not agree with its sights and my ancient eyes. But I could see the Sig's 3-white-dot sights just fine. The holes in the bull and around it are all from the P229.