heavenIsAlie
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Abbotsford
sig+knife by Brennan Sheremeto, on Flickr
P229 9mm- had this for a few years now, its my idpa gun so i have put several thousand rounds though it and am very familiar with it. i love it and it shoots better than i do
P229 .22LR-questar is selling these for $609 and when i saw the price i had to pick one up for practice (i would have got a conversion kit but those dont seem to be coming into the country, no idea why as the barrel is clearly long enough)
here are some comparison pictures
as you can see, the slide is clearly much longer than on the regular 229, to me it looks like all the did was throw a 226 conversion slide on the 229. you do get the adjustable sites on the .22 where my 9mm doesnt have them. personally id have preferred fixed sites but because .22 ammos is so finicky i can see why they put them on. site picture is exactly the same on both of the pistols though. the .22 is lighter than the 9mm because of the aluminum slide and you do notice when you are holding it but not so much that it feels foreign in your hand
you can see the slides are nearly identical on the inside, the part that makes the .22 slide not function on a regular 229 frame is at the rear, on the .22 the pieces are deeper inset in the slide and the frame mirrors this so your 9mm slide will not work on a .22 frame either. im not sure why they did this, since that means the .22 conversion kit has a different slide than the dedicated .22, making manufacturing much less efficient and is in general just annoying.
the magazines are much different, as you would expect. because the .22 round requires more support than the 9mm the mag and follower dont have the cut out to allow the slide lock to engage (i think they could have figured out a design that allowed the slide to lock back though, if they spent the time). while the 9mm mag feels good, with smooth edges, looks good when in the gun, nicely flared bottom ect. in short it was actually designed for the 229 frame. the .22 mag on the other hand feels like junk, even just holding it in your hand. it has no nice edges, no tab to pull down for easy loading like most .22 pistol mags the the bottom is just hideous. where the 9mm mag was designed and made for the 229 frame the .22 mag is a 226 mag where they put a giant square chunk of plastic on the bottom to take up the extra length that sticks out because the 229 mag is shorter.
range report for the .22- my first range trip i put about 500 rounds though the gun, had no issues what so ever using a variety of ammo (regular and high velocity, solid nose and hollowpoint, 4 different brands). the accuracy was more a factor of ammo than the gun (as with all .22 pistols some ammo shoots better than others) but it was just as accurate as my 9mm out to 15 yards, beyond that it dropped off but i havent found the perfect ammo for it nor adjusted the sites and id bet that when i get it tuned it will match the 9mm to 25 yards. i will be shooting high velocity ammo like stingers out of it though, because it gives more recoil and shooting regular velocity .22 ammo the recoil is non existant
Recap
Dislikes/Problems
1)the mag is terrible and feels like a piece of junk, sure it functions fine but i expected more from sig considering how well put together all their other guns are.
2)i wish the slide locked back. its something my 9mm does and i would prefer to practice exactly like i compete. also the fact that im buying a dedicated .22 (as evidenced by the changes sig makes to the slide that mean you cant use it for anything else) i expect the slide to lock back. no lock back is something i can forgive on a conversion kit but its harder to forgive on a dedicated gun
3)why is the slide longer than a regular 229? again i expect better from sig, they dont cut corners anywhere else so why here. it doesnt effect the handling or feel of the gun but it still bugs me.
The Good
trigger and sites are exactly like the centerfire version and it has the famous sig reliability. the finish is good and doesnt feel cheap. basically if i didnt list it in the dislikes im happy with how the .22 mirrors the centerfire
Verdict-the .22LR p229 is a great way to shoot cheaper ammo during practice with the same trigger pull and grip as your centerfire p229 and has the same reliability. for $100 more than a 226 conversion kit id consider it a good deal, but there are some improvements id like from sig and some things that bug me about it
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