This pistol will be familiar to many readers but, even though I’ve seen a handgun owner for almost 40 years (and classic 9mm pistols being one of my favourite types) I’ve never owned Hi Power until this one showed up in the mail today—an excellent pre-Christmas present from the EE! It was pouring rain with high winds here today and with the malls jammed with shoppers I thought it an ideal day to stay home familiarize myself with my new pistol.
When I first picked it up I was surprised at how slim and comfortable the grip is! Even though I’d read about how comfortable it is I was still surprised. I think it may be the best fitting pistol for my small hands I’ve ever owned. It’s quite close in feel to the small grip model I’ve got on my SIG P320, but the Hi Power feels s bit better at first grip.
I’m not sure of the pistol’s finish—I think it’s parkerized but it may be some other type of matte finish. The frame on mine is a little bit lighter giving a pleasing subtle two-tone look.
The previous owner added skateboard tape to the front and backstraps— I expected to remove it right away but it feels pretty good to be honest. I wasn’t really crazy about the look of the grips but they feel pretty good too—the vestigial thumbrest fits me very well.
It’s a Mark II model—the “PR” date code in the serial number indicates that it was made in 1987 (the 245 prefix denotes a 9mm model). For a pistol made then, when three dot sights were quite common, the sights are surprisingly small, with no three dots or any other highlighting. Here’s the rear sight—you can see the rib that runs the full length of the slide:
And here’s the front sight—it’s machined rather the dovetailed in, so I won’t be replacing it! The sight picture against a lighter background is quite crisp, although they do tend to disappear against a dark background (at least around the house!)
The pistol has ambidextrous safeties—I’d read that the right-side safety bugs some shooters but it seems OK to me. The safety isn’t as positive off and on as a good 1911 but it was better than what I was expected. Early Hi Powers has internal extractors, but mine has an external one.
There’s no removable bushing at the muzzle end of the slide. The small hole at the end of the slide below the barrel is supposedly intended to allow water to drain out of the pistol after submersion. I’m unlikely to test this feature out!
The trigger is smooth and fairly narrow. Somewhere during the pistol’s life the dreaded magazine safety was removed—the trigger is quite nice and crisp now. The previous owner measured it at 5.5 pounds—it feels nicer than I was expecting!
One neat feature that I only recently learned about is that when disassembling the pistol, the safety engages a notch in the slide to hold it open while the slide stop is popped out—it makes disassembly and re-assembly a dream.
The barrel has two locking lugs, similar to a CZ75. Using this instead of the more modern method of using the chamber area to lock into the slide helps give the slide a nice, slim profile.
Another unexpected feature is that the barrel does not use the slide stop pin to unlock, but instead uses this cross-piece in the frame instead.
I'm really pleased with the feel of the pistol—it feels wonderful in the hand, and despite being all-steel only weighs in at a well-balanced 32 ounces. The trigger pull on mine is a pleasure, too, and the sights should be OK for my intended use as a "range fun" pistol. I'm hoping to get out to the range over the Christmas break if the weather holds—I'll update once I've had a chance to take it out.
got one of the most iconic pistol of the 20th century!
