I’ve always liked the P226 since I saw it on the cover of a Guns & Ammo magazine back in the mid-1980s, and I’ve owned a few over the years (most recently an Extreme I picked up over the summer—I really liked it) so I was intrigued by the new Legion line. I know the Exeter SIGs don’t have the reputation of the German pistols, and some of the Marketing hype behind the Legion line might be a little over-the-top (although in Canada the only added swag in the box seems to be a few stickers), but there were enough well-thought-out features on the pistol (plus a recent price drop) to catch my interest.
Mine’s the DA/SA model with the decocker; I’ve owned a SAO SIG, and didn’t really care for the controls—the safety and slide release seemed too close together for me. I am not a huge fan of DA/SA pistols in general, but this’ll be a range-use only fun pistol, and unless my life takes a dramatic turn for the worse I’m unlikely to need it for anything else.
The pistol has a very nice dark grey finish that’s a bit lighter shade than the usual Nitron slide/anodized frame finish. It’s “flatter” than it looked in pictures, but is blemish-free (I’ve seen some shooters post pictures of their Legion with flaws in the finish). There are forward slide serrations, like the Extreme. I really like the look of the pistol.
The frontstrap of the grip is checkered with grippy but not too sharp checkering, compared with horizontal lines on standard P226s.
The bottom of the triggerguard is checkered for some reason. I’ve got no use for this myself, but at least it doesn’t bug me.
The grips are a pleasant surprise—they seem a bit narrower side-to-side than factory grips, although I’ve got none here to compare with. They have the same profile as regular P226 grips, which I like. Even though I’ve got small hands I didn’t care for the E2 grips—I found they moved my hand down too far on the grip, exacerbating the high bore line. These grips a quite grippy without being too aggressive, and there are three levels of checkering—coarsest checkering on the backstrap, medium on the sides, and very light checkering on the “thumb pads” at the top of the grip panels. They’re quite nice.
The slide stop and decocker and low-profile compared with the usual controls. The Legion is the top picture above, my Extreme below it. I’m guessing that this is to make a more snag-free pistol? Or maybe to get them out of the way of shooters’ thumbs? In any case I prefer the larger ones—I’ll see how the low profile controls work at the range. You can also see the slight beavertail on the Legion compared with the more traditional profile of the Extreme. I prefer the non-beavertail look, myself, and don’t find that the beavertail helps any with me. At least this one’s a bit more restrained than some of the SIG beavertails!
And now onto the two features that really make the pistol worth it for me.
The sights are night sights, but the rear ones have a black outline instead of the typical white, and the front has a large, bright green dot around the night sight. I usually don't like night sights for range use, but I’m looking forward to these. The rear dots are still visible in the sight picture, but are more subtle, while the front sight really stands out. I took these pictures at sunset on an overcast November day and the dot was still nice and eye-catching.
(Legion on top, Extreme with Short Reach Trigger below)
The trigger is perhaps the best feature. I’m not sure but it looks to be a bit slimmer than than the standard SIG trigger, but it’s thicker than the Short Reach Trigger. It’s manageable in DA mode (although a bit long for me) but perfect reach in SA mode. The trigger pulls themselves are very nice—the DA is smooth and noticeably lighter (maybe a pound or two?) than the stock DA pull, but the SA pull is much nice, even compared to the Short Reset Trigger. It’s very high crisp, but what I like best is that there’s very little overtravel—it’s a very good trigger. I made a brief video demonstrating them below.
[youtube]duQUDQBHLpE[/youtube]
You can also see the slight undercut at the rear of the trigger guard to allow for a slightly higher grip—this is similar to the X5 frame.
So—early impressions are very favorable. This is not a cheap pistol, even as SIGs go, but for me the grips, sights, and trigger make it worthwhile. I'll report back once I've had a chance to take it to the range.
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