I am sure many of you saw the video I posted with my concerns with the Remington R-51 that was sent to me for review, since that video I have been able to get the gun out to the range and wanted to write down some thoughts.
The fit of the gun in your hand is actually pretty decent, but there were a few issues that I had with it. The first few shots I made with it I felt like I was getting slide bite, but I checked my hand placement and there was plenty off room for the side to function and not catch the meat of my hand. After a few more rounds I realized what it was that kept biting my hand, it wasn't the slide. Instead it was the palm swell safety (grip safety) that was pinching my hand after every shot. Being that the small gun is so snappy in 9mm it causes your hand to move a bit and get pinched when the safety is depressed again. No matter what I tried I couldn't figure out a way to change my grip to alleviate this problem, which made it very unpleasant to shoot without gloves on.
Like I said above the gun is unbelievably snappy, there are other sub compact 9mm's that I have shot that had some snap to them but not like this one. Despite being snappy it was easy to keep on target, and the sights were very easy to use. The magazines both dropped freely from the gun, and it achieved slide lock every time a mag was empty. The trigger isn't terrible, but the reset isn't tactile, meaning you can't feel or hear it and you really have to take your finger completely off the trigger for it to reset. The trigger pull is smooth and consistent.
Another issue that I had was the slide became very stiff and hard to rack after achieving slide lock and inserting another mag. It wasn't impossible to do it, but it did require a little extra effort. What I found weird was this began after 6 mags (under 50 rounds) had been run through the gun, but it felt and looked like there was a thousand rounds worth of grime inside the gun. The gun continued to run for the rest of the time I shot it, which ended up being around 100 rounds total. There was only one malfunction and that was a failure to load, but I am unsure wether it was the shooter's grip or the gun since there weren't any other issues like it.
Another issue that I had was the slide became very stiff and hard to rack after achieving slide lock and inserting another mag. It wasn't impossible to do it, but it did require a little extra effort. What I found weird was this began after 6 mags (under 50 rounds) had been run through the gun, but it felt and looked like there was a thousand rounds worth of grime inside the gun. The gun continued to run for the rest of the time I shot it, which ended up being around 100 rounds total. There was only one malfunction and that was a failure to load, but I am unsure wether it was the shooter's grip or the gun since there weren't any other issues like it.
If you look close at the barrel and sleeve above you can see the scratches in them, they are pretty deep too. I noticed these when I was taking the gun apart to give it a cleaning since it apparently runs very dirty compared to some of my other guns. I am not sure if this is due to poor machining, poor fitment, or if this is just normal "wear" on the parts, but it is something I am surprised to see after only 100 rounds.
The sleeve has scratches like this all the way around it, and if you look at the picture of the barrel below you can tell where the sleeve and spring had been jumping around on it. Granted there is a lot of force and stress on guns, but when they are machined and fitted properly they don't show hard wear as fast as I am seeing with this gun.
I plan on running the gun out to the range one more time before sending it back to Remington, but at this point I can't recommend this gun to someone. There are just too many smaller issues that will more than likely become bigger issues down the road. While I really wanted to like this gun, I am not a fan of how snappy it is with recoil or the fact that the grip safety pinches my hand after each shot. If Remington fixes the issues and improves the gun I will be all for getting my hands on the next generation and giving it a go, if they fix the issues.
Make sure to check back for the range video soon, I will make sure to go give a visual of the issues I have talked about in this post on the video.
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