Shooting Grandpas Pocket Pistols

[LouisianaMan]

Good report, thanks! Sounds like your Sauer 38H will still do anything you'd want a .32 Auto to do.

[rintinglen]

Ran into a problem with the Astra 300. My handloads were hanging up, the long RF 35-100L that works so well in my Beretta 84 didn't do so well in the Astra. I'll try it again next week with some FMJ's.

[rintinglen]

William John Whiting is not exactly a household name, but during the heyday of Webley and Scott, he was an important part of their success. He was born near Manchester, England during the American Civil War, and learned gunsmithing at his fathers knee, being interested in firearms and machinery from his earliest youth. He went to work at Webley & Scott when he was 16 and would spend the next 40 years of his life working his way up through the ranks from apprentice, ultimately to the Board of Directors. He became a shop foreman while still in his early 20's and was promoted again on the death of his father. War with the Boers was on the horizon and he was involved in the improvement of the Webley Revolver. The 1890's saw a burgeoning interest in semi-automatic pistols, but the British Army was not persuaded that the revolver was passé. They had made large purchases of the 45 caliber Webley's during the Boer war and were not interested in funding the development of new and untried systems. Though several semi-auto pistols were given trials in the years leading up to WW I, none found favor.

Meanwhile, Whiting and his co-workers had been working on what would become the Webley Semi-auto. Seeing that the conservative forces in the British high command were not likely to change courses any time soon, and with Webley suffering financially from the end of war-time contracts from the Boer war, another source of revenue had to be found. Casting covetous eyes on the success that Fabrique Nationale was having with the Browning designed 1899 and 1900 pistols, Whiting shrank the plans for his 45 down to make a 32 ACP that was sufficiently different to dodge the Browning Patents and filed his own patent in 1905. Within a year, the Webley 1905 was in production.

Right about the time that W&S was getting their ungainly looking 32 on the Market, John Browning and FN broke out another game changer when the FN 1906 in 25 ACP hit town. Especially in Europe, it was an instant success. Before production ended in 1959, FN would sell over a million of these vest pocket pistols, and everybody in Europe was hustling to make copies or similar guns. So it was back to the drawing board for Whiting and crew who further shrank the basic design and came up with the 1908 Webley 25. And at the same time, they revised the 1905, changing the take down procedure and making some other minor mechanical changes, most notably, going to an internal transfer bar, and changing the rear sight and safety. Tada, there were now 2 1908 Webleys; a tiny 25 and a larger 32. Webley continued to make improvements. Police then were generally prohibited from carrying arms other than a night stick. However, after a gun battle with anarchist terrorists resulted in the deaths and crippling of several police officers, the then Home Secretary, Sir Winston Churchill in 1911 directed the London Metropolitan Police to adopt the 32 for issue during hazardous activities. The 1908 was given a better rear sight and over the next 28 years some 15,000 MP (Metropolitan Police) pistols would would be purchased. Production of all Webley semi-auto pistols ceased in 1940 as the need for war materials resulted in the W&S concern concentrating their efforts on making "substitute standard" revolvers to supplement the official Enfield Revolvers.

Prior to 1915, serving officers in the Royal Army purchased their own sidearms. Reportedly, some Webley semi-autos were carried in WW I, but as a non-standard caliber, one wonders what you would do if you ran low on ammo. I suspect that those pistols were replaced rather swiftly, save maybe for rear echelon Staff Officers and the like, who seldom ever used anything more lethal than a pen or a typewriter. Production of the W&S pistols in 25, 32 and--rarely--380 continued after the war, but a series of anti-gun laws restricted the lawful purchase of firearms and greatly impacted the sales of pistols. While I have been able to track down fairly authoritarian production stats for the 25 (~ 48,300- 51,000) and 380 variants (~2,140), the 32/7.65 variants which made up the bulk of production seem to have thus far escaped enumeration. Leastways, I haven't been able to track it down on the web nor in my collection of reference books. At a guess, I'd put the number at >100,000, perhaps as few as 70,000. That said, my personal example is serial Number 156xxx. However, I understand that all of the semi auto pistols, 25,32, 9mm, and 455 were serial numbered together. Thus making the task of getting exact numbers on these 85-120 year old pistols a bit difficult.

In any event, the 1908 Pattern pistols were basically exposed hammer, single stack, single-action, blowback pistols, weighing approximately 20 ounces. It is 6 1/16" long, 4 3/8" tall and just over 1 1/16" thick with a 3 1/2" barrel. It uses an 8 round magazine and it's appearance closely resembles the H&R 32 Pistol, another Whiting design. I am afraid that this will be another pistol which I won't be able fully test. Holsters and factory magazines for these old timers are as common as intelligent socialist politicians and nearly as costly.

The design of this pistol is very different from the Browning designs. You can remove the slide and hunt for a long time for a recoil spring, but you won't find it there. No recoil spring around or below the barrel, no barrel bushing or recoil spring guide either, the recoil system, while not absolutely unique is pretty rare. Underneath the right side grip panel, you will see a heavy U-shaped spring that pushes on a lever that fits into a slot on the under side of the slide. On firing, the impetus given the slide by the force of the explosion drives the slide rearward, pushing the lever back and compressing the front leg of the spring. The slide cocks the hammer as it goes back and is stopped by contact with the barrel. Then the compressed spring expands, forcing the slide forward, stripping a round from the magazine and pushing it into the chamber in typical self-loading fashion.

[rintinglen]

I am having a problem posting images, but my daughter will be here next week and I hope she will be able to assist me.

[rintinglen]

I have a pancake-style holster for the browning 1910 that fits very well and have loaded up some 95 grain FMJ's and some 356-242 ~92 grainers. and I'll give them a shot (or two) come Wednesday.

[shooting on a shoestring]

Thanks again for your efforts in researching, shooting and writing. Good stuff!

[rintinglen]

Well that didn't work. The Servicios Adventuras primers I bought don't work in the Astra, nor in my Walther PPK. They go bang in my Beretta 1934 just fine and they worked in some 38 loads I had previously made, but they take two or three strikes to fire in my Walther, and the Astra 300 has no double strike capability. I had a few PMC Factory FMJ's and they worked just fine and shot surprisingly well, but I only had a dozen or so. I had just loaded up about 300 rounds with the SA Primers, so I guess the Beretta will get a work out. I will break into my stash of Winchester primers and try again next week.

On another topic, the Beretta 1934 has proven to be as reliable as it's younger brother, the 7.65 1935 Beretta. I see that Classic Firearms has them for 275 bucks plus shipping. That is a good price on a good little pistol. I don't recommend them for CCW purposes, but they are very reliable, more accurate than they have a right to be and fun to shoot.

[LouisianaMan]

It's great to have a backup plan! It's also "proof" that we really do "need" multiple guns...

[rintinglen]

Well, I finally managed to get to the range with all the right stuff to test the Astra 300. I had made a holster for my 1910 Browning which works perfectly with the Astra and had picked up a couple of boxes of Blazer 380 FMJ's so I had all the hard ware I needed. What I did not have was a target. I have used up my supply of the 50 FT reduced size Qualification Targets that I have been using. Consequently I used a slightly smaller Dirty Bird Target. I scored the target by centering it over a used target that was floating around the garage after I was done but any way, here's how it went.

On the 3 yard stage, the drill is 2 shots in 3 seconds from concealment. I drew and fired, resulting in 2 very low hits. They were hits though, and at 2.88 seconds they were good. The second pair went higher, but longer, running 2.96 seconds. The delay is attributable to the safety. It is a longish reach to flick it off one-handed, and it requires me to re-acquire my grip, slowing my performance.

The next stage is the right & left one-hand shooting test. Draw, fire 3 shots strong-hand only, transfer to the off-hand, and fire 3 more shots. All this in 7 seconds. Here I ran into a problem. I drew, fired 3 shots right-handed, swapped over to my left hand and then pulled the trigger. Blam-Blam, two for the price of one as the gun doubled. The first round was a 10X, the second went over the target , and the last round was saved as I stared in wonder at my pistol.

Here I took a break, unloaded the saved round, and struggled through the difficult take down procedure and closely examined the gun. I found no obvious broken or missing parts and a trip back to the club house got me the services of a padded vise so I could re-assemble the gun. I then ran two magazines through the gun (12 shots) to see if it would repeat that troubling performance. But it ran fine, one per customer, as I fired, alternating right and left one handed shooting. It was not repeated and I decided to struggle onward.

The 7 yard line was no problem, all six shots were in the scoring rings though somewhat high and scattered. The time was 6.33 seconds. The sun had come out and the bright nickel sights were not my friends. It was very hard to align the sights.

That problem continued at the 10 yard line. I had 8 seconds to draw and fire 6 shots and used nearly all of them to splatter 5 hits and one low miss on the target. 7.44 seconds went by while I was performing this task.

Last and not least, I was at the 15 yard line. Here the drill is to run 5 yards to cover while drawing the gun, fire 2 shots right barricade, perform a mandatory reload, kneel, fire 2 shots, stand, move to the left side of the barricade, fire two shots standing, kneel and fire the last 2 shots, kneeling, left barricade; all in 25 seconds. Since the amputation of the toes on my left foot, I am no longer a rival for Usain Bolt. In fact, the average potted plant can give me a stiff race, But I paced off 5 yards, set the timer and waited for the beep. I gallumped over to the upright bench that served as my barricade and fired two shots, then bumbled the magazine out of the empty pistol. The Astra does lock open on an empty mag, so I was able to eject the empty, pressing the odd, base-of-the-frame mounted magazine release, and shoving a fresh 6 into the mag well in a reasonably prompt time, I dropped to my knee, fired 2 shots, staggered upright and fired two shots left barricade, and dropped to my knees to fire the last 2 rounds, just barely before the timer sounded--24.87 seconds. I managed to put another out low left and a second miss at about 9 O'clock. So, I ended up with a 25/30 score, 4 misses and one saved round, for an 83.33% score. Qualifying, but not great.

And actually, it looked worse than that. The shots were pretty well spread out, with relatively few in the 10 and 9 ring. I was not too impressed. The nickel was perhaps ok at protecting the steel of the gun, but those bright, shiny sights coupled with the heavy trigger made accurate shooting very difficult. That double was very troublesome. Though it did not recur in the rest of the shooting, nor in the shooting of another magazine after the qualification was done, I have to express my misgivings about this. I don't know if it was something I did or if it was some mechanical glitch, but I am not licensed for machine guns.

My final thoughts? My times were pretty slow, though only one round was over time. They are colored by my apprehension from that double. The trigger was very heavy, 9-10+ pounds at a guess, so I misdoubt whether I accidentally tripped the trigger during recoil. I didn't note any obvious breakage that might lead to a malfunction. The disconnector seemed to function alright. I am at a loss to determine the cause.

But that aside, I was a little under-whelmed by the Astra's performance. The Safety is a little too far forward to be easily operable. The grip angle is not conducive to fast, point shooting and the heavy trigger is equally detrimental to putting bullets where they need to go, nor are the sights all that and a bag of chips. I suspect the nickel plating may have contributed to both problems. Certainly I have read that the Luftwaffe Condor Legion thought highly of them. I don't think they'd have been enthused over a pistol of mediocre accuracy and questionable mechanical safety. But that is one of the questions that arise when reviewing a single example of a "vintage" fire arm. I have no way of telling what the gun was like when it was new. In the nearly 85 years since it was manufactured who knows how it was maintained or modified. In 1940 it may have been extraordinary, But not so today. This one is not a keeper, at least as a CCW piece.

[Battis]

On a side note - I have an Astra 400 and 600. I was looking for a 300. I found one at a decent price but I hesitated a few days. When I went back, the gun was still there but the price had more than doubled. They had found a single, small Nazi stamp that they had originally missed. I'm still looking.

[Texas by God]

I’d love to have an Astra 300 - preferably in .32 auto.
No reason except that I like the .32 better than the .380….
I’ve had great experiences with the 400 and 600 pistols- accuracy and reliability.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[rintinglen]

I'd have preferred a 32 myself, but you don't often see them, and they tend to be costly when you do.

[rintinglen]

128 years ago, the remarkable John Browning patented 4 semi-automatic pistol designs. One, a simple blowback design, was the basis of the FN 1903 and the Colt 1903 Pocket Hammerless, one was a rotating barrel design that never was made, the third design was a toggle action that was only made as a prototype, and the 4th and last was the locked breech, drop barrel design that was the great, great grandaddy of just about every service pistol in use today. Now that pistol design was snatched up by Colt and was seen by them as the solution to the need for a "modern" self-loading pistol to sell to the armies of the world. They came out with the Colt 1900 pistol just in time to see the U.S. Army recoil from mid-bore calibers as a result of the failure of the 38 Long Colt revolvers to decisively stop Moro fanatics in the Philippines. Somewhat inauspicious timing, to say the least.

Despite this stumbling block. Colt made several thousand of these introductory pattern pistols, including 50+ for service tests in the Philippines, and a couple for the 1899-1900 Service pistol tests, where the Colt faired well against it's Steyr and Mauser competitors. A few modifications were made; a longer frame and a one round greater magazine capacity coupled with a lanyard ring, but save for the elimination of the rear sight safety, and the addition of a slide hold open lever there was virtually no difference between the 1902 Military and the 1900 models, while the 1902 Sporting Model was even closer, retaining the short frame and magazine, (presumably to use up parts previously manufactured.) However, none of these set the world on fire when it came to sales. The 1900 sold about 4,257 guns before the 1902 military and 1902 Sporting models hit the shelves, and they sold about 25,000 combined over the next 26 years, including about 1,200-1,500 to Mexico at the start of the revolution.

However, the last model, and most successful sales-wise, was the 1903 Pocket hammer. The earlier guns sported 6 inch barrels and were neatly 10 inches long, making them a bit long to stuff in ones pants pocket. Additionally, weighing in at well over 2 pounds, any of the older models would put a strain on ones suspenders. The 1903 was an inch and a half shorter and weighed about 5 ounces less at about 31 oz. Like it's predecessors, it was a locked breech, recoil operated, single action, magazine-fed, semi-automatic pistol chambered for the 38 ACP cartridge. Barely 30,300 would be sold over it's 25 year run. Though truth to tell, once the war started-WW I, sales were pretty poor and I have read that while the last of the 1903's were sold in 1928, none had been manufactured since 1920. And there were reasons for that.

Unlike most of it's successors and the majority of it's rivals, The 1903 Colt Pocket Hammer has NO safety. None, nada, zero. Not unlike the Tokarev M-30's and 33's, the trigger is the only safety once the pistol is cocked...you can put the hammer at half-cock or go chamber empty in condition three. But you ain't going to go cocked and locked. There's nothing to lock. Compared to the smaller 1903 and 1908 32's and 380's, the 1903 Pocket Hammer was perceived as being less safe. Sometimes, perception is reality.

There was a reason that it took Colt a few years to persuade the government to abandon the old revolver and replace it with the 4 generation down the road 1911. Ill-trained soldiers with condition zero pistols seems likely to produce more friendly-fire casualties than desirable. Especially, a Cavalry Soldier trying to control a rambunctious horse while hanging onto his cocked pistol that will automatically reload itself if the hammer falls while he is playing at rodeo might not be as fun to see as it sounds. This model was a step down the road, not the pot of gold at the end of the Rainbow. The dropping-barrel colts had a few stops to make before they finally hit paydirt with the Colt Government Model

The Military Model 1902 pistols had 8 shot mags, while the 1903 Pocket Hammer model has a 7 round magazine which I believe was shared with the 1902 Sporting Model. Mine has an old, unmarked magazine that seems to function just fine. I also have a triple K mag that I hope to be able to make work. (It doesn't right now, how unique.) But anyway, my pistol weighs a smidge over 31 ounces, is about 7 7/8 inches long by 4 7/8's inches high. At it's widest point, it is 1 3/16ths thick, though most of the gun is thinner. The slide measures about 7/8's inches thick and the frame runs about 13/16th's. As has often been the case, the grips are the thickest part. When you take it all into count, somebody must have borrowed one of the late Paul Harrell's coats for this gun to be considered pocket-sized. While slightly more compact, this is heavier than either the contemporary Colt Police Positive revolvers or the rival K-frame Smith's. It is a belt gun, not really a pocket pistol.

A word about ammunition: The 38 ACP, the Super 38 (38 Super nowadays) and the 9 MM Browning Long all share a common head size, and are virtually identical save that the 9 MM Long is about a tenth of an inch shorter, However, they are not interchangeable, despite the 38 ACP and the 38 Super cartridges being identical in length, width--even standard bullet weight. The difference is in the powder charge and bullet weights. The 9 MM Browning Long runs a bullet about 20 grains lighter than either of the other two at at about the same velocity as the 38 ACP ~1050 fps, 200 fps below the speed of the Super. The 38 Super should not chamber in a 9 MM Browning long--but I did manage to almost get one into my 1907 Husqvarna. A slightly looser chamber or a wee-bit smaller cartridge and you'd have the makings of a dangerous combination. Likewise, a Super Cartridge is factory loaded at a pressure greater than that of a 38 ACP PROOF LOAD. Not to be recommended in a hundred--or more--year old pistol. Especially one that has a slide can come off the rear if the cross pin is broken. Now you can fire 38 ACP Loads in a gun chambered for the 38 Super, but they may be too weak to function the action. (And those of us who want 38 ACP for our antiques will curse you roundly for so doing.)

[rintinglen]

In fiddling with this old timer, I have noted a few more things that are of interest. Like most of the pre-great war pistols, the sights are poor. The front sight is a narrow, knife edge that is very hard for me to center in the rear sight. The grip angle is not too great either. It could stand to be a few degrees greater. For me, the gun points low. The trigger seems to be ok, in the 6-ish pound range at a guess. The magazine catch is odd. Unlike its stable mate, the 32 Hammerless 1903, the flimsy looking catch pushes forward to release, not back.

Compared to the 1900 Luger, it's no wonder that the 1900/1902/1903 Colts got so little love. A heel grip magazine catch, no safety, an awkward feel all add up to a very poor showing compared to Georg Lugers improvements on the old 1893 Borchardt. Only the small caliber of the initial Luger offering kept it from sweeping the board. One wonders what might have happened if DWM had seen their way clear to making more .45's for the U.S. Army tests. In 1907, they might have won the prize and the 1911 might not ever have made the scene.

I have dug a few score 38 ACP cases out of my brass stash, left over from my previous project, making 9 mm Browning Long cases from 38 ACP/Super brass and am making a few loads looking for a reliable, but low powered load. I haven't seen any load data in any manual more recent than 1957! Well, there is some data in the Lee 2nd Edition of Modern Reloading, but I know that data was not tested by Lee, and they don't list their sources, so I am viewing that with a jaundiced eye. Still, it is better than none. We shall see what I can find.

[rintinglen]

newbies - Copy.jpg
Left to right, the Colt 1903 Pocket Hammer, the Webley 1908 32 ACP, and the J.P. Sauer & Sohn 38H.

[LouisianaMan]

newbies - Copy.jpg
Left to right, the Colt 1903 Pocket Hammer, the Webley 1908 32 ACP, and the J.P. Sauer & Sohn 38H.

Nice grabs!! Never fired any of the three--looking forward to your impressions.

[Battis]

I have a 1903 Pocket hammer. It's actually a beautiful gun, fun to shoot. Love that old time barrel wedge.
This is how I load for it: 3.2 grs Bullseye, .356 RN bullet, 38 Super dies (bullet seater, crimp), .38 Super brass
.38 ACP rounds can be used in the Astra 400 (9mm Largo).

[rintinglen]

Well, I took heart in some advice from a valued friend and loaded up about 15 rounds of 38 ACP using 356-242 122 grain boolits, five each of 3.8 grains, 4.0 grains and 4.3 grains of WW231 and took them to the range with me. He suggested I use my lighter boolit with data for a 38 Super 147 boolit, using the start load as a top end and dropping a half grain for my start. The Speer Reloading Manual Number 15 shows a start for a 147 grain FMJ as 4.3 grains of ww-231, so I dropped down to 3.8 grns. for my start. I loaded 5 rounds in each of my two magazines, and started shooting. I found the sights as abysmal as they had seemed, but was somewhat surprised when I managed to eke out an ~4 inch group at 25 yards. The 3.8 grain load seemed a little anemic, with cases only traveling a few feet from the gun. The 4.0 grain load was better, the action was more positive and the empties arced out about 6-7 feet to the right while the group was comparable to the lighter charge loads.

The 4.3 load was a bit more energetic, and on the 4th shot the right grip panel cracked in two. At some time in the past, the gun appears to have made a forceful impact that scratched the butt of the grip on the right side and probably cracked the grip panel so that impact of the recoil was enough to break the grip in two. I superglued the two pieces together and will be loading the rest of my 38 ACP with 4.0 grains of WW231.

I found that the Triple K Magazine seems to feed the gun just fine, but it is very difficult to insert it into the mag well. It seems to be just a few thousandths oversize, so I will not be able to do a reload. I have to go downstairs and sort through my holster boxes and see if I have a holster that will fit it. It might be able to work in a 1911 holster, though I think the slide may be a little too deep.

[rintinglen]

IMG_3647 - 3Copy.jpg

Here is a photo of the previous three pistols I have discussed. The top is the Astra 300, the left is the Webley 1908, and the right is the J. P. Sauer & Sohn 38 H.

[barnetmill]

I had once had a cheapo .25 acp that would not work. I slightly uped the powder charge and then it did function. The standard FMJ is the best load for a .25. Think of a 1/4'' ice pick. It best chance of putting someone down is penetrating into something vital like an artery, brain, or spine.