FNP-45 Tactical Range Report

General Firearms Handguns - Semi Auto
1

I picked up a FNP-45 Tactical this past weekend after deciding to get out of the .40 game and consolidate to 9 mm and .45.

I took it out to the NRA Range today (inefficient use of time waiting I know, but I’m off work and wanted to see how the new gun worked).

I shot about 15 rounds of leftover WWB through it at first, 5 rounds in each of the 3 mags it came with. I had one interesting malfunction that I’ve never seen before today, where the next to last round fired, but had the casing fail to eject with the slide closed on the horizontal empty casing and the last round trying to jam its way into the feed ramp. (I wish I’d have taken a picture with my phone…next time I will.) If I recall correctly, the extractor was not gripping the empty.

I then burned through 100 rounds of Blazer Brass through it with one more malfunction identical to the first one early in the first box of 50. I neglected to mark the mag with the first malfunction, but set aside the mag after this one (I suspect it’s the same mag, but can’t prove it.) I ran the rest of the batch through without incident.

After some research, it looks like overly stiff mag springs may be the culprit, so I’ll try and wear them out a bit in the meantime before the next range trip.

Some notes (pro/con/neutral):

– This gun has a lot of nice features out of the box. All the controls are fully ambi, except the takedown lever. Interestingly enough if you drop the mag with the right side of the release, it will unlatch, but than only truly drop free once you release the button. If you just hold the button in from the left, it will drop freely without delay.

– The Trijicon night sights (taller for use with a suppressor, and to co-witness with a red dot) actually glow different colors. The front is green, and the rear dots are yellow in the dark.

– The sights shoot point of aim in closer (10-20 feet or so). Out at 60 feet, I found I needed to aim maybe an inch lower to hit the sticky on the post-it.

– The gun is ridiculously accurate. The trigger is quite decent in single action mode, but different enough from my other pistols that I need to work on it a bit before I’m up to par on drills.

– My only gripe (other than the FTEs) is that the safety/decock lever is in an awkward spot for me. I have to make sure my strong thumb is well outboard of the safety and grasping the outside of my weak thumb to avoid the safety bouncing on my thumb with the recoil. I obviously didn’t do that well at it today, as I have a nice red spot that would be a blister after a shooting class of any decent length. This may turn out to be a decent training aid for me, as I have a bad habit of riding the slide stop on my Glocks and M&P and preventing hold-open with my grip. Time will tell. I don’t believe that the decock would have activated had I just rode the safety with my thumb like I tend to with my 1911, but that would bring me back in to the slide stop again.

– There are two sizes and two textures for backstrap options. One small and one large, with a lined and a checkered texture for each. I prefer the lined one, since the grip side panels are quite aggressive without being painful. The grip size is fine with me, and the angle is closer to the 1911 than the Glock. Take this for what it’s worth from a guy with long fingers who actually likes the old fat G21 grip.

– The muzzle thread protector backs off slowly under recoil like pretty much anything with threads and no loc-tite tends to do. Fortunately, it’s a long set of threads, but just something to keep in mind. I suppose a small dab of loctite would be acceptable, but you have to remove the thread protector to take the barrel out of the slide when stripping the gun.

– Recoil is quite tame. I believe my G17 kicks harder. It’s very easy to recover and follow through to your second sight picture after a shot.

– The safety allows for cocked and locked single action carry, and when swept significantly further beyond “safety off”, will decock the gun into DA mode. It can be put on safe from there too if desired. DA mode is long and stacky like most DA/SA guns. I still managed to do well with it on DA, but if I ever carry this thing, it’ll be cocked and locked.

The obligatory picture, with the bigger sibling at the plaid comforter firearms museum. Eventually I plan on using it as a suppressor host, and putting a red dot on there as my one truly over the top handgun.

2

Am I reading correctly that these feature a 15-rnd capacity in .45?

What’s the catch?

3

They do have 15 round capacity in the round floorplate mags. 14 round mags have a flat floorplate.

I don’t know what the catch is, other than it’s kind of a long grip, but it is getting to be cooler weather soon. One can conceal a fair amount under a winter coat. It definitely feels less thick front to back than my G21.

4

The culprit for your malfunctions is most likely due to FN’s heavy recoil spring. Approx 300-500 rnds and it should feed anything (except SWC’s, I’ve heard). Until then stay away from weaker ammo such as WWB and Remington UMC.

I also found the safety/decocker to be in the way and I went so far as removing the right side lever and shaving down the left side significantly. I carry decocked, safety off so this configuration works great for me. I wrote an article on FNforum.net about it if you want details: http://fnforum.net/modifying-the-fnp-45-t30239.html

5

You’re in VA, just open carry it to your heart’s content. I’m OCing mine right now, about to go out to dinner with the lady…

6

Thanks for the heads up on the recoil spring. I have some other decent .45 that I’ll feed it in the meantime.

After a little more dry fire practice it looks like I can probably get away with riding the safety with my thumb without riding the slide release. Can’t test that theory without recoil though, but my strong hand grip should prevent the decocker from activating.

If none of that works, it’s nice to know there are options for modification. Thanks for the link. :cool:

7

You could use a 9/16x7/16x1/16 o-ring at the base of your barrel threads to hold on the thread protector. There will be a bit of the o-ring that sticks out and will need to be clipped but it works great. I picked a few up from ace hardware for my FNP-45T. Also, leave your mags loaded for a while and they’ll be easier to load; I just stick to loading with a mag-lula though.

8

I only have the plain-Jane FNP-45, but wish to mention that mine feeds lead semi-wadcutter reloads without problem.

I will reinforce the comment about the FNP strong recoil spring.

Softer hand loads that cycle fine in a 5" 1911 with a standard recoil spring (200 gr. LSWC with 3.7 gr. Clays), do not function correctly with the FNP-45.

I have to bump the powder up to 3.9 gr. to get it to cycle, and even then the cases are thrown only a foot away. 4.3 gr. of Clays is a full power load that functions fine and yet felt recoil is very manageable.

Excellent, high capacity .45. The single action trigger takes some practice compared to a 1911, but speaking as an average shooter I have found that with steady practice it is exceptionally easy to control and shoot accurately.