I’ve got the wife interested in shooting, but she has a lot of trouble gripping the M&P (even with small backstrap). There is a lot of problems getting her hand high up on the pistol. Her hands are not exceptionally large, even though she is fairly tall for a woman–she and my son have the same size hands–he’s a skinny 12 and 5’4/pre-puberty–I’ve basically got an extra joint on both of them and I’d say my hands are “medium to medium/large” I.E. im not breaking the scale here.
Of course all of my standard pistols are huge. I did have her grip a 1911 which she liked better, and she had no issue with a Ruger SP101 even with .357 mag. Her preferred firearm is my Makarov, which while a decent gun does not meet the 9mm threshold for self defense. What is available is “slimline” duty or carry semi-auto pistols for carry, 9mm or larger (but probably 9mm only). Is there a Glock 19 SF? I tend to get stuck on capacity issues, so I prefer the double stack models–how are the single stack Glocks or other available options.
I think the Sig P225/P6 feels great with it’s narrow grip. It feels smaller than most medium sized guns, and my hands are about as averaged sized as you can get.
My wife is like yours though, after laying a number of handguns on the table she thought she liked the feel of the Makarov the best! Safety is hard as hell to work, and like you said it’s .380. I tried to push her toward the Mod. 60 Smith 2", but no go. She doesn’t shoot very often, so she’s just going entirely on feel, which is not a bad place to start.
Kahr pistols have what I consider to be a small grip.
Double action only, which simplifies the manual of arms.
The slide and slide release can be stiff, though.
And, Kahr pistols have to go through a 200 round break-in.
One to consider.
I went through the same process with my wife who has medium to small hands. There’s a very long thread if you search my posts. I can send it to you if you like, but basically we ended up with a Sig P229 for her since it had the best combination of grip size and recoil reduction.
The interesting thing is that she completely changed her mind from the showroom to the “go room”. That is, pistols she fondled and liked behind the counter were, in most cases, the ones she shoot poorly.
She shoots the heck out of the Sig, however, she also liked the M&P (except for the trigger) at the range. At that time Apex didn’t have the FCG parts for the M&P, otherwise we probably would have gotten that.
We tried smaller grip pistols like the 239’s Kahrs, etc, but she didn’t like the low mass/recoil that one gets with a smaller pistol. Same with some of the .380s. She absolutely hated the LCP.
This is kind of a hard question to answer on the internet. The best thing to do is to go to a well stocked gun store or gun show with the wife, and have her starting feeling up various guns.
I have a kel tec pf 9. I would not trust it as a ccw for my wife. I put about 100 to 200 rds throught it. Cleaned and did not fire it for about a year. I cleaned it every so often since I was carrying it at the time. When I went to shot it about a year after first firing it didn’t preform well. The first shoot fired the next didn’t, I ejected that round pulled the trigger and nothing. I ejected that round pulled the trigger and it didn’t fire. The next didn’t discharge as well . After I checked the bullets and could see the mark from the firing pin. I then placed those rounds in my glock and fired every shot. KEl Tec did fix the problem for free but I still can not trust it for CCW. Especially for my wife.
What I’m trying to find is an equivalent to a Glock 19 (top of the line reliability), with reduced capacity to make it slimmer. The grip reduction is an interesting take–I typically do not customize my pistols much–but that would definitely be an option.
As several other members have suggested check out a P30.
It’s got the reliability you’re looking for and with the adjustable side panels and back straps for the grip there’s a total of 27 different grip configurations.
My wife found that in order for her to grip the pistol comfortably, it needed to be a) single stack and b) have support for the 5th finger. She ruled out the M&P 9 Compact and the Glock 26 immediately - too bulky - and grip too short. We also looked at the Kahr, but there are too many reliability issues reported. She preferred the Walther PPS. She put the small backstrap on it and uses the 7 round magazine. It’s been a great pistol for her, and I liked it so much I bought one too.
Didn’t even consider the Keltec - my buddy has one and it’s been a nightmare. Not interested in a pistol that requires a “fluff and buff” before it will even begin to feed reliability.
We have three Kahrs: a PM9, a K9, and a TP9. The TP9 with its four inch barrel is noticeably easier for my wife to rack than either of the other two Kahrs, both of which have a shorter barrel and slide than the TP9. Also the all-stainless T9 at about 26-28 oz has the long (for a Kahr) 4" barrel of the TP9 and the weight/heft of a K9. Overall very good guns IMO. IMO reliability and durability in 9mm Kahrs is best in the models with 3.5 or 4" barrels, not 3" barrels.
I’d also look at the Walther PPS in 9mm. As slim as a Kahr poly frame 9mm, about 19-20 oz unloaded, it has Glock-like trigger with a short tactile reset. We have two of them, each with about 1100 rds.
The Walther PPS and the Kahr poly frame 9mm guns have small diameter grips, about .9" in width, and small from front to back as well. Great for folks with small hands.
Length of the grip varies. the Walther uses different length mags to achieve this, and the Kahrs actually have different length grips depending on the specific model.
IMO both the Kahrs and Walther PPS require a break-in period of at least a few hundred rds before being fully reliable.
