Congratulate me. I just got my dream gun.

[EddieCoyle]

Congratulate me. I just got my dream gun. Now with Range Report!

I've wanted one of these ever since I was a little kid and saw one in the movie Joe Kidd. I got it today:



It's a refinished "Red 9" C96 Broomhandle. Whoo hoo!

 

[Srigs]

Nice broomhandle!

 

[Mike_in_OC]

Congrats. Im working on mine, I can get it if I ever move out of California.

 

[Trebor]

Congrats. That one is still on my list. There are so many pitfalls when buying Broomies that I still haven't got one yet.

 

[AirForceShooter]

congrats.
It looks really sweet.
How about a range report, you have to shoot the thing.


What Pitfalls?

AFS

 

[cuervo]

What type of ammo will you be using?

The main reason I ask is that I've been told Tokarev ammo will work, but there is a really good chance that it will harm the pistol due to its high chamber pressure.

 

[EddieCoyle]

What type of ammo will you be using?

The main reason I ask is that I've been told Tokarev ammo will work, but there is a really good chance that it will harm the pistol due to its high chamber pressure.

While what you say is true for the pistols chambered in 7.63mm x 25, this one is chambered in 9mm Parabellum.

I do plan to shoot it and will post a range report this weekend.

By the way... What pitfalls?

 

[Tropical Z]

By the way... What pitfalls?

I know you have to be real careful when you reassemble them.If you put something in backwards it will fit and you will be screwed.

 

[Trebor]

"Pitfalls"

There's a lot of so-so quality Broomhandles out there and it's hard to find a nice one that is safe to shoot yet still affordable. That one looks like it was profesionally redone, so it should be good.

As the other poster mentioned, get some good instructions before you tear it down and try to put it back together. You can put it together wrong and if you do, you have to have a hole drilled in the receiver to trip a certain part in order for it to be dissassembled again.

 

[flashman70]

That's a beauty. My sister's second husband (my one time brother-in-law?) had two and a stock. I would have given my eye teeth for one. Congrats.

 

[EddieCoyle]

I took it to the range today with mixed results. OK, I was disappointed - but I'd still buy it again in an instant - even with the semi-accidental discharge. Read on.

I don't have stripper clips for it yet so I started off firing single rounds. The ejector is on the top of the bolt and the cases eject straight up. They were coming down on my head, arm, nose, etc. Kind of a pain in the butt.

After a while, I held the bolt back and loaded a whole magazine (10 rounds). Upon firing, the pistol failed to return fully to battery a few times. I attribute this to a weak recoil spring - I have new springs on order from Wolff as we speak.

With the rear sight set at it's lowest position, it fired about a foot high at 25 yards. I use paper plates as targets so I wasn't even hitting the target. I could tell they were hitting high because I could see it on the berm. I stapled one plate about a foot higher than the target plate and carefully aimed at the lower one to see where the rounds would group on the high plate. I was getting 3-4" groups at 25 yards - they were just 12" above point of aim. I have no idea what I'm going to do about this.


Now onto the AD...

I'm a lefty and I have big hands. The safety for the C96 is a small lever, just above the grip on the left. I found that the web of my hand kept moving the safety just out of the "fire" position. When I pulled the trigger, nothing would happen. This happened a few times. The last time it happened, I pulled the trigger and nothing happened, so I took my finger out of the trigger guard, flipped the safety back down to the "Fire" position, AND THE GUN WENT OFF!

Now, I've been doing my research on the C96, and I read an account (I think on this very forum) about this little idiosyncrasy, so I was half expecting this. I had a good grip on the gun, pointed downrange, when I flipped off the safety, so no harm was done. It still scared the crap out of me. I'd done the same thing a half dozen times and the gun did not go off. It did that last time though. Afterward, I did some experimentation and found that if I moved the safety to just the right position, I could get this to repeat. I'd rather have the safety disabled than have to deal with this mysterious "second trigger". I've got to think about what I have to do about this.

I'm going to replace the springs to improve the reliability.

I would greatly appreciate it if anyone out there has any suggestions for what I can do to get this thing to fire to point of aim (short of moving back 100 yards).

All in all, I was a little disappointed that it didn't put all ten shots into a single hole at point of aim with 100% reliability, but I still wouldn't trade it for anything.

 

[Trebor]

I'd forgotten about the safety doing that. Now that you mention it, I've heard of that before as well.

Contact WildAlaska over at The Firing Line forum. He knows a few things about Broomhandles and might be able to help you. I've exhausted my knowledge.

 

[RecoilRob]

Congrats on the Broomie! As you have found out, they were not designed with any thought to 'ergonomics' and trying to hold one against recoil is difficult.

The C-96 was intended to be used with the shoulder stock attatched. I know, lots of them don't have the cuts for stock attatching but I'm speaking about the original design. Without the stock, they tend to squirm about and all the movement is up which tends to throw the shots high.

Also, the 'generous' sighting arrangement makes things even more difficult. The proper sight picture is just the very tip of the front sight showing in the notch. Not fast, not easy to do and, combined with the tiny grip and total lack of human engineering, hitting small things at distance is not easy.

But, you GOT to love the thing...yes?

Another thought. What kind of ammo are you using? I limit mine to 115 gr standard pressure stuff or low powered handloads. Reducing the power and recoil of your ammo to the minimum required to operate the action should bring the impacts down a bit too.

I have a Fed Ord 714 (semi version of the full auto Schnellfuerer) and learned a bunch about C-96's and springs. The thing would fire and eject the empty along with a couple of rounds from the mag. The recoil seemed very harsh for 9mm.

Long story short....the recoil spring was missing a couple of coils. Replacing it helped but didn't cure the troubles. After much research, it became clear that the hammer is responsible for much more than just igniting the primer. It, along with its' spring, are a large portion of the force holding the bolt closed and locked during firing.

Putting a new hammer spring in transformed the gun. No more feed/ejection problems. Recoil seemed to be reduced by several magnitudes. The Broomie became friendly to shoot!!

Hope your spring transfusion goes well. Anyone interested in guns should disassemble a C-96 once to see how they did it. Amazing. And, this was before CNC machines. Machined springs and the puzzle like fitting together of the parts makes me take mine apart every now and then just to admire it. Truely a work of art.

 

[EddieCoyle]

Thanks for the detailed reply Recoil Rob.

The C-96 was intended to be used with the shoulder stock attatched. I know, lots of them don't have the cuts for stock attatching but I'm speaking about the original design. Without the stock, they tend to squirm about and all the movement is up which tends to throw the shots high.

Mine has the slot for the stock. I'm looking for a repro as we speak.

Also, the 'generous' sighting arrangement makes things even more difficult. The proper sight picture is just the very tip of the front sight showing in the notch. Not fast, not easy to do and, combined with the tiny grip and total lack of human engineering, hitting small things at distance is not easy.

That's what I was trying to do and it still shot very high.

Another thought. What kind of ammo are you using? I limit mine to 115 gr standard pressure stuff or low powered handloads. Reducing the power and recoil of your ammo to the minimum required to operate the action should bring the impacts down a bit too.

I was using some low powered 115 gr Remingtons.

Putting a new hammer spring in transformed the gun. No more feed/ejection problems. Recoil seemed to be reduced by several magnitudes. The Broomie became friendly to shoot!!

I just checked, the spring pack that I ordered includes the hammer spring too. Thanks for the heads-up.

 

[cuervo]

With the stock, are these considered SBRs and need all the required taxes and things? This isn't a dream gun for me, but if a good opportunity presented itself, I don't think I'd turn one down.