kBob
Member
OK. it was me.
I just hope I was not wrong. Likely still a jerk but hopefully not wrong.
Yesterday I had a few minutes and as it happened was passing by a pawn shop I have made a purchase from in the past and not felt scalped.
Mayber forty handguns in there which I initially ignored and hit the open racks in search of a cheap break action single shot shotgun. Found a H&R 12ga. for $85 plus and a same same 20 that had some sort of pistol gripped boxy plastic stock on it with storage compartment for $125.
Nothing blew my skirts up, except a late model 67 Winchester single shot .22 (Bulkier stock with the take down screw inletted rather than sticking out) so as long as I was there I figured I look at the handguns.
Pretty much standard pawn shop fare......until I came across a Walther P5. Now I was never that impresses with the messed up P-38k from when the Polezi in Hessia had them but it was interesting to see one in a little small town pawn shop with glowing neon "GUNS" sign in the window.
Odd, the PP next to it had adjustable sights but no exteneded barrel. That's really odd it has an external slide stop. Wait a minute! there was a Walther PPS right there in "Smallville". Not bad looking. Perhaps sock drawer carry since it was new did not seem worn much internally from what I could see.
Ulm (antler) 1976 proof and marked 9x18 on the slide.
This is were my inner know it all made its prescence known. The tag was marked "9 MAK" under caliber.
I felt compelled to tell the shop person I felt this was an error. When I looked at these guns all those decades ago in Germany I was told that they used a cartridge called the 9mm Ultra by some and 9 mm Special Police by others and that it was a 18 mm case in length. This same 9x18 mm designation is often used to describe the 9mm Makerov. My understanding is that the two rounds ARE NOT INTERCHANGABELE or at least not in both directions. I was told that the Ultra used your basic 9mm .354-355 bullet while the Makerov used a 9.3 mm bullet of .365-368 diameter and necessarily a larger case mouth.
The shop person got a little huffy over it and another customer made a comment about a "gunshop know it all".
SO I have to know.....was I wrong? Will the PPS marked 9x18 function safely with MAK ammo?
I did not comment that I personally though $800 was a bit of a high price on a commercially failed gun using unobtainium for ammo. I did take the oppertunity to handle it again and be reminded of how neat it felt to do so in the way back and marvel that the German Polezi of the time could not see the value of them over a .32 PP with FMJ ammo. Today they are too big for what they offer but they were sleek neat and hard to beat in the Euro police market of the day.....except no on bought them.
Unless you guys tell me different I hope no one buys this one and tried to shoot 9Mak in it either.
-kBob
I just hope I was not wrong. Likely still a jerk but hopefully not wrong.
Yesterday I had a few minutes and as it happened was passing by a pawn shop I have made a purchase from in the past and not felt scalped.
Mayber forty handguns in there which I initially ignored and hit the open racks in search of a cheap break action single shot shotgun. Found a H&R 12ga. for $85 plus and a same same 20 that had some sort of pistol gripped boxy plastic stock on it with storage compartment for $125.
Nothing blew my skirts up, except a late model 67 Winchester single shot .22 (Bulkier stock with the take down screw inletted rather than sticking out) so as long as I was there I figured I look at the handguns.
Pretty much standard pawn shop fare......until I came across a Walther P5. Now I was never that impresses with the messed up P-38k from when the Polezi in Hessia had them but it was interesting to see one in a little small town pawn shop with glowing neon "GUNS" sign in the window.
Odd, the PP next to it had adjustable sights but no exteneded barrel. That's really odd it has an external slide stop. Wait a minute! there was a Walther PPS right there in "Smallville". Not bad looking. Perhaps sock drawer carry since it was new did not seem worn much internally from what I could see.
Ulm (antler) 1976 proof and marked 9x18 on the slide.
This is were my inner know it all made its prescence known. The tag was marked "9 MAK" under caliber.
I felt compelled to tell the shop person I felt this was an error. When I looked at these guns all those decades ago in Germany I was told that they used a cartridge called the 9mm Ultra by some and 9 mm Special Police by others and that it was a 18 mm case in length. This same 9x18 mm designation is often used to describe the 9mm Makerov. My understanding is that the two rounds ARE NOT INTERCHANGABELE or at least not in both directions. I was told that the Ultra used your basic 9mm .354-355 bullet while the Makerov used a 9.3 mm bullet of .365-368 diameter and necessarily a larger case mouth.
The shop person got a little huffy over it and another customer made a comment about a "gunshop know it all".
SO I have to know.....was I wrong? Will the PPS marked 9x18 function safely with MAK ammo?
I did not comment that I personally though $800 was a bit of a high price on a commercially failed gun using unobtainium for ammo. I did take the oppertunity to handle it again and be reminded of how neat it felt to do so in the way back and marvel that the German Polezi of the time could not see the value of them over a .32 PP with FMJ ammo. Today they are too big for what they offer but they were sleek neat and hard to beat in the Euro police market of the day.....except no on bought them.
Unless you guys tell me different I hope no one buys this one and tried to shoot 9Mak in it either.
-kBob
