Micro Desert Eagle: Initial impressions and first 1000 rounds

[The Wiry Irishman]

I'm not a big fan of small guns, but I could really use a gun small enough to carry when I go running, and last week I was having a bad week and decided, screw it, pocket guns are fairly cheap, and I could use a present. I'm not a fan of plastic guns, so I had two in mind, either the Micro Desert Eagle or the Sig 238. The combination of reliability concerns and a limited budget, I picked up the Micro Eagle.

Ammo

900 reloads, 2.7gr Bullseye under a 95gr Missouri Bullet Co. LRN.
100 Winchester PDX1

Maintenance

Cleaned after every range session, lubed with FP-10.

The manual doesn't give any suggested recoil spring change interval, and Magnum Research just gave me the not-so-helpful suggestion of "Just replace them whenever the slide starts to cycle improperly" so I'm going to wait it until it starts to screw up, then subtract 1 or 2 hundred rounds from that and use that as my change interval.

Malfunctions

Zero. When it first came into my FFL I stripped it, lubed it, then gave it a reliability workout, running 500 of my filthy lead handloads through it in one go without re-lubing. No issues. Here's a few pics of how dirty it was when I was done:

Fit and finish

Everything is very well fit - slide to frame is tight and smooth, barrel to frame seems to be good as well. There are machining marks visible everywhere on the gun. Those on the outside are almost polished away, but still readily visible close-up. Not really a big deal. The marks on the inside are far deeper, and also they don't seem to affect function or the smoothness of the trigger pull or slide movement, they're fouling magnets and rather difficult to clean.

I haven't really had the gun long enough to assess finish durability, especially since my holster for it hasn't come in. A little bit of wear on the barrel is all that's shown up so far, everything else looks exactly like it did new, even the slide rails.

Accuracy

Surprising. With pocket pistols like this, everything about the gun is a compromise to cut size. There's no sight radius to speak of, the grip is too short and thin to get a proper grip that isolates the motion of your trigger finger, and the trigger pull is designed for safety rather than shootability, so I wasn't expecting much. Results were much different. Here are my targets from my first range session, the first at seven yards, the second at 15, 50 shots per bull, emptying each six round mag in 3-4 seconds:

The gun has excellent, full-size sights, and although the trigger is heavy (8 or 9 pounds, it feels like, and after a few hundred rounds of breakin, it feels like it dropped by a full pound) it is very smooth and it breaks with amazing crispness. I can't understate how startling clean the break is, its on part with my tuned DAO S&W Model 64. The trigger also stacks slightly right before it breaks, so that combined with the good sights and crisp break make for a very shootable gun. What really blew my mind is when I was shooting at 100 yards with some friends, ran out of rifle ammo before and decided to play around with the Micro Eagle while I waited for a target change. It took two or three shots to get the holdover dialed in, but once I did, I was holding about a 24" group and putting most of my shots in the 12x24" cardboard box I was shooting at. Most of my misses were horizontal stringing from poor trigger control, so I imagine the gun itself is capable of much more.

General Impressions

The first thing that strikes you when you open the box is how tiny the pistol is:

And with my cell phone - if you have an iPhone or one of the flagship Android phones, it'll be just a little bit bigger than mine:

I forgot to take side-by-side pics when my friend had his LCP at my place, but the Micro Eagle is actually slightly smaller. Its a fair bit heavier, though, but I consider that a plus.

For those of you not aware, the Micro Eagle is a licensed, American-produced copy of a Czech pistol, the ZVI Kevin. This has to be one of the most uniquely-designed pistols I've ever seen.

Its a delayed blowback, utilizing two little ports just in front of the chamber to blast gas into the the front of the ejection port, slowing slide movement:

Unlike most fixed-barrel blowback guns, it does not have a single recoil spring surrounding the barrel, but two guide rods and recoil springs held inside the frame rails. And unlike most guns with guide rods, they're not held stationary in the frame during recoil, the reciprocate with the slide:

Also unlike most fixed-barrel blowbacks, the barrel isn't attached to the frame. Instead, the barrel has a locking lug underneath the chamber that engages a coutout in the frame. To field strip the gun, you line up two notches on the frame and slide, which lines up the frame cut with a relief cut in the slide, then you rotate the barrel 180 degrees and slide come right off the front.

It also has a pair of little plastic recoil buffers to prevent the steel slide from peening the aluminum frame:

In general, the design is brilliantly simple. There is no slide lock, and the only safety is the double action trigger and an inertial firing pin. It has a grand total of thirty parts, and although I haven't tried yet, it looks like detail stripping it will be about a ten minute job.

Also what surprised me about the gun is how soft the recoil was. I was expecting it to be rather vicious, given its size and the straight blowback design, but it isn't too bad. I'm wondering if the gas ports in front of the chamber also act as a sort of improvised compensator, because there is almost zero muzzle rise. Overall, recoil feels a lot like my PPK/s. It does dig into your hand quite a bit more, though. The little hump at the back of the grip really slams into your hand, especially with hot carry-level loads. I'd highly recommend wearing a glove if you want to put more than a box through it in one sitting.

Overall, I'm very happy with my purchase, and very pleasantly surprised with the general shootability of this gun. Its actually a boatload of fun to shoot.

 

[The Wiry Irishman]

Modifications

With a gun this small, there's a fair bit of recoil force even with .380, and although its pretty straight back with little muzzle rise, the smooth front and back straps still let the gun move around a fair bit in your hands. I put grip tape on the front and back strap, as well as on the front of the magazine baseplate.

The shiny nickel-teflon finish makes the sights, especially the front, rather difficult to see in certain light. I masked off the slide and hit the front and rear with some black grill paint. Hopefully it will hold up well over time. We'll see.

And one last pic of the gun as it is now, with 1000 rounds through it, front and backstrap grip tape, basepad grip tape, and painted sights:

 

[12131]

Very nice! Thanks for the write-up. A thousand rounds in 1 week, in a pocket gun. No malfunction. Impressive!

 

[VA27]

I really like mine. Slightly larger than the Seecamp, slightly smaller than everything else in .380, though as you said, a little heavier.

The gas ports work like little rockets and blast the forward edge of the ejection port retarding the slide's rearward movement and reducing it's velocity, which accounts for the relatively soft recoil (for a blow-back gun).

A dandy little gun.

 

[memphisjim]

isnt a bit thicker than the lcp/keltec?

 

[Caliper_Mi]

Those two gas ports are very interesting. Looks like they make the pistol a bit dirtier while controlling slide velocity.

How are the ergonomics of the gun? My g/f really likes the looks if it, but have seen some reviews stating that it is very prone to causing slide bite. Did you find it wanted to nip you?

Nice looking targets there!

 

[Bane]

Yes it is a little bit thicker than an LCP. But it is a good deal shorter than the LCP.

 

[Shear_stress]

Great report on an interesting gun. I'd consider getting one for curiosity's sake. Do you have any data on the muzzle velocity with that vented chamber and short barrel.

 

[Harley Quinn]

I bought a Beretta Jetfire 950, 25 cal...Years ago, never had to use it, but with certain ammo and 10 rounds, I have to think it will do the job

The Micro DE, you are showing/discussing is interesting, thanks for the detailed report, I went to Gunbroker, looked around, noticed some are priced very reasonable...Stainless would be good imho

 

[The Wiry Irishman]

The gas ports work like little rockets and blast the forward edge of the ejection port retarding the slide's rearward movement and reducing it's velocity, which accounts for the relatively soft recoil (for a blow-back gun).

Thank you for posting this. This makes much more sense that what I was thinking. I've edited the OP to reflect that.

How are the ergonomics of the gun? My g/f really likes the looks if it, but have seen some reviews stating that it is very prone to causing slide bite. Did you find it wanted to nip you?

The pseudo-beavertail at the rear is pretty well-designed to avoid that. Here is the highest possible grip I can manage on the gun:

My hands are fairly slim, but the muscle in the web of my hand is way overdeveloped from shooting so much, so in that respect at least, it would be very similar to someone with fairly chunky hands, and I've still got a few sixteenths of space. Even if your hands are fat enough to get nicked by the slide, it shouldn't be too bad. As you can see the edges on the rear of the slide are rounded, they won't leave twin lacerations on you like PPKs are prone to. Also, slide bit is another issue that can be solved with a glove.

Do you have any data on the muzzle velocity with that vented chamber and short barrel.

I don't have a chronograph, but I think the short barrel would be a much larger factor in reducing velocity than the chamber ports. Lets use a .38 revolver for comparison, as the cartridge has similar pressure to .380.

The ports on the Micro Eagle measure .007" in diameter, so the area of each port is (pi*r^2) .0000384 in^2, or .0000768 in^2 total area through which gas can vent. The cylinder gap on a revolver is typically about .006", so with a bore of .357, you have a total area for gas to vent of (2 * pi * r * h) .00672 in^2, or 87.6 times greater than the area in the Micro Eagle's barrel ports. Considering a revolver's cylinder gap is responsible for around 30fps or less of velocity reduction, the ports in the Micro Eagle most likely have a negligible effect.

 

[chicharrones]

Great report! Great pics!

 

[bannockburn]

The Wiry Irishman

Super job reporting on your Micro Desert Eagle; excellent photos too. I was also very impressed with your accuracy results; pretty much on par with what I can do with a SIG P238 at around 10 to 15 yards.

 

[The Wiry Irishman]

The latest modification, made my own cocobolo grips:

 

[OldStumps]

First wanted to thank you for this thread. First post to this group and I found it because of search on ‘Micro Eagle chronographs’. You have helped me better understand some things and how to go forward. I hope I can contribute a bit on the subject as well. First a correction to your post. You state the ports are .007” in diameter. They are right at 1/16”(.0625”) so I think you’re off by a decimal point and measured .07”d. When you go through the math (this was the best part to me in drawing comparison to revolver cylinder gap) you find that each port has area of .004 inch^2, or a total of .008 inch^2. That makes the pressure loss about the same as the .38 special revolver. It would be nice if it only was 30 fps. One other factor of importance. The barrel length in autos is measured from the back of the barrel traditionally. The .380 case is .7” long and a little of that sticks out past the end of the chamber to allow for ejector. In any event the 2.2 inch ME barrel is really only 1.5” long ahead of the case rim. Revolvers are measured from the start of the barrel ahead of the cylinder. So even a 2” snubby wheel gun is a half inch longer than the ME. I think the short barrel length and those ports due add a lot to fall-off of velocity. The P3AT is a 2.7" barrel so about a half inch longer and no ports of course

I do have a chronograph and have run some numbers comparing the ME to the P3AT for a couple different rounds. The round that I hoped would work well was a Magtech Guardian Gold 85gr. I get the following velocities in each pistol (average of six rounds).

Magtech Guardian Gold - ME 595 fps, 67 ftlbs, P3AT 850 fps, 137 ftlbs

This was very disappointing and got more so as I made some gel targets to check on expansion. Firing three rounds in each gel block I got about a half inch less penetration with the P3AT but right around 9 inches for each round. (11% gel). The reason for the slightly poorer penetration was the 85gr JHP expanded much better with the higher velocity out of the P3AT. Here are the three bullets recovered from the gel. P3AT on right and ME on left.

Anyway so now I am looking to punch things up. I saw another post that showed 800 fps for Federal Hydro Shock 90gr. That’s a little less than twice the MTGG muzzle energy at 128 ftlbs and is almost equal to the P3AT with the MTGG. I will try that in the near future. Today I got in some Buffalo Bore .380 +P 95gr JHP that I hope will get me adequate velocities and energy, and properly expand the HP. We’ll see.

 

[M2 Carbine]

Excellent report.

The slide cracked on my early MDE. Magnum Research took care of it in record time. No problems since.

I like to shoot compact handguns at 52 yards (standing, two hands). The MDE did well although I was aiming a little low and put 2 rounds under the steel plate.

 

[kokapelli]

I have both the Micro Desert Eagle and the P238 and the Micro has been 100% reliable as has the P238, but it ends there.

The P238 is better in every way. Better trigger, much, much less felt recoil, much better sights and better grip.

A blowback like the Micro will always have way more felt recoil than a locked beach system like the P238.

If you don't mind the recoil the Micro should serve you well.

Velocity for Remington 88 gr jhp from the Micro was 726.5 fps
Velocity for Remington 88 gr jhp from the P238 was 755.8 fps


My Micro on top and P238 on bottom right.

 

[OldStumps]

kokapelli, Did you measure those velocities, and was the Remington the Express ammo in the green box with yellow banner? Thanks for posting them. If the ME gets there with this ammo that's 103 ftlbs of muzzle energy. Certainly worth seeing how penetration and expansion looks in gel. Still would like something with a little more oomph, but this looks promising. Recast some gel tonight so later next week I'll give it a shot, literally

 

[kokapelli]

kokapelli, Did you measure those velocities, and was the Remington the Express ammo in the green box with yellow banner? Thanks for posting them. If the ME gets there with this ammo that's 103 ftlbs of muzzle energy. Certainly worth seeing how penetration and expansion looks in gel. Still would like something with a little more oomph, but this looks promising. Recast some gel tonight so later next week I'll give it a shot, literally

The ballistics are from the Gunblast website. He has a few other brands listed as well at...

http://www.gunblast.com/

Just look in his archives for the pistol you are interested in.

 

[kozak6]

Its a delayed blowback, utilizing two little ports just in front of the chamber to blast gas into the the front of the ejection port, slowing slide movement:

Wow, a gas retarded blowback. That's really cool and really simple. Just two little holes instead of some silly gas cylinder assembly like a P7.

It sure makes a mess on the gun, but I guess that's ok considering the intended use.

The futuristic appearance is also neat.

 

[OldStumps]

kokapelli, I've seen his tests and to be honest I don't believe them credible, at least for this pistol. The MagTech Guardian Gold I like is a +P loaded round (although there is no +P in .380 so just loaded to SAAMI max like Buffalo Bore +P). Numbers for it on the box are 1082 fps and 221 ftlbs (compared to 990 fps and 191 ftlbs for the Remington 88 gr). I got 595 fps and 67 ftlbs for the 85 gr JHP in the ME. That's a 45% reduction in velocity and 70% reduction muzzle energy. The Buffalo Bore +P is showing 1125 fps on the box and 267 ftlbs. If I get similar drop in performance I should see 620 fps and 81 ftlbs out of the ME (benefit coming from 95 gr JHP and the 620 fps calculates 80.1 ftlbs me). That's a 21% improvement in muzzle energy and the real question will be is velocity high enough to allow adequate expansion of the different JHP. I'm hoping so.

BTW, the ports are directed forward at maybe 45 degrees, so there is some benefit to keeping nose down.

 

[kokapelli]

kokapelli, I've seen his tests and to be honest I don't believe them credible, at least for this pistol. The MagTech Guardian Gold I like is a +P loaded round (although there is no +P in .380 so just loaded to SAAMI max like Buffalo Bore +P). Numbers for it on the box are 1082 fps and 221 ftlbs (compared to 990 fps and 191 ftlbs for the Remington 88 gr). I got 595 fps and 67 ftlbs for the 85 gr JHP in the ME. That's a 45% reduction in velocity and 70% reduction muzzle energy. The Buffalo Bore +P is showing 1125 fps on the box and 267 ftlbs. If I get similar drop in performance I should see 620 fps and 81 ftlbs out of the ME (benefit coming from 95 gr JHP and the 620 fps calculates 80.1 ftlbs me). That's a 21% improvement in muzzle energy and the real question will be is velocity high enough to allow adequate expansion of the different JHP. I'm hoping so.

BTW, the ports are directed forward at maybe 45 degrees, so there is some benefit to keeping nose down.

I know Gunblast never knocks guns but I don't see any reason to doubt his ballistic numbers.

On the other hand I have a big problem with Magtech claiming their 380 ammo to be +P.

There are all kinds of ballistic tests of Magtech Guardian Gold that show it is anything but +P!

If you go to....

http://www.ableammo.com/catalog/Reference_Charts.php

You can see that for example the 95gr Gold Dot has significantly faster numbers than Magtech Guardian Gold and from other gelatin tests I have seen the Magtech Guardian Gold is an unreliable expander.

Personally I have chosen to only carry fmj in 380 because just about any fmj 380 round will penetrate to more than 16" in Ballistic gelatin.

 

[OldStumps]

:kokapelli,

I am just trying to learn what this little guy will do or won't do. And I only have an F1 Shooting Chrony but it seem to give consistent results. I really don't know how someone else tests but it's pretty challenging to find exact same comparisons. Closest site for me when we talk subcompact carry is the Bullets by the Inch site where they not only test ammo in barrel lengths from 18"-2" but also in specific pistols. www.ballisticsbytheinch.com

The ME there shows pretty good numbers for Gold Dot at 773 fps and 119 ftlbs. I will say that same site shows better numbers for the Hornady XTP 90gr that are better than I got in the P3AT by a significant amount (130 fps). Maybe my chrono isn't all that great.

I don't really care much about velocity numbers in the end, or muzzle energy for that matter. I do care that a HP bullet properly expand because that's my best chance for it not leaving the target. Velocity is the major factor in energy calcs though and the hydrodynamic pressure effect on the HP is what expands it, and that too is a velocity factor. So maybe I do care about velocity a little.

I am confident in my gel results though. The bullet from the ME failed to expand properly. That from the P3AT expanded just fine. I retract the expressed opinion on the Gunblast numbers. They didn't seem consistent with what I am finding. I will shoot the BB +P and see what I come up with. Thanks for your comments.

 

[kokapelli]

OldStumps I think your thinking is right on the money.

I think most of the better hp ammo is right at the threshold for expansion from most if not all of the pocket 380 pistols and when you shorten the barrel even more like the Micro expansion is probably just not going to be reliable.

 

[oddmannout]

failure

Ok. I purchased a MDE this week and decided to put it through its paces today. 37 rounds with 6 ftf and on round 37 trigger goes. Nothing...totally limp. I don't want to take it apart before I send it in to see what is wrong and I don't know if I will have confidence to carry even with repair so what now? I assume i will lose $150 or so on resale minimum but maybe I can find a trade for slightly used s&w 442. Anyone else hear of this problem with the MDE?

 

[rtz]

Page 20, $300!

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