The R9 is probably as small as a 9mm firearm semi-auto can be made and still be reliable. I have no faith in Remington's ability to make the R9s and have them work.
It really makes use of the spring so those get used up pretty fast - they're good for about 200 rounds. I have used my springs out to 250 rounds. It really wants to jump out of your hands when its shot, and the trigger guard almost always thumps my trigger finger on the recoil. The sights are pain black fixed sights milled into the slide.
I have 2 Remington RM380 pistols, one I carry as a backup to my R9 and the other I picked up for $99.00 and is my bathroom gun.
I was going to get a Hi-Point for the bathroom. I go out of my way to make sure the humidity from the shower doesn't go into my bedroom where I have some firearms, and I don't take a firearm with me into the bathroom because I don't want to expose it to all of that humidity. But I really hate it when I'm in the shower and I hear a noise. Every so often I'll be in the shower and I'll hear a noise and I'm not sure if it is the thump of a truck outside putting down its lift gate (or something similar) or someone kicking down my door - I mean I'm in the shower and I have no clue what the noise is. I figured of the stuff on a Hi-Point that can rust most of it is interior and can have oil or light grease on it all of time, so I don't think the guts will be much susceptible to rust and I don't think the ZAMAK rusts from simple humidity and contact with the air. I wanted to get a "bathroom only" Hi-Point, since I don't think there is much on a Hi-Point that rusts, and if a part were to get rusty I'd just scrub the rust and for $175.00 I don't care if it gets a little rust on it.
Illinois has had a melting point law on the books for a while but I would see Hi-Points in gun shops anyway. I don't know what happened - maybe there wasn't enforcement in the past or whatever but now there is, and no one is selling Hi-Points in Illinois.
A lot of people responded that if I just kept a normal steel gun lubricated, it wouldn't rust - even if it was in a bathroom that got steamed up from showering.
Then the Remington RM380 went on sale for $99.00, so I purchased another RM380 for my "Bathroom Gun"
I took it apart, waxed the slide and put grease on the internal parts and now it sits on the tank of my toilet, right next to the shower, been there for 7 months now and not a spot of rust on it. I took it apart today, and the pin would not fall out. I shook it, I tapped it, jiggled it and the pin would not come out. I had to get a toothpick and push the pin out. I did have Lubriplate on the pin, and I think any little bit of grease on the pin means you'll have to push the pin out from the other side.
I don't have any faith in Remington's ability to reproduce the R9 but the RM380 works. I haven't had any problems with the little guns.
If one has about $1200 for LNIB sample as deep conceilment close range defensive handgun the R9 can not be surpassed.
