12/31/2023 0 Comments Fn 9mm review![]() ![]() This would have been easy enough, since FN wisely shapes the rear sight with a ledge on the front, for just such emergencies. I found I needed significant pressure with the support hand thumb to close the slide via the lever during speed reloads, and it was sufficiently difficult with the thumb of the firing hand that if I’d had to perform a 1-hand-only “injured shooter” reload with it, I would have released the slide with a tug instead of fighting the lever. Yes, FN lists the part in its nomenclature sheet as a “slide stop,” but if pushing it down releases the slide, well, it is also a slide release. I had to work awfully hard to close the slide 1-handed via the lever. However, pressing down on these levers to close the slide and chamber a live round was another matter. Even though molding in the frame shields the levers on either side from a thumb inadvertently pushing them up and locking the slide open in mid firing cycle, they performed as intended in the hands of all testers. On either side, they make it easy to lock the slide open without a magazine in place for inspection. Slide lock/slide release levers are also ambidextrous. The latter method is faster for a lot of people, and very likely safer since it gets the finger out of the trigger guard. ![]() However, this did not prevent deliberate, clean release of an empty magazine when depressing either side, whether using thumb or trigger finger. On both sides, the frame is molded to shield the release buttons from being inadvertently depressed and turning your 17+1 round auto pistol into a single-shot. The ambidextrous magazine release was appreciated by this old man, who has some arthritis of his own in the dominant hand thumb among other places. It’s not the pistol to buy for your great grandmother with osteoporosis and arthritis. The stout recoil spring assembly requires a vigorous effort to rack the slide of the FN 509. Some FN 509 owners have reported excellent triggers, so sample GKS0001514 may have simply been an exception. In between that draggy take-up and the shot, the pull “at the wall” (i.e., just before discharge) felt about like a Glock with an 8-pound connector. There was also palpable backlash, or additional rearward movement of the trigger after the sear released. That is, as the trigger began coming back, it transmitted little “catches” to the trigger finger as the internal parts moved against each other. Our test 509, serial number GKS0001514, exhibited “creep” as noted by all on the test team. There’s pace, and perhaps most important, smoothness. There’s more to trigger pull-quality than weight, of course. I suspect the factory (like most) took the measurement low on the trigger, where greater leverage requires less pressure. Measured at the toe, the bottom tip of the trigger, the Lyman digital gauge from Brownell’s registered an average of 6.5 pounds, right in the middle of FN’s stated range. This one turned out to average 8.85 pounds when weighed at the center, where the shooter’s trigger finger generally lies. It felt more like the 8-pound range to me, but we always weigh the triggers anyway. Even with my old arthritic hands, it was no problem loading it all the way up, or thumbing rounds out of a full magazine to change ammo.įN specifies the trigger pull as 5.5 to 7.5 pounds. It inserts smoothly and falls free cleanly. The all-metal magazine (our sample came with two) holds 17 rounds of 9mm to back up the one in the chamber. ![]() ![]() This pistol is proudly “Made In USA,” specifically in Columbia, South Carolina. Its long grip makes its 4-inch barrel and proportional length slide look short (picture a Glock 19 upper on a Glock 17 frame, and you’ll have an idea of the proportions). Like most of its genre, the 509 is a blocky-looking pistol. The polymer FN pistols have already been winning major matches in the hands of FN’s sponsored world champion shooter Dave Sevigny, and Dave was quite high on the 509 when I discussed it with him at one of the shows a few months ago. FN’s 509, essentially an improvement over the FNS introduced about 3 years ago, joins the legion of polymer Parabellum pistols vying for the market established and dominated by Glock. ![]()
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