Apparently Ruger, not content to sit on its laurels after actually having some marketing successes, is going to throw it all away by trying, yet again, to bring out a duty pistol.
*sigh* Ruger makes a lot of great stuff, but an automatic pistol that corners the police/miliary/defensive market? Nope. The swung for the bleachers with the P85/89 series to try and win the US military contracts…and failed. The design evolved into the P95 (which, actually, I think is a great gun) and was only discontinued a few years ago…but never really wound up in any departments holsters. They retreated to the drawing board and came up with the SR9 series which should have done well for them but, again, didn’t burn up the gun counters of our fair land. And now they’re going to try again.
Smith and Wesson is a good example of a company that made lame autos and redeemed themselves with a successful design. The old 3/4 digit ‘Third/Fourth Generation’ autos were, in my opinion, terrible. Smith learned their lesson (although they had to go through the fiasco of the Sigma) and came out with the M&P series which is actually a pretty good pistol. Ruger must be trying for that same redemption.
As I said, Im actually a really big fan of the P95DC series of autos. They can usually be had very reasonably, are tough as hell, built to take abuse, and only has a few more parts than the equally simple Glock. While I prefer the Glock (or HiPower) for most of my 9mm needs, I’ll never pass up a P95 if one comes up at a bargain price.
As with virtually every new product Ruger comes out with, I’m sure there’ll be the usual recall in the first year or two of production…after that it’ll be interesting to see if this thing has legs or if it winds up as another eveolutionary dead-end in Ruger’s quest to make a dent in the police/military sidearm market.
I’m with you. This seems like a late entry into an already over crowded field of contenders for full-sized duty pistols. I’m sure Ruger has done more market research than I have, and obviously they’ve convinced themselves that this is worth the investment in production, inventory, marketing, etc. Speaking just for myself, however, if I were in the market for a full-sized auto, this would be very far down the list of models to consider.
Agreed. I was raised on 1911s but my “run in the mud” pistols are Glocks, purely because they work, period. We all want high end 1911s and LWRC ARs but all we can afford are Glocks and Wasr-10s that aren’t pretty but they work.
As far as Ruger making a new duty pistol, I guess they are inspired by their 1911 sales and someone said “Let’s try this again…” If the P95 didn’t catch on (to be honest, at the time it looked more “ray-gun” than Glock, Sig, or 1911) even with it being as robust as it was I have reservations about a M&P look-alike.
Yes, they are trying to break into a crowded field, but the gun reviewers on the internet need something to keep them busy.