New XDm40 5.25 Sort of Range Report

[JustSomeGuy]

My buddy was building a fence with his neighbor, so I have no pics, but I'll try to draw you a picture with words.

I picked up the Competition model XDm on Saturday and bought a new case for it on Sunday. Why a new case? Because I have 6 new regular magazines and 6 with Arrendondo (Spelling?) 140mm extensions so you can't put all that stuff in the case that comes with the gun. Besides, I like to keep the factory cases clean so I always get a different case for the new guns for the range. It's an outdoor USPSA type range and it can rain on you (it did for a couple of minutes!), be dusty, and generally is hard on shiny new stuff, so I buy the double height plastic cases with two layers of foam padding you can get almost anywhere for about $20-$23. They work well, are relatively inexpensive, and are deep enough to hold a second layer of stuff under the layer that has the gun and magazines.

I brought with me about 150rnds of .40 loaded with a Montana Gold 180grn JHP over 5.8grn of Silhouette, and another box with about 400rnds of the same Montana Gold 180grn JHP over 6.0grns of Silhouette. My intention was to use up all of the slightly lighter load, which I did, and then try some accuracy work with the 6.0grn load to finish up.

I had loaded all the new (6) 16 round magazines the night I bought the gun so the springs could take a "set" and be easier to reload once at the range. This tactic worked out because the magazines which would normally be very stiff and hard to push the last couple of rounds into if you just leave them unloaded until you use them, were pliable enough so I could just use my thumb to reload them to their full capacity. The ones with the 140mm extensions, which allows an extra 3 rounds, had already been broken in with use in my 4.5 inch XDm and so no pre-loading was necessary to render them "thumb friendly" for today's (Tuesday, 6/12/12) foray.

The factory case contained the usual gun, 3 new magazines, paddle holster, 2 mag belt pouch, and helpful magazine loader tool, along with a stamped piece of metal that turned out to be a handy two bladed screwdriver for adjusting the rear sight, and a couple of lengths of front sight colored inserts in red and green in case I break or otherwise want to change the fiber optic in the front sight.

Now... on most of my XD's and XDm's I have Dawson front and adjustable rear sights, with the front sight being .1 (One Tenth) of an inch in width with a fiber optic insert, usually red in color, and green fiber optic two dot rear. The new gun came with a red insert front sight of about .125 width, with a more or less target type rear which is black only with no inserts. I have this same setup on several of my 1911 type guns and frankly, I like it. I thought I would crave a thinner front sight, but after shooting this setup I found it to be most satisfactory and I think I will keep it this way.

The trigger is still stock, but I will change that soon. I have 6 other XD's and XDm's and all have trigger jobs, mostly with Springer kits or done by him, one from the Springfield Custom Shop (which is very good) and another with a Powder River Precision kit in it. I am going to try another Powder River Match trigger kit in this one. I already ordered it, but it's not here yet, so when it gets here I will update this with the stock trigger pull vs what I get with the new kit... if I can find that new trigger gauge I have around here somewhere!

On to the actual shooting... I inserted one of the previously loaded magazines into the gun and fired three shots into the berm just to get the feel of the trigger. It is, of course, a bit on the heavy side with some creep, but it breaks OK when it finally does. I then set up my chronograph and stapled up a USPSA silhouette type target and then taped a bullseye target to that so I would have something to shoot at at 15 yards so I could chrono the various loads I brought with me. I will not go into that since that is another tale entirely, but they seemed to be producing about what I expected from them as far as power factor. At this point I was not going for absolute accuracy, as I was reading the chrono after every shot and writing down the results, but I was pleasantly surprised by the results I was getting with the groups. After 40 rounds over the chronograph, I put that aside and taped up another target that had 6 small bullseyes on it intended for work with a small caliber rifle like a 22 rimfire from 50 feet. The six targets on the one piece of paper are only about 3" in diameter each, with a ten ring of about an inch, so they are relatively challenging for a large caliber pistol from 15 yards. My intention was to keep all of my shots in each string of 16 or 19 (depending on which magazine I was using) all within one of the 6 chosen targets for that string. I almost made it! It took a few shots to realize that I needed to adjust the rear sight about 3 clicks up and the same left to zero with the rounds I had. After that, the game was to obliterate the small x ring with however many shots I had in the magazine, ignoring the shots that did not hit the center, but hopefully still remaining in the actual chosen target. I had some fliers... I even had one that hit the bottom of the paper. I just fell asleep on that one! But by the end of the first magazine, I had cut the center out of the first target and moved on to the next. When I had gone through six magazines, I realized I still had a couple of the small bullseyes that were sort of "lightly used", and spent a couple more magazines trying to remove any insulting white areas that remained in the inch wide centers. Now that I had myself tuned to the gun, I replaced that 6 up target with a new one of a different configuration with only a single bullseye of a dark grey hue which was kind of oblong in height about 2 1/2 inches high and 2 inches wide at the X ring. The entire 10 ring was about 1 inch larger in both directions and the 9 ring another inch larger outside of that. I fired 48 shots at that target, offhand, with a two handed grip. I got 42 10's with 38 x's. 5 of the 6 remaining shots were in the 9 ring. Regrettably, there was another called flier. Sometimes I just go nuts!

I loaded a few more magazines to cut the X ring out of that target too... I hate to leave any paper where I don't want any. I burned up a bit more ammo taking a few odd shots at other stuff laying on the berm like some shotgun wads and pieces of clay targets that happened to be there... you know, just plinking.

I am not claiming that the XDm40 5.25 is a bullseye gun that you can take out of the box and go win a National Championship with. God knows it needs a trigger job. However, for most purposes, it is good enough, and in the right hands I think that even in stock condition, you could threaten some pretty good tuned up guns in a USPSA match with it.

I think in the end I fired 265 rounds or thereabout. I had no malfunctions of any kind, and all shots were with my reloads. All the empties fell onto my 5x7ft tarp which I had spread out about 2 feet to the right of my shooting position. A few rolled off but were easily recovered. This made it very easy to round up my brass at the end of the session.

It was a very pleasant day... Like I always say, the worst day at the range is better than the best day I ever had at the office, and this was a pretty good range day!

[JustSomeGuy]

Well... I did find my trigger gauge, and the stock trigger measured 7 1/4lbs. No wonder my finger was sore. I just finished putting in the Powder River "Best" kit which touts itself as the "Ultimate Match Trigger Kit". It comes with a reduced power trigger spring, a reduced power sear spring, a new striker safety lever, a new sear, and a new trigger with an overtravel stop on the back of the trigger instead of doing something internally for that.

On my gun, it was necessary to adjust the sear's contact with the grip safety to allow the grip safety to freely operate... This may not always be necessary, and only took a few passes with a medium file on the appropriate part of the sear that meets the grip safety. This is described in the included instructions, and so it was no surprise when it required some fitting. The only other thing that required some fitting was, of course, the trigger's overtravel stop. To do this right, you have to assemble and dis-assemble the gun several times. However, after a couple of repetitions, you get good at it, and when you finally barely get the striker to fall, you know it will only require one more assembly cycle and a bit more filing/sanding to get it to work perfectly.

When retested with the trigger gauge, it went from a truly horrible stock pull of 7 1/4lbs with a lot of creep and overtravel, to an acceptable 4 1/2lbs with very little creep and a crispy break with no perceptible overtravel and a shorter reset. I would have liked it if the kit had included a reduced power striker spring as well, which may have the potential to bring the trigger pull down perhaps another 1/2 to full pound or so. That would have made it a very good trigger indeed. I'll have to go back to the Powder River site and see if he offers any. The old kits used to have those in them, but since he now includes a new sear with a different angle cut in them, I suppose he thought it was not necessary. It could be that after a few hundred more cycles at the range, I could experience a bit more reduction in trigger pull weight, but still, I would like to have had the option of trying a different striker spring from the beginning. Since this is strictly a range gun, if I had problems with ignition, it is but the work of a less than a minute to change the striker spring. Since I reload, I could always go to my stash of Federal primers and see if they would work with a lesser striker spring if a weaker one gave occasional problems.

Nonetheless, I am happy with the results. It is a remarkable difference. Though not as light as some of my other triggers, it has a better break and less creep than most of my other XD's and XDm guns do.

[Montourage]

Yeah I read on another thread that the Ultimate kit didn't include that spring because they thought the total trigger weight would be too low and unsafe if I remember correctly. I bought the drop in kit and it included two of those striker springs, a lighter than stock as well as a competition one with blue paint on it. I figured I could always order that sear if I wanted to get the "Ultimate" trigger as they sell it individually for about $50 if I remember correctly. Personally I don't see the need for anything better at my skill level.

I'm shooting in the same spot I did as before the kit, but I do like that the gun surprises me vs the stock trigger.

[john_bud]

Originally Posted by JustSomeGuy

When retested with the trigger gauge, it went from a truly horrible stock pull of 7 1/4lbs with a lot of creep and overtravel, to an acceptable 4 1/2lbs with very little creep and a crispy break with no perceptible overtravel and a shorter reset. I would have liked it if the kit had included a reduced power striker spring as well, which may have the potential to bring the trigger pull down perhaps another 1/2 to full pound or so. That would have made it a very good trigger indeed.


Nonetheless, I am happy with the results. It is a remarkable difference. Though not as light as some of my other triggers, it has a better break and less creep than most of my other XD's and XDm guns do.

I found that a quick smoothing of the striker channel, striker body and striker <-> sear contact points really smooths out the pull. And may reduce the pull weight (no pull guage to test with ).

[JustSomeGuy]

Originally Posted by Montourage

Yeah I read on another thread that the Ultimate kit didn't include that spring because they thought the total trigger weight would be too low and unsafe if I remember correctly. I bought the drop in kit and it included two of those striker springs, a lighter than stock as well as a competition one with blue paint on it. I figured I could always order that sear if I wanted to get the "Ultimate" trigger as they sell it individually for about $50 if I remember correctly. Personally I don't see the need for anything better at my skill level.

I'm shooting in the same spot I did as before the kit, but I do like that the gun surprises me vs the stock trigger.

I dunno... It will be interesting to put in a reduced power striker spring and then measure the results. With my particular gun, which as I reported now seems to average about 4 1/2lbs with the kit as provided, my "desired" pull weight for the range is really about a pound lighter. If as you say, the folks at Powder River deem that including a new striker spring of reduced power would make the gun "dangerous" or "unsafe" they must be thinking it would be be either: A) too light for a carry gun where folks might get excited and might bump the trigger causing an unintended discharge, or too light to cause reliable ignition in a confrontation where reliability is paramount, or B) It would reduce the trigger pull to something like 2lbs or so which is very light indeed and again, might cause unintentional discharge even at the range.

I don't want to go that light... but 3 1/2 to 4lbs would suit me just fine. I am tailoring my ammo to about 171-175 power factor to guarantee "major" even for practice, though my days of running and gunning in competition are probably over (neither my unassisted eyesight, nor my run averse back and legs lend themselves to that vigorous an activity anymore!), it would be nice to think I could do it if the occasion arose and I had a gun and ammunition combination that would be good for the task. Steel I might try since you don't have to move that much and a good trigger is just as helpful there as any other gun sport. Steel is also advantageous in that you can load even lighter if you so desire 'cause all you have to do is hit it and most guys use 9mm's anyway. So loaded down .40's would still fit the bill.

[JustSomeGuy]

Originally Posted by john_bud

I found that a quick smoothing of the striker channel, striker body and striker <-> sear contact points really smooths out the pull. And may reduce the pull weight (no pull guage to test with ).

Though you might be on to something, as smoothing things out in general can provide some reduction in pull weight and overall pleasantness as far as the "feel" of the trigger, the sear provided has a pretty good finish on it to begin with. The striker itself is not too bad, and if I still possessed a black Arkansas stone of sufficient fineness I might have a go at that, but regrettably I no longer have one of those. They do sell some strikers which they claim to be "micro smooth", but a somewhat reduced power spring would be quicker and more telling I suspect. Since they offer them in several weights, as you allude, I think I will try to order some and see what happens. I will, of course, report back if they are available and I get them in a reasonable time to make it viable to do so.

[JustSomeGuy]

Well... I've had the gun now for 2 weeks! I have put a bit over 1000 rounds through it so far with various full power reloads using both Silhouette and Universal with Montana Gold 180grn JHP's, and S&S Casting 180grn Lead Flat Nose bullets and have not had any malfunctions of any kind. The Powder River trigger kit I put in seems to have gotten a bit lighter, but I will have to measure that again. It does break really well now, and rivals some triggers on some 1911's I have built in the past. I am still surprised at that part of it. I have not yet obtained any lighter striker springs as Powder River does not seem to offer them separately, but only in a kit with a bunch of other springs I will not need. I will try some other sources for those springs, but I am still glad I put the trigger kit in.

[Montourage]

Originally Posted by JustSomeGuy

Well... I've had the gun now for 2 weeks! I have put a bit over 1000 rounds through it so far with various full power reloads using both Silhouette and Universal with Montana Gold 180grn JHP's, and S&S Casting 180grn Lead Flat Nose bullets and have not had any malfunctions of any kind. The Powder River trigger kit I put in seems to have gotten a bit lighter, but I will have to measure that again. It does break really well now, and rivals some triggers on some 1911's I have built in the past. I am still surprised at that part of it. I have not yet obtained any lighter striker springs as Powder River does not seem to offer them separately, but only in a kit with a bunch of other springs I will not need. I will try some other sources for those springs, but I am still glad I put the trigger kit in.

yep I was about to mention that calibration kit they have as it seems to have nearly every spring you could possibly need for the XDm. I usually shoot about 50 rounds per week so I think I'm only at like 300 rounds through mine so far. Yeah I've thought about buying that sear just to see but it's already a better gun than I could have asked for as is. I think at most I might get around to polishing anything that effects the trigger movement someday but maybe not. Some coatings actually produce less friction than polished metal.