First Shots Through the Springfield XDs 9mm

After picking up the Springfield XDs 9mm yesterday, I was able to put about 50 rounds through it today. A friend of mine who works at a local range offered me a couple handfuls of 9mm that he’s picked up off the floor, and I headed into the range to shoot.

First magazine was at 7 yards, and I literally had one enlongated hole in the target after 7 rounds. Second magazine was similar, as was the third. For the last magazine I shot, I loaded the pistol with the Hornady TAP FTP ammo that I carry in my small 9mm pistols, and ran the target out to 20 yards. At that distance, even with the short sight radius, I was able to keep all 7 rounds in about a 3″ group. Having never shot the pistol before, and being that it is so tiny, I was pretty impressed.

One thing that I really liked about the pistol that I hadn’t really given much thought to before I shot it was the texture of the grip, especially around the front strap and sides. It’s textured with big bumps, which really let your hand get into them and they offer a really solid grip. The texture is large enough that it doesn’t tear up your side when carried IWB like the RTF2 and Gen4 Glock pistols do. While I’m on the grip subject, I’d like to note that I tried to grip the pistol high enough that the slide would bite my hand, but I couldn’t get it to do it. Slide bite is the major reason I’m moving away from Glock pistols, and while I was able to get the slide to touch the web of my hand as it cycled, I couldn’t get it to bite me. Score!

The pistol ran flawlessly through all of the random rounds that I shot, including some moly coated lead, and whatever else was in the mixed bag of ammo I ran through it. Recoil was very soft, on par with my Glock 19, and other compact/fullsize 9mm pistols that I own.

As I mentioned in my first impressions post, I think the sight picture is a little tight for my liking, so I might begin to look for a replacement rear sight for the time being, or I may just put all new sights on the pistol and call it a day. From what I’ve read, fullsize XD sights, and some Sig Sauer sights will fit the dovetail on the XDs.

When loading the pistol, I rode the slide forward with my hand a little (a no-no) and the round being loaded jumped the extractor, and needed to be fixed. From that point forward I used the slide release, or the sling shot method of dropping the slide, and it chambered perfectly from that point forward.

I did have an issue getting the slide to lock back when the pistol is empty. I have rather large hands, and my strong hand thumb rides right on top of the slide release. I tried modifying my grip a little, but it was no use. I don’t think this is a huge deal though, maybe someone will make a low-profile slide release in the future.

All in all, I’m pretty excited about this pistol, and can’t wait to shoot it more in the future!