05/30/2021
Yes I have been trying to improve my writing skills and to adopt some new perspectives. No, I have not yet succeeded and, no, I do not deem twenty years in pursuit of those illusive goals excessive. In any event, I signed up for the Wesleyan University Creative Writing Specialization Program.
Tuition is typically $84,000 per year, which left me with two choices. I could pretend to be a liberal democrat and let all of you pay off my student loans… and then buy me lunch at some future date, or I could participate on the geezer plan. The geezer plan means that universities waive tuition when they think a person is too old to consume resources long into the future, or that courses/programs can be audited for free.
Opting for auditing the program, I surrendered the opportunity for peer evaluation by nonjudgmental, eighteen year old pimple poppers, with no life experience and a stinted view of the world… who would judge me… damn me, condemn me based solely on the color of my socks and the generation of my iPhone. Also lost were the benefits of being lectured, live, by a professor with limited commercial success and being required to purchase a book he or she authored for class study.
So far, the greatest stumbling block encountered has been the professor’s penchant for citing solely from Harry Potter books when illustrating creative writing concepts. Something along the lines of, “An excellent example of the application of Freytag’s “Rising Action” would be when Harry turned to Ganondork the wizard and said, ‘The Snargeltharps are the ones who stole the magic Fizzle Bop'”. Yes, I did just make up that passage and, no, I have never read a Harry Potter book, nor have I ever seen a Harry Potter movie.
So what does this all have to do with the Smith & Wesson M&P 9 Shield Plus? This week’s article and course assignment.
Act one, scene one… a knock at the door
Despite the queue of review work to be done, I was having a difficult time getting any traction on a project. So I immersed myself in some repetitive and familiar work. First it was a few days of converting handloading components into shrink wrapped loading blocks of finished ammunition. Then it was inventorying smokeless powder. Then on to organizing lathe tools in alphabetical order: boring bars, chamfering tools, knurling tools. Finally, after finding some new lidded plastic containers that held 32 ounces, rather than the existing 28 ounces, I swapped out and relabeled ninety three containers to hold short count brass cases. The excitement was underwhelming. Just when I was about driven to go outside and service and pressure wash all of the landscaping equipment, the Smith & Wesson M&P 9 Shield Plus arrived.
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S & W M&P 9 Shield Plus TS |
|
| SKU # | 13246 |
| Manufacturer | Smith and Wesson |
| Point of Origin | Springfield, MA |
| Type | Striker |
| Caliber | 9mm Luger |
| Magazine Capacity | 10 and 13 Round Included |
| Barrel | 3.1ā³ Stainless Steel |
| Rifling | 1:10ā³ |
| Overall Length | 6.1ā³ |
| Overall Height* | 4.7ā³ –Ā 5.0″ |
| Overall Width | 1.1ā |
| Weight | 20.2 Oz. |
| Sight Radius | 5.5ā³ |
| Trigger Pull ā Actual | 4 Lbs. 7 Oz. |
| Sights |
3 Dot – White |
| Slide Material | Stainless Steel |
| Slide & Barrel Finish | ArmorniteĀ® ā Black Nitride |
| Frame Chassis | Stainless Steel |
| Grip Frame | Polymer |
| Safety | Trigger, Thumb |
| Magazine Disconnect | No |
| Chamber Check | Barrel Hood View Port |
| MSRP | $553 |
|
* 10 versus 13 round magazine |
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The 9mm Luger chambered micro compact pistol is a popular choice for concealment. Some manufacturers have put together very good products, but others not so much.
Some miss the mark on capacity, others present a challenge to firearm control, some are cheaply made in a manner that shows as substandard fit and finish and unreliable function.
Smith & Wesson obvious put a lot of thought into the M&P 9 Shield Plus design and into the manufacturing process that yields the finished product.
The 9 Shield Plus is supplied in a cardboard display box containing: pistol, two magazines, cable lock, safety & instruction manual. Aesthetically, the matte black stainless slide and barrel looks terrific. The Smith & Wesson ArmorniteĀ® finish is the result of a nitride process, rather than surface coating like plating or bluing.
Armornite, in comparison to conventional plating and coating, offers: improved wear and corrosion resistance, improved heat and friction resistance, increased fatigue strength, a uniform black finish, reduced contact surface friction, and smoother surfaces
The subject pistol’s configuration includes two staggered round magazines, one with 10 round capacity and another with a capacity of 13. The higher capacity magazine employs a grip adapter that adds only 1/4″ is pistol height while adding 3 rounds in capacity.
The 9 Shield Plus can be configured to maximize defensive capability or minimized in form to maximize concealment or to be in compliance with state governments that make less logical and reasonable gun laws regarding magazine capacity for the sake of political expediency. Smith & Wesson also offers 10 round capacity only configurations, with or without a manual thumb safety.
Control comes in intuitive forms
Take down lever, slide stop, magazine release, and thumb safety are typically placed, which means little adjustment from shooting other firearms. The magazine can be flipped for left or right side operation.
The manual safety on the subject pistol was not a casual thumb knuckle actuation, but then it stayed put in the selected position. Lots of “new” on the pistol and, as noted previously, the manual safety is an optional feature. There is no magazine disconnect, so the pistol is not rendered inoperative when the magazine is removed.
Polymer grip frames have come a long ways over the years. Materials like glass fiber infused Zytel Polyamide 66 are more precision molded, more attractive in finish and able to hold greater fine detail like the stippling pattern on the M&P 9 Shield Plus.
Barrel, slide, fire control pieces, and frame remain precisely in position and in alignment through the use of a hard anodized aluminum chassis within the grip frame. The Shield Plus, despite its small size is hand filling, providing a lot of support.
The take down lever disassembly is straight forward. The recoil spring has captive elements; two springs, one inside and one outside a truncated guide rod. The stainless steel barrel is ramped.
The simple three dot sight system is a good one. They contrast well with most backdrops and tend to pick up light. While there is a set screw in the rear sight, it is not meant to facilitate adjustment. Windage adjustments are made with the dovetail mounted front sight. Fiber optic night sights are an option. The chamber checking view port straddles the barrel tang and aft end of the slide ejection port.
As gun makers revise trigger surfaces, trigger fingers and approaches to squeezing a trigger are subject to reeducation. In this case, the trigger safety embedded in the trigger presents a flat face. For me, the flat face tends to keep the pistol in alignment in the hand, neither applying pressure pistol left or right.
Live Fire
The Smith & Wesson M&P 9 Shield Plus is approved for all standard and +P factory ammunition. Ammunition used during live fire: L-R: IMI Systems 115 grain JHP, Remington 115 grain JHP +P, Remington Ultimate Defense 124 grain BJHP, Remington UMC 124 grain FMJ.
SAAMI standard ammunition has a MAP assignment of 35,000 psi, SAAMI +P has a MAP assignment of 38,500 psi. +P+ ammunition is not approved for use in the 9 Shield Plus.
| Brand | Type | Grains Weight |
Rated FPS |
Recorded FPS |
| IMI Systems | JHP | 115 | 1150 | 1121 |
| Remington HTP +P | JHP | 115 | 1145 | 1103 |
| Remington UMC | FMJ | 124 | 1100 | 1048 |
| Remington UD Compact | JHP | 124 | 1100 | 1009 |
The standard test barrel used to establish nominal factory ammunition velocity for the 9mm Luger is 4″. Subsequently, velocity from a pistol with a 0.9″ shorter barrel would tend to be less when checked with a chronograph. In the case of the Smith & Wesson M&P 9 Shield Plus, the difference was moderate and nothing in a range that would adversely impact bullet expansion where applicable.
But what does my wife think?
My wife and I do a lot of shooting together. In fact, we jointly taught our children and grandchildren safety and marksmanship and she is quite accomplished with handguns from small auto loaders to big bore single action revolvers.
Generally, Diane does not like shooting sub compact pistols. To her, the small grip and short barrel reduce control and make them unpleasant to shoot. She also doesn’t like the typically high effort required to open the slide when checking chamber or charging a first round. By comparison, her favorite pistol is a Commander or full size 1911 in 45 Auto.
For this project, Diane was going to log chronograph data and mark up targets and I was going to do the shooting. A few magazines into the shooting session, she volunteered to do some of the shooting, and went on to do so for the rest of the day. Using small smiley faces drawn on a cardboard box for targets, she had no problem adding a nose and eyebrows at 10 yards. She also had no problem racking the slide on the 9 Shield Plus.
But what do I think?
While it obviously is a very compact 9mm Luger, it doesn’t feel like one while shooting. The 13 round magazine grip adapter adds a little grip length, enough to provide a very stable gripping surface without attempting to put a full size grip on a short barrel pistol.
Accuracy? Well, at 200 yards… No, of course not. Using 3.5″x2.5″ regulation playing cards for targets, $1 for 52 targets at the Dollar Store, all of the ammo indicated easily put five rounds in a card at ten yards.
The M&P 9 Shield Plus can be shot for an extended period of time without discomfort. Muzzle rise is minimal, report is moderate… it is a fun gun to shoot. The trigger pull is short, quite crisp and not too heavy. Take down is easy, clean up as well, and the Plus handled all ammunition types without complaint or malfunction. It is lightweight, an easy carry and very concealable. Nice pistol.
But what do you think?
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