 Para-Ordnance
P12
by Jan Haluska
Bottom line: get one with a PXT. For the full saga, read on.
Some people say that all compact 1911s are trouble. My gunsmith echoed
the advice of many wise old-timers when he told me, “Anything smaller
than a Colt Commander just isn’t reliable enough to bother with.” Still
the idea of all that power in a tight package is pretty appealing, and
for a couple of years I took every opportunity to shoot several of the
“little beasts” as one gun article called them. In the process I learned
some things.
Surprise: the recoil of a compact .45 isn’t bad at all. Yes, Colt
Defenders, Kimber Ultra CDPs, and Springfield Ultra Compacts all bounce
a bit more than full-size 1911s, but not one of them stings the hand
like a comparably sized Makarov that still shoots only 9mm shorts. The
result is more excitement from guns I can fire indefinitely without
pain.
True, those little pistols all seemed to produce 30% wider groups than
my target-tuned 1911. But a video featuring a master shooter who used a
snubnose revolver to make hits at 200 yards gave me some hope. Maybe
smaller barrel length and sight radius weren’t absolute barriers to
accuracy after all. Apparently practice could lessen the problem,
anyway.
Finally I saw a brand-new Para-Ordnance P12 at an amazingly low closeout
price. It had a 3.5 inch barrel like those other compacts I’d shot, but
featured 10+1 capacity with 12+1 as an option, in a shorter, slightly
fatter grip. It felt good in my hand and the trigger was crisp, so I
took a deep breath and bought the thing. The 10 months since then have
been interesting, and now I know enough to make a report about what has
become my favorite pistol.
After the rear sight was nudged very slightly to the right, the gun shot
exactly to point of aim. Off a Weaver stance it could hit shotgun shells
squarely at 10 yards, and sometimes hit them again where they had
landed, when my technique came together. Of course that was rare enough
at first, and one-handed shooting was a disaster. A day or two per week
at the range for several months did make my accuracy a lot better, until
I had learned to shoot IDPA-style double-taps with enough control to try
a match with the P12. I wasn’t going to beat a lot of people, but the
target holes might not embarrass me too much either, even with my weak
hand.
Still, other problems had surfaced by then. Only one of the two original
mags was new, and the used one was a balky feeder, even with a new Wolf
spring. A ProMag from Midway replaced it, and the feeding problems were
over—when the pistol was clean. After about 30 rounds feeding would
start to get sluggish, and cartridges would occasionally get stuck
halfway into the chamber. I discovered that a bit of oil on the slide
would fix the problem for a while, but by about 100 rounds, nothing
would help. All the same, since one of our local IDPA matches requires
something under 70 rounds, it might still work.
But as the gun had begun to break in, it had started jamming on empty
hulls caught horizontally in the ejection port, backwards. Apparently it
tossed them high enough to complete half a rotation, then jumped up and
caught them again like a dog snatching a Frisbee. “Limp-wristing” was
the term people used to describe the problem, telling me that I just
needed to hold the gun tighter. But even a hand-trembling death grip
didn’t cure the problem. My arms are kind of lanky; was I just too much
of a girly-man for a P12?
I went to the next IDPA match anyway, and had reason to regret it. All
that tapping and racking to clear jams blew my time to pieces, while
there was no end of advice. “Those little guns never work right,” said a
police firearms instructor. “Get yourself a Commander instead.”
“It’s probably the recoil spring,” advised another veteran shooter.
“They get weak pretty fast in compact .45s. Try a new standard one, or
maybe a stronger one, or . . .” he paused thoughtfully, “maybe you
should clip a couple of coils off this one to make it a little softer. .
. .”
I did every one of those things without any improvement whatever.
Then a friend lent me his Warthog while he was on vacation. Although
it’s the P12’s little brother, it did not jam or misfeed at all in 100
rounds, even in my weak hand. One difference I noticed was that the
Warthog has a PXT, Para’s so-called “power extractor” which fits into
the slide like traditional ones, but has a bigger claw and an internal
coil spring to maintain tension much more reliably. My P12 was one of
the last made with a normal 1911 extractor. Maybe changing over would
solve my problem.
I e-mailed some questions to Derek Brodka, the wizard who runs Para’s
custom shop in Sevierville, Tennessee (paraderek@charterinternet.com).
He answered immediately, confirming that all the problems could be
coming from a malfunctioning extractor that pinched the cartridges on
the way in, causing misfeeds, and then gripped them too oddly for clean
ejection later. Powder fouling would make it worse all right, while
extra lubrication would help only a little and for a short time. He
offered either to adjust my present ejector or retro-fit a PXT for $99.
I chose the latter, sending him the slide and barrel for the job.
One week later I received the finished product and took it to the range,
rapid-firing the P12 on three roasting July afternoons with no cleaning
or lubrication in between. After a total of 220 rounds, the dirty little
pistol still ran like a sewing machine in every grip mode. Even the bad
magazine now fed cartridges as smoothly as if they were lumps of butter,
and the ejected hulls tended to group pretty well in one area.
So after 10 months the P12 is finally what it should be: a really fun
little .45 with an energetic but manageable kick, reliable operation,
and surprising accuracy. I can hardly wait for the next IDPA match.
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