It’s legend. The Walther PPK – James Bond’s gun.
In the first Bond movie, 007 is told to trade in his Beretta and use the Walther PPK.
Major Boothroyd: [to M, referring to Bond’s Beretta] Nice and light… in a lady’s handbag.
M: Any comment, 007?
James Bond: I disagree, sir. I’ve carried the Beretta for ten years, and I’ve never missed with it.
M: No, but it jameed on you last job, and you spent six months in hospital in consequence. When you carry a 00 number, you have a license to kill, not get killed. Furthermore, since I’ve been head of MI6 there’s been a forty percent drop in casualties, and I want to keep it that way. From now on you carry the Walther… unless you’d rather return to standard intelligence duties.
James Bond: No sir, I would not.
M: [to Boothroyd] Show him, Armorer.
Major Boothroyd: [to Bond] Walther PPK, 7.65 millimeter, with a delivery like a brick through a plate-glass window. The American CIA swear by them.
I must admit, I am a Walther fan. Yes, JoeGLOCK likes Walther firearms.
The Walthers used in the Bond movies were .32 ACP. I had one years back and sold it to my brother. I then used the funds to purchase the Walther PPK in .380 ACP.
It’s a fine, double action/single action, hammer-fired pistol made of steel. The pistol operates with a gas blowback design. It disassembles in such an odd way. You actually push the trigger guard down, away from the slide and then push it slightly to the left. This allows the slide to be removed. The barrel is stationary, a part of the frame itself.
The original Walther PP was released in 1929, followed two years later by the PPK – Polizeipistole Kriminalmodell (Police Pistol Detective Model.)
Last year, Walther introduced the next iteration of the PP line, with the PPQ M2. It’s a striker-fired pistol with a steel slide and polymer frame. I believe it has the best trigger, out-of-the-box, of any striker-fired pistol on the market today, and feels spectacular in the hand.
They also released the CCP (Concealed Carry Pistol) which is a single-stack, 9mm, gas delayed blowback design. And that is what makes this pistol different from the other polymer pistols out there. There’s actually a small piston sitting under the barrel. When the gun is fired, gas is bled down into the gas chamber to push against the piston. It’s actually pushing the slide forward, not back. Once the bullet leaves the barrel and the gas pressure drops, the slide, having been delayed in its rearward travel by the gas piston, moves rearward, compressing the very wimpy recoil spring. With much of the gas used to actually push against the recoil energy, the result is a soft shooting pistol with less recoil than you would expect.
I took this slim shooter to the range today to break it in and see if it really had less recoil.
What was surprising though, was the heat build-up. I was shooting at a fairly steady pace using full 8-round mags. I went though a box of 50 cartridges, not fast, but about one second per shot at 15 yards for each mag. When I dropped out the last magazine the slide was too hot to lean my thumb against while shooting. This isn’t because I shot so fast, but because of the technology used to make the gun cycle. The super hot gases bleeding into the chamber under the barrel along with the pressure from the piston (shown below) against the recoil spring (high school physics teaches that pressure generates heat too.)
In a dynamic critical incident or self-defense situation the heat would not be an issue. It feels good in your hand, it shoots very accurately and does have less recoil than other 9mm handguns the same size.
There are two downsides:
- The trigger has no reset. You must completely release the trigger in order to reset the striker. That takes some getting used to. Practice. Practice. Practice.
- The disassembly requires a thumb tool to unhook the slide from the frame. It’s a pain in the neck, but simple once you’ve practiced it a few times. This is standard fare on delayed blowback pistols, but this implementation is funky.
Do I recommend the CCP? Sure. It’s a soft shooting 9mm with some cool technology. It doesn’t have the best trigger, but you will get used to it. Racking the slide is a breeze for someone with poor grip or upper body strength.
Of course, there’s always the GLOCK 43… but you lose two rounds. 🙂