New SA-35

I'm new to this forum, and new to this gun. I just ordered an SA-35 from one of the distributors, and they just received it the previous day, so I hope any improvements they've made will already be done to my gun. It was sent to my local gun shop, and I hope to pick it up Monday March 14, or the following day if it hasn't arrived.

I've watched all the videos I can find, and read most of the reviews, but to be honest, I wanted to buy one for years - but never acted on it. Now that it's newly released by Springfield, I feel really excited about it. I'm wondering if it will ever have adjustable rear sights, but I've already got those on my bullseye guns. It would also be nice if one could mount a red dot sight..... I was very impressed with the Hickok45 video on the new gun - he loved it.

I've read that the gun likes Wilson remanufactured ammo - I've got lots of that, and also a large amount of Magtech ammo that I bought from someone at my shooting club.

Hope to post a photo of it here by early next week, but you all know what it looks like anyway.

One question if anyone here knows - is it ready for shooting right out of the box, or does it have any protective lube that should be cleaned off first?

Voltaire said:

All pistols in my experience should be/must be stripped when first unpacked, cleaned, oiled and rack the slide and engage the slide stop and work the safety, then put in empty mag to see if all is functioning. Good shooting.

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I haven't bought a "new" gun in as long as I can remember. So, I've never had an opportunity to even consider this. In the "old days" it made sense, but in what I called the. "old days" people buying guns were much more likely to understand this. It's now 2022, and I suspect buyers expect to purchase something, and immediately start using it.

As for me, I think the safest way to deal with this is exactly what you've written. Then there is no question.

About the red dot, in the video review posted by Hickok45, we see that rear sight with a large set screw unscrewing from it, as if it's about to fall off. Hickok notices it, and screws it back in with his hands, and surprisingly never says anything about it. My assumption is that I can push the rear sight out of the dovetail, and someone will soon provide a replacement part, to which something like the Vortex Venom can be attached - and it's small enough, and light enough, that it should work great on the SA-35. This is all for future reference - the gun comes with "iron sights", and I expect to leave it like this for a long time. It's amazing to watch Hickok45 hit one thing after another, aiming so quickly. I pay attention to what he does, and he is very precise, and he holds the gun very steadily. I've been practicing this on a Les Baer Premiere II, with iron sights, and I can shoot well with them - but only very slowly.

I mostly will be using this gun to shoot at my local Bullseye range, and while there is no class for 9mm, I'll have no problem using it at my local club. It's not in any way being bought for "defense", nor do I have any need or desire for a holster. At my club, very few people shoot one handed, which is necessary to compete in a "real" Bullseye match. My club allows both - use any gun you want, with one or two hands, in the "club" group (at 15 and 25 yards), or use a bullseye-legal gun, held in one hand, in the "Bullseye" group (at 25 and 50 yards).

I read that it's a "heavy gun", but my 1911 with a rail and an Ultradot or Aimpoint sight mounted on top is almost certainly much heavier.

The gun will arrive at my local gun shop by 9pm Monday, meaning I'll most likely get it early Tuesday morning, 3 days from now.

Me too. .......thinking back on it, the closest I've come to buying a "new" gun was my Les Baer Premiere II, but technically it wasn't "new"; a fellow at my range damaged it, sent it back, where it was re-built as new, and I bought it from the guy before he had a chance to shoot it. I was the worst experience I've ever had, or could have imagined. The Les Baer guns are built so tight that I couldn't rack the slide, and only with great difficulty could I remove the barrel bushing. The Baer instructions are to do nothing - just shoot several hundred rounds, which supposedly would allow the gun to loosen up. The real number was several thousand rounds, maybe because I was shooting light Bullseye loads most of that time.

I suspect Browning learned a lot from the 1911, and with a clean piece of paper, had a chance to improve on the past. The SA-35 seems to come apart, and be re-assembled effortlessly. I'm not going to talk about the insane amount of time it took me to get the slide stop back into my Baer Premiere II, and apparently that's typical of most 1911's built to the tighter specs needed for bullseye.

I'll take photos, and do my own range report, but from the point of view of "precision shooting". At my range, the maximum number of rounds loaded into a magazine is only five, although with a revolver it's up to six. Having a 13 round or 15 round capacity doesn't do much for me. I guess I want to buy a second magazine anyway.

I'm surprised there aren't more people posting in this forum topic.