[Michigan Dan]

Today, I received the following email from Mr. Irving Stone 111 from the Bar-Sto Barrels Co. :

Mr. Walters ,

It is in the works . Probably late may early June if it works well .Please
check then .

Thank you ,

Irv III

-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Walters [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, April 05, 2004 6:41 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: 32 NAA Barrel for Kel-Tec 380


Dear Mr. Stone;

Last year their was some talk that you might make a drop in barrel in 32 NAA
for the Kel-Tec P3AT. Have you given anymore thought to this project?

Sincerely,

Dan Walters
[email protected]

 

[oldgranpa]

Good idea!!

Dan,
That's a good idea if you can get one. Just make sure the guy is using top grade heat treated steel to take the little bit of extra pressure generated. See my post about the .32NAA at Flyer's thread about his conversion test.
Keep us posted.
og

 

[Michigan Dan]

Bar Sto Barrels are well known and seem to be well recommended on the web (I have never had need to use one of their barrels). If they follow through with the manufacture of the barrels for the P3AT, they will be ready available to anyone. Here is a link to their homepage:

http://www.barsto.com

MD

 

[ttown]

Well I sure hope they can make the barrels for $100 or so. Looking at the Barrels for the Glock firearms they run $200! That's almost the price of the P3AT. :roll:

 

[oldgranpa]

Name??

Dan, looks good.
So what will you call your modified P3AT when you get the conversion barrel?? A P32AT? or a PNAAT? Get some names ready!! It's a pocket cannon for sure.
The modified barrel should be fine since the OD will be same size as present P3AT for .380 but bored for the smaller .32 bullet. So it should handle the extra pressure. The only thing I wonder about is will you still have smileys and can he provide the barrel with Flyer's modified feed ramp. A hard smiley hit with this new round could cause enough setback to raise the pressure to unsafe levels. Possible it's not necessary, though, with the smaller bullet that the ramp wouldn't hit it at all. Maybe Flyer can tell us. One nice thing about it is no rim lock with this round!!

Just for info here are some comparisons with the .32 and .380 from my previous tests with the P32 and P3AT, based on 5 rounds tested. Data with 32NAA is with a NAA Guardian, 2.5" barrel, 7 rounds tested.
Modified barrels for the Makarov are already available and are about 4" long which give even better expansion and penetration than I show here.

Showing expansion and penetration in wet paper.

.32acp 0.45"avg/5"penetration with many not expanding

.380acp 0.51"max/5 - 6" penetration many not expanding

new 32NAA 0.505 - 0.52"/7 - 8" penetration a few partial exp.

7" penetration in wet paper equals about 10.5" in gelatin which is the lowest I'd want for personal defense. So the new 32NAA ammo just meets (my) criteria. 3 out of 7 rounds only partially expanded (one-sided opening of bullet) due to hitting the paper pack at a slight angle but all expanding to the .5" range or more. Wet paper is a lot more severe test than gelatin. All rounds covered with wet paper when recovered.

Dan, keep us posted on the progress of this new idea for the P3AT. As this gets more popular I hope other ammo companies will make the 32NAA round. Right now I can only get CorBon and it's kinda expensive. But I don't plan to shoot much of it, this stuff is not for a lot of target shooting and is mainly just a hard hitting personal defense round. (But not for bears!! :shock: )

og

 

[ttown]

Would you all feel secure with a conversion barrel in your 3PAT?
What about the mags and feeding, esp. during rapid fire?

I have a conversion barrel for my glock, it is great fun at the range allowing me to shoot the cheaper 9mm's but if my life on the line I wouldn't trust it. Even with G19 mags in my G23 it will FTE every once in awhile and I'm sure quite a bit more durning a rapid fire event.

I think I'll wait for a drop in barrel from Kel-Tec and them to provide mags for them too. My Glock G32 barrel (357 sig) in my G23 with G32 mags runs just like it was made for the gun....

 

[Michigan Dan]

Re:

Well I sure hope they can make the barrels for $100 or so. Looking at the Barrels for the Glock firearms they run $200! That's almost the price of the P3AT. :roll:

That is the question isn't it? If it costs as much as a new P3AT, I think I'll probably pass on it---

MD

 

[packin heat]

yeah just make it a seperate gun. the P3T2NAA. Ill take one hard crome, melted, ported, with an ivory color grip and a stainless belt clip please! and a slide hold open! price it at about $249 and watch em fly out the door!!

please please please!!!

 

[Guest]

hard chromed, slide lock and ported would be sweeeeeet! black grip for me and for that price, your right it would probably fly out of the door. it would be nice if they would ship them and all of their other pistols for that matter with an extra mag.

 

[packin heat]

and a stainless mag & stainless pinky extension!
ooh ooh how about carbon fiber grips?? rohrbaugh does it!

darn, now im drooling. hope my keyboard doesnt short out

 

[oldgranpa]

polymer??

Nice thoughts, but what you've all described is the NAA Guardian 32NAA, all stainless, 2 magazines, one with pinky finger extension. And fancy grips are available. But you're not talking $249, more like $400. (It's only money :lol: )
The barrel for the Makarov is already out and at 4" long it's getting even better results. As for the P3AT barrel conversion, I'm more concerned about the polymer housing for the frame than the barrel. Like I said before this thing is like a small cannon, really loud and more recoil than the std. .380. So if the polymer housing for the frame, and even the aluminum frame can't take it, you'd be in for trouble. Try to find someone with one and fire it and you'll see what I mean.
Somebody needs to test this barrel idea in the P3AT first before making it available. What we need is a word from Kel Tec if the conversion barrel is such a good idea after all.

And where is Flyer?? He was having a barrel made. Tried to wake him up in his previous thread. Flyer, we need your input. Did you ever test your barrel idea??

og

 

[Flyer]

Geez, I was hopin' I could sneak by this one and wait it out...
Oh well!
Ahem.
Right now I'm considering making up small steel inserts to replace the frame holes that elongated after one magazine of the .32 NAA... gonna just drill the frame holes bigger, fill them with steel plugs, and re-drill the holes.
At this point, I'd say...
DON'T count on a .32 NAA KT in the near future, unless it's chambered in the P-11!!!
It's a good thing I've got more than one P-3AT... 8)
Flyer

 

[oldgranpa]

Aha!!

Thanks, old friend, for getting in here. As I suspected you have been testing the 32NAA idea. Besides the pin holes, how about the recoil spring? Doesn't it also need a better spring to handle the higher recoil?
og

ps I was going to ask you about smileys but forget that since your P3AT has the cut off ramp like mine. :wink:

But, I will ask, have you found any 32NAA ammo besides CorBon??

 

[Flyer]

Nope, haven't seen anything but Cor-Bon... yet. Other makers are purportedly going to start producing it.
I made an entirely new spring for mine from a section of M-1 Carbine recoil spring... quite a bit stronger than the regular weight. I suspect that adjusting the lockup timing MIGHT make it possible to shoot the round in this pistol... but that takes resources to calculate that I simply don't have available.
Oh well.... it was fun playing around with, at least!
Flyer

 

[oldgranpa]

for Dan.....

for Dan,

there you have it from Flyer who knows. Before you try one of the BarSto barrels, you'll need a better spring and will still probably tear up the frame.
You might want to send a note to Mr. Stone and warn him about the risk.
I repeat my earlier comment... this thing is a pocket CANNON!!! :lol: The holes it made in the wet pack were fierce!

Cheers,
og..........fun thread!, I'm outa here!

 

[packin heat]

og,
yeah but the guardian is too heavy, and the bersa pinky extensions are much more stylish than the naa. oh well, i'd be happy with a regular P-32. mabey someday.

i do like the naa fish scale slide though...

 

[Michigan Dan]

Well, I figure Mr. Stone is in the business of making barrels. It would be a little presumptuous on my part to tell him his business . It will be very interesting to see how he markets the barrels (that's if he decides to build them). You can be sure he will be trying them out before he sells them. I can't imagine him wanting the liability of selling untried barrels. He might fine out that it impractical in this caliber.

MD

 

[Guest]

bar-sto makes replacement barrels for the original guns. they may be making 32NAA barrels but they may limit them to the Guardian pistols only. some shooters want to replace their factory barrels with bar-sto. i would think that it Flyer has shown that the 32NAA will effectively dismantle a P3AT around you that bar-sto would not want that liability. i would like to see Kel-Tec take the P3AT, beef it up a little and market and sell something in 32NAA. someone posted before that our wishlist was essentially a Guardian. i disagree, imho the Kel-Tec's are much more user friendly that the guardians and more than half the price. i think that the hard chrome upgrade for the P3AT will more than double their projected sales. and it may turn out that the 32NAA in a P3AT size gun would be a complete failure. might end up being too much round for the gun. and we would probably all agree that if it's not fun to shoot than we probably won't carry it.

 

[oldgranpa]

range test with .32NAA

I'm posting this "Unballistic" test here for lack of a better place.

But mainly to say...I recommend you stay with the P3AT, lighter weight, more ammo brands available, lower cost, more friendly to shoot.

The .32NAA Guardian is heavier, costs more, and is not very friendly to shoot, not a ladies gun. Also only one brand of ammo to date from CorBon, hot stuff, really high velocity, and that makes for problems testing it. My first range test in just a plain newspaper wetpack, bare paper, all the bullets fragmented with the petals stripped off. Discussion with CorBon said wetpaper too severe and water jugs too severe. Well, never heard of that before, so just to be fair about it I ran more tests. Wetpack with denim cover, wetpack bare, 2 jugs with homemade Knox gelatin covered with denim, 3 water bottles, and the old 55gal steel drum at the range.
The Knox gelatin test was a flub, the bullet went thru the first jug and stopped in the second jug, rupturing the jug. Petals of bullet torn off, minimal expansion of remaining lead. The water bottles were even more spectacular, all 3 exploding with water flying everywhere. Bullet ended in third jug fragmented. Two shots thru 55gal drum went clean thru both sides, not bad if you like to shoot thru car doors. This bullet also zips right thru a fat, dry phone book.
The wetpack test picture is shown below (in the photo 'newpaper' should read 'newspaper', but you can figure it out). With the denim cover the bullets held together fairly well with good expansion. In the bare wetpack, same results as the first time, complete fragmentation, velocity is really high. The denim is needed to slow it down. CorBon designed the round to shoot a BG with heavy clothes on, I guess!! Penetration was 7" with the denim cover which is barely adequate in wetpack.

My analysis, FWIW, CorBon has more homework to do on the bullet. The jacket is too thin and doesn't hold together well in this high velocity round. Wish Winchester would make this round with lower velocity and Silvertip bullet. Then it would be worth something. For now, not what I expect.

Anyway, I'm trading the .32NAA with my dealer for something else. For those of you considering the .32NAA, don't, stay with your P3AT.

og :roll: :roll: :roll: ....just another 'unballistic' report from og.

p.s. forgot to mention, the dental pick in the photo is what I use to clean the wet paper off the bullets.