SgtB, Sorry I was away a few days and missed your post.
The PA-63 has a tang that tends to bite some people's hands. Criticism is that they "will only last 5000 rounds" and such nonsense. These are not range guns. They are inexpensive and reliable carry guns. You need to clean them up well and lubricate them, replace the hammer spring with a #9 from makarov.com and put on a Hogue grip. Shoot them enough at the range to know what you are shooting at and that is it. I use Barnaul 95 gr hp for carry/practice and Hornady 95 gr hp for carry.
I doubt in a defensive situation you will remember the bite (I got a buck last week and don't remember the sound of the shot and when I go to the range and forget my hearing protectors, my ears ring for hours.)
If you want a range gun, buy a Mak. I love 'em and they are pleasant to shoot, even right out of the box. However, they are not as light or compact as the FEGs, IMHO.
I see where Flyer is coming from, but these are military pistols meant to be used at short range and sre not ergonomically wonders. When you shoot a 9mm mak out of a sub 20 oz pistol it will have high felt recoil.
I read all the time about people who have Keltecs and PA-63s that have ftf and ftf. I am not a mechanical genius, just a guy who can do some basic work and has some degree of logic--sure I'm smarter than the average bear, but you can't think your pistol to work correctly.
I have 5 PA-63s, a R-61, a P-11, a P-11 with both .40 and .357 conversions and did basic cleaning and the F&B I mentioned. No FTF, FTE, etc etc etc from any of them. I bought the one P-11 (a 15XXX serial number from someone and it had a broken trigger--off to KT and nary a problem. One of my conversion kits was difficult to remove and KT replaced it with no problems. I have KT 9mm mags that I tweaked as per directions and they feed .40 and .357 Sig, reliably.
They are available from several of the distributers--try Coles email:
[email protected]
website:
http://www.coledistributing.com
They are 190bucks plus S+H
At gunshows I have paid 99-125
As for my positive experiences, maybe I'm lucky and maybe I just follow directions an maybe because I am Hungarian and Czech by birth and my maternal grandfather was a mercenery soldier... I just like them.