Category: Canik

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Canik Clark Brothers subcompact TP9 Elite Virginia Warrenton

My Thoughts on My Recently Purchased Canik TP9 Elite Subcompact

Yes, this is now a thing.  It feels good enough to replace my XD45 Mod 2 as my daily carry.  I’m tempted to use the holster that’s included with it (it’s configured by default to use as OWB, but I’ve rotated the clips so that I can use the holster as IWB) but when testing it, the grip rubs my skin, so I’d have to wear undershirts when using this holster.  I’d looked at N8 Tactical but they don’t have a Pro model hostler for this specific handgun.

I’ll probably visit the range some time this week so that I can get some rounds through the gun (mandatory for me, before I can consider carrying it).  Fortunately, I’ve a bit of 9mm ammo stashed away.  I may even consider using a red dot optic on it, since it has an RMR slide cut.

 I may also decide to sell my two TP9SAs and use the funds from selling those to obtain an SF Elite (looked at one of those yesterday at the LGS).

By the way, if you’re in Northern Virginia around Manassas or Gainesville, visit Clark Brothers.  They’re a good LGS.

UPDATE:  I’ve visited the range with the new Canik.  I’ve a post range visit video here:

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bar Canik Canik Fanatik excessive wear RMA spring TP9SA trigger

TP9SA Trigger, Trigger Bar, Firing Pin Block, and Springs Replaced!

I recently published the following post – Issue with one of my TP9SAs (or maybe both).

I sent the tan TP9SA back the week of April 15 in the hopes that Century Arms (the importer of Caniks) would replace some worn parts on the firearm.

I received the gun back today (28 April).

Per the work ticket that they provided when returning the firearm, the gunsmith noticed the trigger parts were “worn/poor” and replaced the trigger, trigger bar, firing pin block, and upgraded the springs.

They also checked headspace, mag catch fitment, ejector functionality, and test-fired 18 rounds (presumably to check the trigger work they performed).

Just dry-firing it, there’s a night/day difference with the trigger. The new trigger spring is still different from what’s in the black one, but at least they fixed the tan handgun’s worn parts. The trigger bar where the trigger spring attaches is flat, vs the original part having nooks at the top portion. It no longer feels that the trigger bar is dragging on another part when pulling the trigger.

I was on the fence on sending the gun back to them, after reading of complaints here and on the FB groups. They were very engaged with the process of me reaching out to them, them sending me info on how to file a claim, them receiving the firearm and working on it in a timely fashion, and them sending me back the firearm (in a real gun box that was discreetly packaged). The gun is also clean (they stated they cleaned it after the test firing). I’ve no complaints at all…I received outstanding service.

I guess I’ll need to visit the range with this firearm soon.

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bar Canik Canik Fanatik excessive wear RMA spring TP9SA trigger

Issue with one of my TP9SAs (or maybe both)

I’ve two Canik TP9SAs.  I bought a black one in Jan of 2014.  Back then I was planning to move to CA.  I’d decided to buy another TP9SA since no Caniks are on the CA DOJ Approved List of guns, so I bought the tan TP9SA.

I’d always wondered why there was a drastic difference between the two triggers.  For reference, the below are the trigger pull stats for both handguns:

Black handgun:

2 lb 14.3 oz

2 lb 15.8

2 lb 7.3

3 lb 1.4

2 lb 8.0

Average – 2 lb 12.6 oz

Tan handgun:

3 lb 12.3 oz

3 lb 3.3

3 lb 2.1

3 lb 2.9

3 lb 4.8

Average: 3 lb 5.1 oz

Initially, I’d noticed that the trigger bar on the tan one appeared to be rubbing against the frame, so I thought that was why.  Maybe two weeks ago, I decided to remove the slides of both and put them side by side so that I could compare components, knowing that the black TP9SA had the good trigger.  Well, I noticed that the trigger springs appear to greatly differ between the two guns!  The black handgun appears to have the lighter spring with more coils.  The tan gun’s trigger spring is heavier with less coils.

When I posted pictures to Canik Fanatik’s forums, I was told that the tan gun had the standard spring and that the black one may be out of spec.

Keep in mind, both guns were bought new.  The black handgun was bought locally, at a gun store.  The tan gun was bought from Prepper Gunshop.

I dry fire both a lot, although I don’t shoot them much.  I’ve a lot of handguns, so I tend to rotate my favorites a lot…the Caniks are good but are not my favorites, so the round counts for both are low.  I’ve shot 150 rounds from the tan handgun and 100 rounds from the black gun.  Still, that’s way too much wear from just dry firing.  As well, I dry fire them roughly the same amount, but only the one handgun has excessive wear.

I mention the dry fire because the tan TP9SA has a lot of wear on the bar/lever that the spring is attached to.  On the top of that lever is supposed to be a 90 degree edge.  That edge is completely gone and almost worn level.  On the black handgun, the edge is present.  As well, on the striker surface that the trigger bar actuates, the surface is worn and material appears to be missing (it’s supposed to be a flat surface, but the area is beveled from excessive wear.

I’m currently OK with the way the black handgun’s trigger is.  It’s light but not too light (it’s about as light as I’m willing to allow).  There’s no wear.  At least one person at Canik Fanatik’s forums thinks there’s something wrong with the black handgun, but I don’t think anything is wrong with it….as long as there’s no excessive wear, I’m OK with it.

So, I reached out to Canik and told them the issues.  They replied back asking for a slew of information so that they could process the RMA.  Once I get the RMA number from them, I’ll send it to them to check out, tune, or replace.

I’ll update the blog as I’m updated by Canik.

UPDATE – 4/22/2021:  Century Arms currently has the Canik.  Due to Coronavirus, it may be awhile before it’s repaired and sent back to me, but I’m patiently awaiting.

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Canik Century Arms CZ Glock nationalists patriotism Turkey

Canik Firearms

For those of you that don’t mind Turkish guns (the non-Nationalists out there, maybe), Caniks are very nice guns.  They’ve a good polymer gun presence in the US gun market.  A few of their polymer guns are the TP9 SF, The TP9 SF Elite, and the TP9 SFX.  They no longer sell the TP9 SA, but have reworked their TP9 v2:  it is now called the TP9 DA.

Canik also sells all-metal guns.  Canik Sharks and their variants are available on the market, but I do believe they’re no longer imported by Century Arms.  Tristar is an importer of Caniks.  Any handguns they have are actually Caniks.  Tristar handguns are just rebranded Caniks.  A few of those guns are:  the C120, C100, T120, T100, and P100.  Most people refer to these guns as CZ clones, mainly due to the slide rails being inverted compared to traditional gun slides.  They are not actual clones…they may share similar parts but you actually won’t be able to swap most parts internal to a CZ75, for example, into a Tristar C120.  I don’t call them clones.  I call them CZ-inspired.

Now, about my Nationalist comment.  Many people tend to get their panties in a bind when they discover that Caniks are gaining popularity.  These people usually can’t hold back the “I don’t support terrorism” comment.  The general population of Turkey should not be held accountable for the few radicals they have.  The US has radicals as well.  If people held the US accountable like the US citizens always want accountability with other countries (such as Turkey), there probably wouldn’t be an uproar.  The things we do to our own citizens here is actually appalling, yet we’ll make generalist comments about a damned Turkish gun maker.  Caniks are imported by US businesses.  The money spent on these guns are staying in the US…it’s going to those that work in those US businesses, to people like you and I.  I wish I could buy a Canik every time I heard these comments, just so I could tell those folks, “every time one of you open your mouth, I buy a Canik.”  I’m a military veteran and I’m about as red-blooded as one can be and I own three of these guns.  It doesn’t bother me one bit.  You can love your country and buy imported goods without issue, IMO.  Every person is different.  I feel I can do whatever the hell I want with my money, for one.  Secondly, for every Nationalist that tells me that I’m unpatriotic because I bought a Turkish gun, I ask them, “have you served your country?  Have you fought on foreign soil?”  It usually shuts them up because most of those folk have never seen the world beyond the town they live in.

As well, those of you that feel that “it isn’t a Glock”…no shit.  You can own both.  Some people say, “well, aftermarket support isn’t on the level of Glock”.  Well, there aren’t many gun makes that have the level of aftermarket support of Glocks.  Still, all you have to do is Google Search on “Canik TP9 holsters” or “Canik TP9 sights” and you’ll see a ton of hits…it won’t be like there’s a scarcity of such info…trust me, I did several such searches the other day when someone commented that Caniks weren’t wanted.  I also posted the results.  I also said, “there’s a whole world beyond just Glocks.  I own several Glocks and several Caniks and I like both.  There’s room for both.”  The guy never responded back.  It was probably because such details are difficult to refute.

If you’re new to Caniks or want to know more about them, check out the Canik Fanatik web forum..

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9mm Canik CZ75 Shark C T-100 Tristar

I Present the Tristar T-100 9mm!

My immediate impressions of the gun:

  • Sturdy and solid (hefty)
  • Very long and strong DA trigger (not gritty but a bit notchy-like)
  • Very nice SA trigger
  • Slide feels like it’s riding on glass
  • Stock grips are plastic (not the rubber that it looks to be)…will have to see how well they grip when firing rounds
  • Cerakote is good…not a blemish in sight
  • Slide serrations are very aggressive, allowing a good grip on a small area
  • Takes down well
  • Magazines are high quality
  • No decocker (I knew this when I bought it)…will require manual decocking…half cock allows DA without dropping hammer fully when decocking (a good thing for carry, IMO).

I’m thinking I should’ve focused on getting one of these a long time ago…the handgun feels that good in my hand.  I’ve no doubt that I’ll love it at the range.  I’m not sure about carrying it, though, as it is heavy (1.5 lb) and I’ve heard that it’s difficult to find a holster that’ll hold it that has a retention strap.

I’m not sure I’ll do a table-top review…there are several very good reviews on this handgun already.

More T-100 stats at Tristar.com

UPDATE (7/28/2016):  The after-range impressions are here.  As well, below is an image of the VZ Grips that I bought for the gun, since I wanted grips that were a bit more aggressive.

Tristar T-100 with VZ Grips for CZ75 Compact
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380 Bersa Canik CZ75 Guns America Plus Shark C T-100 Thunder Tristar

Cancelled the Bersa Order, But Purchased A Tristar T-100!

I updated my previous post, as I had to cancel the order for the Bersa Thunder 380 Plus because the online store didn’t have the gun in stock.  I had to chase them down to ask after I noticed the order wasn’t being updated.  Argentina is experiencing economic issues that are apparently affecting Bersa shipments.  This gun is backlogged all across the U.S.  I don’t want a used gun because the gun has a lifetime warranty if bought new.

So, I’ve really no choice but to wait, or check local pawn shops for used examples.  Or, check local gun shows.  As well, Bersa recently released a new product, the Plus Combat.  I can certainly wait for that version!

I’ve also been looking for a Tristar T-100 in 9mm, or a Canik Shark C in 9mm.  Both are the same gun.  Tristar is just the US Importer (or was).  This gun is hard to find as well.  Even used.  I found one on Guns America that was in a perpetual state of “an offer has been submitted for this item”, meaning, someone is trying to purchase it.  It stayed that way for at least 2 weeks so I asked the dealer (located in Connecticut) if they still had the gun.  They did and told me that if I called and bought it, it would be shipped out tomorrow.  I called them and bought the gun.  I had to also call my local gun shop and ask them to fax a copy of their FFL to the store I was buying the gun from, as I wanted the store to ship the gun to my local shop.   Doing it over the phone was a bit convoluted, as I’m used to doing it straight over the internet.  Connecticut must be a bit hokey like that when it comes to guns (especially after Sandy Hook).

So, I went from not being able to get the Bersa to getting the Tristar.  The T-100 is basically a compact CZ75.  It is a DA/SA gun (without a decocker).  It has the inverted slide rails.  It is all-metal and blued. It can use CZ parts.  It comes with two 15-round magazines.

Shipping is $30 (kinda high).  I’ll also be looking at paying my local gunshop $25 to accept the transfer.  The gun was $319.  With total shipping, it’s $375.  Not sure I’m happy about that, but available T-100s are extremely difficult to find, so I’ll eat the shipping costs.

I can’t wait to shoot this gun!

Tristar T-100 with VZ Frag grips
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Canik Century Arms Mrgunsngear review TP9 V2 TP9v2

Yet Another TP9v2 Review

You can probably tell I love Caniks. I’m trying not to spam the viewers but I think each one of these reviews are important. Mrgunsngear hit upon some key points: 1. You’re not going to see inadvertent actuation of the decocker on ANY handgun, but if you do happen to see it with the v2 gun, it’ll put you in DA mode. 2. He had issues with riding the slide release, which caused the gun to not lock the slide back on the last round. That’s not a gun issue…that’s a handling issue. 3. He’s shot thousands of rounds out of all his (5) Caniks with NO failures, feed, or extraction issues. These are great guns. I think most people focus on the price and think cheaply priced guns will develop problems. Not in the case of Caniks.

UPDATE (12/8/2023): The video link no longer exists by no fault of my own. The owner either moved/deleted it or it was taken down by the social media platform (Facebook). I was going to delete this post but I’ll just delete the reference to the old content instead.

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Canik Century Arms Sootch00 TP9 V2 TP9v2 VSO Gun Channel

Canik TP9v2 – Another Extensive Review!

More Canik TP9v2 goodness, from the VSO Gun Channel!



UPDATE: 

sootch00 just published a review of the TP9v2 as well!

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CAI Canik Century Arms TP9v2

CAI Facebook Post on the TP9v2

Look at this!

Now shipping TP9v2’s!
Posted by Century Arms on Monday, July 13, 2015

Well, they aren’t telling me anything I haven’t already published in recent postings of this particular gun, but the fact that they’re advertising it is pretty cool (I didn’t see them doing that with the other TP-9s).

Oh, and here’s another video of the gun, this one by Hank Strange (and quite a bit longer than James Yeager’s).

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Canik DA/SA TP9SA TP9SF TP9v2

Canik TP9v2 Now On The Market!

I knew awhile back that Canik was supposed to be revamping the original TP9 and renaming it the TP9v2.  Well, it’s out.  I discovered this while researching if the TP9SA’s sights can be replaced.

It has not yet been reviewed online (not when I looked last night on YouTube), James Yeager has a quick video of it.  I thought MAC did as well, but he was actually quick-reviewing an SF model (it has no decocker).



NOTE:  I’ve taken some unneeded heat for using Yeager as a resource.  1) I don’t care what you think 2) I’m just trying to share information on the gun…no one else had footage or spoke extensively about the gun at the time of my post.  I’m not a Yeager groupie, but if you don’t like Yeager, that’s your problem.  My post is about the gun, not about Yeager specifically.

I’m seeing the gun listed between $308 and $380, which was roughly what the SA model was selling for 6 or so months ago.

The gun is essentially a TP9 with the TP9SA’s frame.  The gun is shorter (4.1 inches) than the TP9SA, though.  The difference between the TP9 and the new version is the trigger…both DA and SA modes are supposedly great!  Yes, there’s still the decocker, only now it’s used to go from SA to DA mode.  What’s cool is that it’s confirmed that the TP9SA and TP9v2 can share magazines…that’s a huge plus.

I find myself intrigued, but I already have two Canik TP9SAs (one black and one tan).  I’ve already mentioned that I could sell one of them to fund another gun.  Then again, the gun is so cheaply priced, I could probably get by without selling a gun to purchase a v2.  I can also wait, as Canik is supposed to be releasing compact models too.  They also have .40Cal versions but I’m not sure if they’re exporting them to the U.S.

I’ll be paying attention to the upcoming reviews, especially since James Yeager thinks the v2’s trigger modes are excellent.