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Hi Efficiency
Written By: Yulia Selezneva
Reference
The Hi-Point has an unusual design philosophy, where 100% of the effort goes into function and price, and the remainer goes into how it looks and feels. It uses the simplest possible blow-back action, which nobody had ever used for a high-caliber pistol, because it would make the slide incredibly heavy and awkward. Hi-Point solved that problem by... just doing it anyway.
Almost every part is made from cheap zinc alloy casting and injection-molded plastic, to avoid the cost of expensive CNC machining, which gives it rounded edges that are hard to grip. It has unusual controls as well -- there's no external slide release, so after each full reload you have to pull back on the slick slide serrations and hope the spring has enough energy to feed a new round from the weirdly tight magazine feed lips. Despite all of these cut corners, the simplicity of the design make it surprisingly reliable and mechanically accurate, even under adverse conditions. It's a solid sidearm to have when the stakes are high, because you can use its weight to pound them back down.
Almost every part is made from cheap zinc alloy casting and injection-molded plastic, to avoid the cost of expensive CNC machining, which gives it rounded edges that are hard to grip. It has unusual controls as well -- there's no external slide release, so after each full reload you have to pull back on the slick slide serrations and hope the spring has enough energy to feed a new round from the weirdly tight magazine feed lips. Despite all of these cut corners, the simplicity of the design make it surprisingly reliable and mechanically accurate, even under adverse conditions. It's a solid sidearm to have when the stakes are high, because you can use its weight to pound them back down.