Stoeger Cougar

charlesb · Post by **charlesb** » Sat Sep 05, 2015 11:48 pm

Looking for an inexpensive carry gun, I bought a Stoeger Cougar in .40 S&W today.

Click image to see larger picture.

It has my favorite fire control mechanism. - It can be fired single or double-action, and has a de-cocker. The magazine holds 11 rounds, so with one in the chamber you have twelve.

The double-action pull is much better than I expected, one of the best I've ever encountered. It really surprised me. The single-action pull is good too, but I kind of expected that.

Everything works well on it, all of the controls are positive, the sights are good. Nothing about it cries out "Cheap Gun", in fact it seems to be a quality piece. My son noted that the barrel rotates slightly upon locking up. - Dunno what the deal is with that.

They're made in Turkey.

Tomorrow I'll take it to the range and see how it behaves. My first impression though is very good.

More later.

Post by **Bullseye** » Sun Sep 06, 2015 10:37 am

How does it feel in your hand? Looks a little like a cut-down clone version of a Beretta 92, is the grip the same width?

R,
Bullseye

charlesb · Post by **charlesb** » Sun Sep 06, 2015 11:08 am

I've never fired a Beretta 92. I did find out though that the Cougar is a Beretta design that was superseded by another new model. Beretta did market the Cougar for a while, but it was old-school compared to the newer designs so they dropped it from their line. The tooling was sold to the Turkish manufacturer owned by Stoeger.

The Stoeger version is about half the price of the original, and so far I have not discovered any quality issues.

The gun feels very good in my hand. Shooting Federal Range Ammo, I got an 8" 12-shot group offhand at 15 yards. Shooting at a steel silhouette at 100 yards, I hit it a few times, but I also managed to miss it - on both sides!

It is a compact auto, but very comfortable to shoot with 40 caliber.

The rotary (as opposed to tipping) barrel lockup is supposed to wind up being more accurate. If so, maybe mine will become more accurate as I put more rounds through it. - So far, I've fired 22 rounds through a new gun.

Owners say that it gets a bit more accurate as you shoot it. That sounds kind of dubious, but that"s what I've seen several of them say.

It"ll do for the intended purpose, but I've seen a lot of 1911 Combat Commanders shoot a good deal tighter.

Post by **Bullseye** » Mon Sep 07, 2015 9:25 am

The frames are basically the same size (grip-wise) between the two pistols so if you like the Cougar you'd probably like the feel and controls of the 92. I am not warm to the feel of the 92, the girth and trigger pull turned me off to it way back when the armed services adopted it as the main duty pistol. I have large hands and I still never could get truly comfortable with the feel of the Beretta.

On the side, I could see the pistol slightly increasing in accuracy as the lock-up wears in, thereby allowing the barrel to re-position itself more consistently in between shots. The parts would be basically fire lapping each other for a smoother lock-up. Once any production tooling marks were honed down the accuracy improvement potential would have peaked.

R,
Bullseye

charlesb · Post by **charlesb** » Wed Sep 09, 2015 10:52 am

This picture is a little better.

Click to enlarge:

The other side of the pistol has the serial number on the frame and on the slide.

The Stoeger Cougar replaces my Hungarian 9mm Hi-Power/S&W clone that I reported on last year. The clone did a good job, but this pistol is smaller, lighter and more powerful.

Both cost about the same, around 300 bucks. I think the Stoeger gives me a little bit more for the money.

Post by **Bullseye** » Sat Sep 12, 2015 6:48 pm

Not a bad price for a hi-cap 9mm.

R,
Bullseye

charlesb · Post by **charlesb** » Mon Sep 21, 2015 5:01 pm

They'll sell one to just about anybody.