Hi-Point Firearms, also known as Strassell's Machine, Inc (distributed by MKS Supply), is an American

firearm A firearm is any type of gun designed to be readily carried and used by an individual. The term is legally defined further in different countries (see Legal definitions). The first firearms originated in 10th-century China, when bamboo tubes ...

s manufacturer based in

Mansfield Mansfield is a market town and the administrative centre of Mansfield District in Nottinghamshire, England. It is the largest town in the wider Mansfield Urban Area (followed by Sutton-in-Ashfield). It gained the Royal Charter of a market to ...

Ohio Ohio () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Of the List of states and territories of the United States, fifty U.S. states, it is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 34th-l ...

. All of their firearms are manufactured in several different locations in Ohio.

Construction of products

Pistols

Hi-Point semi-automatic pistols are polymer framed handguns based on the blowback design. Different from other blowback design pistols such as the

Walther PPK The Walther PP (german: Polizeipistole, or police pistol) series pistols are blowback-operated semi-automatic pistols, developed by the German arms manufacturer Carl Walther GmbH Sportwaffen. It features an exposed hammer, a traditional double-a ...

, the P-64, and the Astra 600 which use a heavy slide combined with a stiff recoil spring to hold the breech closed, these pistols use a heavier slide so they can use a softer recoil spring. When compared to breech-locking handguns of the same caliber and dimensions, the Hi-Point is rather top heavy. As with most blowback handguns, this pistol has fewer moving parts to clean and lubricate than its locked breech counterparts. While most semi-automatic pistols can be field stripped without the use of any tools, Hi-Point pistols require a small punch or a screwdriver and a hammer to remove a pin in the receiver, in order to permit slide removal (and thus enable field-stripping). Rather than being machined from forged steel, the slide is die cast from Zamak-3. Zamak is a

zinc Zinc is a chemical element with the symbol Zn and atomic number 30. Zinc is a slightly brittle metal at room temperature and has a shiny-greyish appearance when oxidation is removed. It is the first element in group 12 (IIB) of the periodi ...

alloy An alloy is a mixture of chemical elements of which at least one is a metal. Unlike chemical compounds with metallic bases, an alloy will retain all the properties of a metal in the resulting material, such as electrical conductivity, ductili ...

which is often used in low cost firearms; previous manufacturers using this technique included Lorcin Engineering Company and

Raven Arms Raven Arms was a firearms manufacturer established in 1970 by firearms designer George Jennings. The Gun Control Act of 1968 prohibiting the importation of inexpensive handguns prompted Jennings to design the MP-25, a .25-caliber semi-automatic ...

. Die casting is particularly commonplace in Ohio, which influenced the decision to implement it. Uncommon for this construction, Hi-Point pistols are rated for +P ammunition in calibers up to .45 ACP. Blowback designs are generally simpler in design and easier and cheaper to manufacture than locked-breech

recoil-operated Recoil operation is an operating mechanism used to implement locked breech, autoloading firearms. Recoil operated firearms use the energy of recoil to cycle the action, as opposed to gas operation or blowback operation using the pressure of the ...

firearms. While the fixed barrel of a blowback gun generally will contribute to improved accuracy, blowback guns usually need to be larger and heavier than a locked-breech gun firing the same caliber.

Carbines

The Hi-Point carbine is a series of

pistol-caliber carbine A carbine ( or ) is a long gun that has a barrel shortened from its original length. Most modern carbines are rifles that are compact versions of a longer rifle or are rifles chambered for less powerful cartridges. The smaller size and lighter ...

s manufactured by Hi-Point Firearms chambered for

9×19mm Parabellum The 9×19mm Parabellum (also known as 9mm Parabellum or 9mm Luger or simply 9mm) is a rimless, tapered firearms cartridge. Originally designed by Austrian firearm designer Georg Luger in 1901, it is widely considered the most popular handgun ...

, .40 S&W,

10mm Auto The 10mm Auto (10×25mm, official C.I.P. nomenclature: 10 mm Auto, official SAAMI nomenclature: 10mm Automatic) is a semi-automatic pistol cartridge introduced in 1983. Its design was adopted and later produced by ammunition manufacturer ...

.45 ACP The .45 ACP ( Automatic Colt Pistol) or .45 Auto (11.43×23mm) is a rimless straight-walled handgun cartridge designed by John Moses Browning in 1904, for use in his prototype Colt semi-automatic pistol. After successful military trials, it ...

and

.380 ACP The .380 ACP (9×17mm) ( Automatic Colt Pistol) is a rimless, straight-walled pistol cartridge developed by firearms designer John Moses Browning. The cartridge headspaces on the mouth of the case.Wilson, R. K. ''Textbook of Automatic Pisto ...

. They are very inexpensive, constructed using

polymer A polymer (; Greek '' poly-'', "many" + '' -mer'', "part") is a substance or material consisting of very large molecules called macromolecules, composed of many repeating subunits. Due to their broad spectrum of properties, both synthetic a ...

s and

ed metals as much as possible, resulting in a reduction of production costs and sale price. It functions via a simple direct blowback action. Hi-Point carbines use a

stock, stamped

sheet metal Sheet metal is metal formed into thin, flat pieces, usually by an industrial process. Sheet metal is one of the fundamental forms used in metalworking, and it can be cut and bent into a variety of shapes. Thicknesses can vary significantly; ex ...

receiver cover, and a receiver and bolt cast from Zamak-3. The barrel is steel and button rifled using a 1-10" right hand twist.

Use of zinc alloy

Some people are wary of Hi-Points because of the use of zinc alloy ( Zamak-3) castings in much of their construction. However, the parts made from Zamak-3 in Hi-Point guns (slide) are low-stress components that do not require the strength of steel at these pistol cartridge power levels. The slide is made of a Zamak-3. The frame is made of steel reinforced high strength polymer. Higher stress and wear components in Hi-Points, like the barrel, chamber, breech and other small parts, are made of steel.

Calibers

Hi-Point manufactures firearms in the following calibers: *

– Model CF-380 and 380COMP *

– C-9 and C-9 COMP pistols and YC-9 * .40 S&W – Model JCP pistol *

– Model JHP pistol * Hi-Point Carbines chambered in

, 9mm Luger, .40 S&W,

, and

Safety

Hi-Point firearms have a manual thumb safety and an integral drop safety that prevents firing in the event that the firearm is dropped. Until the 2000s, all Hi-Point products except the 995 (9mm) carbine had a last-round lock open and magazine disconnect safety, preventing firing unless a magazine was in the gun. With the replacement of the original 9mm carbine with the new 995 TS model, all pistols and carbines now have these features.

Gallery

File:380 acp.jpg, Hi-Point CF380 pistol with two-tone finish; the C-9 is identical except it is simply black, and chambered for 9x19mm Parabellum File:Hipoint1.jpg, Hi-Point C380 pistol with the slide locked back File:Hp995carbine22.jpg, "Generation 1" 995 Hi-Point Carbine File:Hi-Point_C9_Pistol.jpg, Hi-Point C9

References

External links

*
MKS Supply's website

{{Webarchive, url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160902160049/http://hi-pointfirearms.com/Hi-Point-manuals/default.html , date=2016-09-02 Firearm manufacturers of the United States Companies based in Ohio