When I bought my first handgun in the mid 90's, it was a decision between a 4006 and a 3" 65-5 (I was in college and had the money for only 1 pistol). The 3" 65-5 won that round, and I carried it for years. However, I still remember my friends (some who were officers) carrying S&W auto's, and knew that I would own one some day...

That came last year, when I picked up a hardly used 6906. It was my first 9mm, and I really fell in love with how well build it was and how well it shot.

Well, my local store picked up some police trade in 5903 pistols, and were offering them for $299. I couldn't resist. They had a few in stock, and looking them over, I selected one that looked the best, but had some nasty looking worn out hogue grips. The clerk noted that it had been passed up because people thought it looked bad with the grips. A quick call to S&W for grips and replacement springs solved that. A good hour of disassembly and cleaning some serious grunge out of it resulted in a nice looking pistol. Looking forward to the first range trip.

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My first S&W semiauto was a 1006, not typical for a "first S&W auto" and though I totally loved it from the start, it actually took me many many years before I got my second one, a formerly LE issued 5906 from Bud's out of Kentucky.

Mine also had the Hogue and wow, it was well beyond it's expiration date. When I went to take the old dry-rotted Hogue off, I literally had to peel it off in broken and crumbled pieces.

When new, the Hogue has a decent feel IF you don't mind that it's gargantuan, but yes... new or old, it looks bloated.

I still have that 1006 and amazingly enough, a mere TWO 5906's... but as for how many S&W 1-2-3rd Gens total? Your honor, I will plead the Fifth on the grounds that my answer may incriminate me.

You're right. I had a 5946 that was my former duty weapon somewhere in my safe for years. But lately I have bought just about every 1st,2nd, 3rd Gen Smith I can find. Within a little reason. Including a 59, 645, 439, 459, 469 another 5946 NIB, 5946TSW, 2-5906s, 4566TSW.

Yeah, the rubber of the grips had almost welded itself to the frame. Took a while to get it all off, but the frame cleaned up nicely after some work. I know the hogue's were all the rage for a while, but mine will be wearing the stock plastic grips for the foreseeable future.

Oh, I don't know. I've had only 1 - a Model 59 - for a couple of years now. Though I've been looking pretty hard at at a Model 39...

I love the look of the OEM delrin 3rd Gen grip and one big objective was met -- make the pistol as slim and trim as possible, so in that way, S&W did a fine job with the 3rd Gen OEM grip.

But it's slicker than snot on a doorknob. That is a very valid and genuine complaint. The way I typically rectify that issue is with bicycle tire inner tube. Yes, it looks basically horrendous, but it's extremely grabby and it stays grabby over years and years. Unlike the made-for-retail slip-on grip covers, it doesn't have any goofy patterns or awful finger grooves or worse palm swells, it simply uses a very thin layer of rubber to add "GRAB" and on a couple of my pistols where I choose function over form, that's the route I take.

I've not really used an inner tube, but have used grip-tape on the front strap to some success. I find that having some traction on the front strap works best for me. The back strap and sides aren't as big of an issue as long as I have a good grip surface there.