Stainless Hi Power

Alpo

Alpo

Member
Joined
Sep 29, 2006
Messages
5,824
Reaction score
6,513
Location
N/W Florida
Is there such a critter?


I'm reading a Spenser novel, written in 2001. They're describing the pile of pistols on the table. A P38, two Brownings, a Glock and three S&W 357 revolvers. "And since most of them were stainless, they gleamed dully in the twilight."


Most is "more than half", so I was attempting to find four or more stainless guns in that list. There ain't no stainless P38. Pretty sure Glock don't make a stainless plastic gun. But I wondered about the Brownings.


Of course, Parker is not known for being all that correct with his firearms.
 
Register to hide this ad
The Belgian Hi Power, from the start ( pre-Browning as well as Browning imports beginning in the mid 50's), has never been made in stainless steel.
 
Last edited:
I haven’t ever seen a stainless steel Hi power. I am guessing that he was describing a nickel plated Hi power.
 
It may have been a hard chrome Browning HP. Or literary license. :)

There is a current production HP clone made in stainless, seems to get good reviews, but it was not in production in 2001.
 
Browning/FN mfg... no, only hard chrome, or nickel. But there was one made by a company called Bafford Arms, and not long ago a company in Florida made some frames, can’t remember their name though.
 
Last edited:
These came out in the early 80's.
Forget the factory name of the finish but they
were all factory.
Scarce BHP these days and expensive.
DSC00523.jpg
 
Xfuzz said:
These came out in the early 80's.
Forget the factory name of the finish but they
were all factory.
Scarce BHP these days and expensive.
DSC00523.jpg
Click to expand...



Xfuzz...the one in your photo looks similar to the Browning Centennial edition. I passed on one at a gunshow several years back for $700. I believe now they are going for double that.

I have two hipowers...a "245PZ" serial numbered in "hard chrome" or "brushed nickel-ed" with a black/red lined rug, the wrap around rubber grips manufactured in '81 (with similarly finish mag) and a "215RR" serial numbered "parkerized arsenal" finish manufactured in '77 (with black mag/alum follower). I believe I read somewhere that the 215 numbered hipowers were made for military contracts. Both only have the "Made in Belgium" roll marks...not the "assembled in..." I hope someone smarter than me will come along with more info.
 
Was the book Double Duce with the street gang? I remember him and hawk taking a hi power off a kid and Spencer remarked to Hawk he had one just like it but his had target sights.
 
I think the reference to stainless was to the .357 revolvers. He probably said "most of them" loosely.

Parker's gun knowledge improved a lot as he wrote those books over about a 35 year span.

He did own guns, as did Ian Fleming. Most writers, like Tony Hillerman, seem not to have had any. I felt that Hillerman's Navajo cop books lacked a lot in gun, uniform, and car detail that would have made them more interesting. He was a newspaperman before becoming a writer, and we know how the press views guns!

Parker was a Harvard (?) professor, another field unlikely to produce a gun-knowledgeable writer! But he did improve a lot. He mentioned a S&W shotgun. Only place I've seen that in literature.

Hillerman told a member here that his lack of gun data didn't seem to hurt the sales of his books. I doubt that he cared. He also thought that most states had gun registration. I'm sure that he favored that.

Some authors, like Jack Higgins and David Lindsey, have tried to get by a lot by just naming brands. You have to guess which model they logically had. When Higgins says "Ceska", he means a CZ.

Lindsey had his Sgt. Stuart Haydon, a Houston homicide detective, carry a "Beretta". I THINK he meant a Model 92SB, current at that time, before the 92F was adopted as the US M-9. But in, "Mercy", Sgt. Carmen Palma had a SIG that could have been any of several models. As a female, she may have carried a .380, but I settled mentally on a P-228. But if some other reader envisions a P-225, I won't argue. It was a purse-carried gun, so I ruled out a P-220 or P-225. And I doubt that a female cop's hands would enjoy the feel and recoil of a .45 P-220. Why carry a 9mm or .38 Super 220 when she could have had a P-226 or P-228?

Did she wear the same gun off duty? Argues for a P-230 or P-232 .380. I'm thinking of asking Lindsey, but seriously doubt that he knows the SIG line well enough to know. Probably just knows that some Houston detectives he rode with while doing research carried SIG pistols.
 
Last edited:
jframejoey said:
Was the book Double Duce with the street gang? I remember him and hawk taking a hi power off a kid and Spencer remarked to Hawk he had one just like it but his had target sights.
Click to expand...
Double Deuce was '92. This was Potshot. Small town in the Sawtooth Mountains in New Mexico had been taken over by a gang of criminals and Spencer collected a bunch of thugs he had met in different books to run them off. He had Hawk, Vinnie, a little guy from Las Vegas named Bernard who carried an Officer's Model, a great big homosexual from Georgia named Sapp, and two gangsters from Los Angeles - a Mexican named Chollo and a Kiowa named Bobby Horse. 7 against 40.


I just realized. They were the Magnificent Seven.



With all the high powered, high tech weaponry they had brought, there was a lever action Winchester 45 carbine. Vinnie spoke disparagingly of it - that it only held 5 rounds. Spencer said it was nostalgia. His uncle had given it to him in Laramie. His uncle and Laramie had to have been the 60s or earlier. Winchester carbines in 45 did not exist yet. and once they made them they held more than five rounds.
 
Texas Star - much of what you mentioned was in this book. The town of Potshot had a five-man police force. there was a Smith & Wesson shotgun in the gun rack at the police station.


The long guns they brought consisted of 2 AR-15s, 3 pump shotguns - no models given, no gauge given - an H&K with a 20 round magazine, the Winchester 45 carbine, and Bobby the Indian had a BAR.


Spenser normally carried a J frame, but which one was never mentioned. In early books he only carried 4 rounds, keeping an empty chamber under the hammer for safety. He sometimes carried a Browning. From the description, it was a Hi Power, but Parker never said. The Winchester 94 in 45 Colt is mentioned in several books, so I suspect Parker owned one. All we know about Hawk's gun is it is a long barrel 44 Magnum, and is either chrome or nickel. Some books it's one, some books it's the other. Never brand given though.


One thing I've always found interesting in the series, is that Spenser's carry license is good everywhere. Georgia, California, England. :p
 
Last edited:
Fictional writers , like certain other groups, are not required to be truthful , have accurate facts or hold to any sense of accuracy in their writings.
Don't literally believe everything you read....they can be loose with the facts.

Nickle plating looks a lot like stainless steel to those ignorant of firearms.
I have seen many P38's and BHP's brought back from WWII and refinished in nickle .

Gary
 
I have a beloved Hi Power, the Grande Puissance, that is in what Browning called silver chrome.

Everybody who gets to touch it, immediately wants to buy it.
No chance.


Prescut
 
I've had this one for a while and it came from the factory as shown. This model, as I recall, was referred to as the "Combat HP" and is, with the exception of the trigger, hammer, safety and slide release lever, finished in "satin nickel." The trigger is gold plated and I really don't know why that feature was selected.

It has the adjustable sights and I was lucky to find it with two additional matching magazines. A friend of mine has one just like it and he reminded me that it was the pistol carried by the "bad guy" in Crocodile Dundee.

I was told that this specific model was made for about two years. A similar model came out later with a different adjustable rear sight.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_0229.jpg
    IMG_0229.jpg
    100.1 KB · Views: 25
Novels? Accuracy concerning firearms details? or essentials?

I just finished (which impugns my credibility) a Ben Coes novel where the protagonist chambers a round (where noise is a major no-no) in his 1911 and then takes the safety off.

Parker is another. I'm not sure that there has been an accurate novelist writing about firearms since Donald Hamilton. However, I will say that I cannot recall Brad Taylor's having erred in that area. Even Oliver North, truly one of the good guys, put a non-existent safety onto a SIG.

Each individual is entitled to ascribe whatever veracity he chooses to an individual who has lied to him. My tolerance is fairly low.

As was once commonly observed in the military, "Six beautiful bridges I build. Do they call me Pierre the bridgebuilder? Nooooo. But one little
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

I
Hi Power
2
Replies
36
Views
1K
alwslate
A
O
Hi Power Extractor and Spring
Replies
4
Views
494
otis24
O
Narragansett
Browning Hi Power Clones
2 3
Replies
51
Views
3K
ISCS Yoda
ISCS Yoda
P
Browning Hi Power help - factory sights
Replies
16
Views
815
pdcrig
P
petepeterson
Hi-Power fans
Replies
9
Views
728
kaaskop49
K

Latest posts

Back
Top