well..actually that's a bit of a lie. I carried a Phoenix HP22 for a while and eventually sold it to fund future purposes. Life happened and the stash whittled down before i could replace it so my hip has been empty for about a year now and I finally filled the rat hole up enough to pull the trigger on a carry piece. I had a budget of six bills and had looked at a number of platforms. countless gun shops, and alot of handling different platforms had me looking hard for a used Walther P99.

My major deciding factor was fit and feel. I have large hands, and I'm a pretty big guy so concealing a near full size weapon was less of a concern than true feel in my hands. To be honest, i had forgotten all about the Cougar platform and was actually secretly looking for either the P99 or another lesser known gun the Llama. Both fit my hands VERy well and ergonomically they are perfect for me. When i picked up the Stoeger last weekend at the shop, angels sang and trumpets sounded. I was enamored by the fit and finish on the display cougar...at that point it could have been a 450-500 dollar gun and i would have gotten it...it fit THAT good. I ended up walking out for 480 with a hard case, cleaning kit, a new can of CLP, 3 boxes of ammo and a IWB holster. I think i did pretty good and still have cash left for more ammo

I've now put 200 rds thru it and only on this last trip to the range did i have any problems. the last time i cleaned it, i was in a hurry and didin't want to deal with being delicate with the lube so i sprayed the mating surfaces with Remington Dry-Lube. First shot with the drylubed gun stove piped. and the next 4 did the same thing. Same ammo lot as the last two sessions, so i immediately thought i jacked something up during cleaning. I had the aerosol CLP with me so a quick field strip, cleaning and re-lubed with CLP Breakfree and it went right back to flawless operation.

I have a couple things i'll be doing to the weapon to make it "mine" as I love to tinker. Polishing the ramp, a little work on the mags (they are not as slick as the chrome/stainless XD mags), wood grips (i have some really nice dense cherry wood from some trees i dropped on my property a few years ago) and I really want a set of Trijicons for it but i can't find a gunsmith that is willing to work on the weapon to install them because of the safety levers.

In any case - I think the Cougar is a great platform regardless of the cheap price, and though it's a little chunky i have no issues carrying it at 4o'clock strong. I got the 9mm version and would love to hear from anyone with any other custom work that has been done to these.

I think i may also want to checker the back strap...the vertical cuts seem counterintutive to me for some reason. I don't think horizontal cuts would be the fix either, so i may checker them...but it's not priority.