When you get some advice on here, it's probably from experience. I can tell you that back when I turned 21 I wasn't much of the internet type and surely wasn't on any forums. I was hellbent on buying a handgun and off I went uneducated and unprepared. I bought a Lorcin .25 pocket gun and a Lorcin 9mm for home and range. Two of the biggest turds on the planet. I should have known based on price alone that they were all but worthless. (I think the .25 was like $50) And then to add another self inflicted wound I bought my wife a Lorcin .25 with pink plastic grips. (at this point in my life, I would shoot my stupid *** self should I run into me with a time machine for my ignorance) The 9mm blew goats. Lots of misfires, FTE, FTF you name it this gun had that problem. The .25 I carried got dirty from riding in my pocket (lint is so unfriendly to semi-auto actions) and I got ahold of the manual and decided to strip clean and reassemble it. (Again, 21 no experience with guns) I disassembled it and it never worked again. It wasn't that it wasn't put back together correctly, I had a gunsmith look at it. (he had mercy and checked it out for free since I was broke) It was simply the poor metal quality had over time degraded to a point that the tolerances were worn so badly it wouldn't function. It thus became a $50 paper weight. About 6 months after purchase the 9mm starting misfiring every other trigger pull. It would literally only fire every other shot. I sold it to some chump whom I told it had issues for $50. (loss of $150) At this point, I didn't want my wife using that junk so I sold hers for like $30. I decided to buy new. I bought a Jennings 9mm. Come to find out, Lorcin had gone out of business and Jennings had started making the exact same guns. (again, I had no gun knowledge and was completely unprepared) Straight out of the box that SOB would only fire every other round. I got so pissed off I sold it for $100 (a $100 loss for a gun that was only a couple weeks old) At that point, I was fed up with crappy guns. I went and bought myself a Glock model 30 subcompact .45 I then went and bought my wife a Beretta Bobcat .22 I still have both of those all these years later.
So after reading all that, if you are still reading this, the moral of the story is that I pissed away enough money on junk that I could have bought the Glock to begin with and still had some coin in my pocket for all the crap I bought as an uneducated gun buyer. Bryco Arms made the names Lorcin, Jennings, Bryco and is now Jimenez and I believe Cobra as well (though I'm not sure about Cobra) Lorcin went out of business in 1996 or so due to overwhelming lawsuits against them. Such poor quality weapons as they were, they had multiple instances of unintended firing, sometimes from simply trying to unload them. Others simply broke apart. You can see what happens to cheap metal produced guns here;
http://m4carbine.net/showthread.php?t=41897
Here's the best part though. I'm cutting and pasting this:
"Due to California law requiring California-manufactured guns to pass safety tests, Jimenez Arms submitted passing test results on the new guns to the state, but the guns failed subsequent additional independent tests. The law requires that upon failure, the manufacturer must correct the problem and resubmit for additional testing. Rather than complete the process, Jimenez Arms ceased California operations and established itself in Nevada, which has no safety testing requirements for firearms."
These guns, through all of their incarnations, have been called "Saturday Night Specials" because they are cheap throw aways for criminals.
As for the Chiappa, I've never used one of their handguns but I do have the M4-22 dedicated .22 AR15 upper that I use to go to the range on the cheap. One of my wifes coworkers just bought one this week for a range gun. I think it's a little large for a carry weapon, especially in .22 You could get a fullsize 1911 in .45 in the same size. Bottom line, save your money and buy something that works for your intended uses that is of good enough quality that your life can depend on it.
