Get a better shooting experience with gun customizations that tailor your weapon to meet your shooting needs. Adding the right pistol upgrades can change your gun’s accuracy, sight picture, or even its rate of fire. Whether you’re building out a gun for concealed carry or getting ready for competitive shooting events, you can create a gun you can be proud of with a bit of time, effort, and quality aftermarket gun parts. Here’s how to get started on the right foot with your customization project.
Why Gun Owners Upgrade Their Firearms
The commercial gun you buy at the gun show, sporting goods store, or gun shop is built to offer the baseline performance needed by a wide range of shooters for a wide range of use cases. The manufacturer increases its potential customer base and sales by designing a firearm that fits a broad spectrum of users. Firearms are powerful tools for hunting, sporting, and self-defense, and gun customization should hone that tool’s ability to serve its owner’s needs better. That’s why there are as many reasons to upgrade your pistols as there are pistol owners, but they all share the desire to build a gun specifically to improve their individual shooting experience.
Deciding on Your Custom Gun Upgrades
The first step to gun customization is deciding what you want to change about your firearm. Not all pistol upgrades are suitable for all use cases. Even the most popular modifications can vary from shooter to shooter depending on their individual needs and comfort level, and that’s only if they decide that particular is even suitable for their gun. Let’s take a look at what to consider as you start your gun’s customization.
Intended Use
One of the most important considerations when choosing upgrades is how you intend to use your firearm. A self-defense handgun for everyday carry may need very different modifications from your house gun, let alone a pistol for competitive shooting events. Decide what’s most important for a firearm that’s filling that niche using your judgment and research choices, like your favorite firearms publication or content maker. Consider what accessories, equipment, or aftermarket components can help you better use your gun within those parameters.
Budget
Blank checks sound good when you’re planning a gun customization project, but for most of us, they just don’t exist. You have to build to meet your needs within your means. That means looking for the parts that give you the most bang for your buck and have the most significant impact on your shooting experience. One money-saving technique to get the pistol upgrades you need without compromising on performance is choosing third-party products you can count on.
Shooting Skill
Firearms are powerful tools you’re responsible for controlling. Don’t plan a gun customization build that’s beyond your ability to use safely. If proper trigger technique is an issue, adding a pull-release trigger might just compound the problem rather than correct it. A smart pistol upgrade plan keeps your firearm equipped to let you use your skills to their fullest while challenging yourself to continue to improve.
Comfort Preferences
Comfortable use is vital to improved shooting performance. From mag extensions to the size of your optic lens, your preferences make a big difference, and they can be completely different from the shooter in the lane next to you. One of the joys of gun customization is building your perfect gun.
Pistol Upgrade Experience
Along with your shooting skill, you should factor in your familiarity with gun customization and your comfort level with the work of modifying your firearm. Jumping right into a barrel upgrade is a lot easier with a drop-in barrel than trying to machine one from scratch. While that may be an extreme example, remember that biting off more than you can chew can be dangerous or leave you with an expensive paperweight needing a professional gunsmith for repairs.
Top Beginner-Friendly Firearms Customizations
While every build is tailored to the individual, there are a few great places to start when first upgrading your pistol. These can have a dramatic, immediate impact on your shooting and help you take the next step toward your gun’s potential.
Custom Pistol Slides
The slide may be the most noticeable element of your gun, and aside from the grip, it is the part of the firearm that requires the most manipulation for proper functioning. Custom slides can change your gun’s lines, make it easier to rack, or get it ready for performance optics. Look for slides with deep serrations for handling in tougher environments, cutouts for aesthetics and weight reduction, and milled mount patterns to support sights for better aiming.
Precision Barrels
The barrel of your firearm is under immense stress as it manages the rapid pressure and temperature changes from a controlled explosion that propels your bullet downrange. Over time, these stresses can damage barrels or cause the rifling to wear to the point of affecting your weapon’s accuracy and precision. Drop-in barrels can restore your gun’s performance or enhance it with upgraded pistol features like porting or a threaded muzzle.
Performance Optics
One of the most popular pistol upgrades, adding an aftermarket optic, is also a popular first gun customization for beginners. Red dot sights can improve accuracy, precision, and the speed of target acquisition by making aiming your gun more intuitive. They’re easy to install on optics-ready slides, look good, and, with practice, make aiming as easy as pointing and shooting.
Custom Triggers
If you’re looking for a more advanced shooting experience, changing your trigger group could be the right gun customization for your weapon. Custom triggers can have a cleaner breakover for firing or a lighter pull weight. You can even add a pull-release trigger, like those from PR Triggers, that doubles your firing rate by shooting on both the trigger pull and trigger release. Custom triggers let you tailor your gun’s firing for more fun at the range or a smoother pull that supports better accuracy.
Get Quality Aftermarket Parts You Can Count On
When you’re ready to start your gun customizations out the right way, we have pistol upgrades that are engineered for real-world action and priced to let you build a gun you can be proud of without breaking the bank. Sign up for our email list to get notified about new product releases and special prices on the gun parts you’re looking for. Take your gun to the next level with parts from Patmos Arms today.