Arsenal Firearms Strike One Ergal Pro: the All-Italian, All-Metal Production pistol!
The Arsenal Firearms Strike One Ergal Pro semi-automatic pistol is a dedicated competition shooting version of the Italian striker-fired pistol platform: lightened and built around a smooth, machined alloy frame, it is meant to deliver speed and accuracy
The Arsenal Firearms AF-1 Strike One Ergal Pro semi-automatic pistol is the latest, competition-oriented incarnation of the Italian-made striker-fired handgun initially introduced in 2012.
While the first versions were built on a reinforced polymer frame and conceived as heavy-duty service sidearm for military, law enforcement, Government and private security or PMC personnel, the technical architecture of the Strike One immediately caught the eye of the most dedicated IPSC, USPSA and IDPA shooters due to its inherently stellar potential.
The peculiar striker-fired, single action trigger with a two-stage transfer bar and the patented AF Speedlock vertical locking block system – basically an evolution of the Bergmann system, keeping the barrel fixed and ensures one of the world’s lowest bore axis at 12 mm / 0.47” – will indeed guarantee inherent levels of accuracy that other handgun designs can match only after extensive custom modifications.
The Arsenal Firearms AF-1 Strike One Ergal Pro is an evolution of the previous Strike One Ergal pistol model; unlike the baseline versions of the design, the Strike One Ergal Pro pistol is built around a lightweight aircraft-grade aluminum alloy frame, CNC-machined from a solid 7075-T6 billet. Commercially used in Europe as ERGAL-55 (hence the name of the pistol), this aluminum alloy is globally accepted as the gold standard for firearms manufacturing worldwide.
The Arsenal Firearms Strike One Ergal Pro is aimed chiefly to the competition shooting market, particularly for use in the IPSC/USPSA Production category.
Standing in at 202,5 mm / 7.97” in overall length and weighing in at 950 grams (2.09 lbs.) with an empty magazine, the Strike One Ergal Pro comes with a 5” SUS416 stainless steel barrel, featuring six left-handed grooves and a 1:10” twist rate.
The slide is machined out of a solid billet of chrome-moly 42CrMo4 steel, is available in a wide palette of colors and is protected against corrosion by a uniform ANC/Tenifer/QPQ surface treatment.
The slide of the Strike One Ergal Pro also features a series of prominent lightening cuts to keep overall weight to a minimum while maximizing speed of operation.
A set of front and rear serrations make the Strike One Ergal Pro easy to operate in any condition and in a variety of shooting techniques. The Strike One Ergal Pro comes from factory with a drift-adjustable front post with a 1mm high-visibility red fiber-optic insert, and a fully adjustable rear sight that can be removed and replaced with a micro red dot sight mounting interface.
The billet-machined frame is completely smooth: no railed dust cover, no checkered gripping surfaces on the grip, no gripping textures on the trigger guard or the rest of the surface.
Ad odd decision, taken to minimize grip and frame width without sacrificing overall solidity while at the same time eliminating the vast majority of factors that may cause friction or be prone to snagging when the gun is drawn or holstered: the Strike One Ergal Pro is meant for high speed operation, and it shows. The frame is fully Cerakoted, once again in a wide palette of colors, left to the customer’s decision to pick.
The Arsenal Firearms AF-1 Strike One Ergal Pro pistol is available in 9mm Luger (9x21 IMI in some markets) and .40 Smith & Wesson, and feeds through the same 13-, 15- or 17-rounds double-stack metal magazines with polymer floorplate used by the rest of the Strike One series pistols.
The magazine well is beveled to speed up reloading and release, and the release catch is of the type dubbed the “Model 2021” by the Arsenal Firearms company: ambidextrous from factory, elongated, and checkered.
Not much else is changed from the other variants of the design: the slide stop release lever is the same found on the other versions of the Strike One, but the factory polymer guide rod for the captive return spring has been replaced with a sturdier steel rod.
Other features of the Strike One Ergal Pro include a black flat-face competition trigger and a standard 1,5 kg / 3.3 lbs trigger pull.
Customers, however, may choose between a plethora of other triggers available, including the lighter and shorter Match Pro trigger and the cutting-edge Extreme trigger – both purely competition-oriented.
The Arsenal Firearms AF-1 Strike One Ergal Pro pistol is already available in Europe at a manufacturer’s suggested retail price of 1990,00€, which is $1,735.94 at the current exchange rate; but “the fastest, most accurate pistol on the planet” – as the Company calls it – is a custom-grade, custom-made version, and deserves every penny.
Arsenal Firearms Strike One Ergal Pro: the All-Italian, All-Metal Production pistol!