HiPoint 995 9mm Carbine

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Ah farmers. I was raised adjacent to a dairy farm, and am very familiar with what we in CNY call 'a barn gun'. Barn guns are (in my experience) universally in horrible condition, and live rough lives of neglect and hard service. Our dear neighbor, whom we affectionately call The Farmer, brought me their current barn gun, and it is far and away in the best condition of any such gun I have ever seen.

This particular barn gun is his son's HiPoint 995 TS, a handy little 9mm carbine that works quite well. The gun pointed naturally, and had a tough but serviceable trigger. 
My task was to take this little 995 and see if I could find some adequate replacements for the variety of missing screws, and see if I could tackle the seemingly growing rust problem. Missing were the rear sight screw, both front sight screws (we were able to find the front sight) and a few bits that the picatinny rail mounts to inside the dust cover. 

before cold blue

The rust was superficial, but fairly prolific. I contemplated how best to tackle the refinish, and thought about hitting the receiver cover with a rattle can of high temperature BBQ paint, but instead thought I would try to preserve some of the existing finish, and set out to cold blue the cover to match.

This way, I wouldn't have to strip off the remaining blue, and could preserve at least some of the gun's original look.

The bluing on the 995 was quite thin, and despite the gun's robust design, the 'finishing work' left much to be desired. I will say the stock is surprisingly ergonomic though, and I see why people grow so fond of these little shooters.

My spare parts bin netted me a variety of functional screws, the thread pitch of which I have no idea. The carbine really isn't bad to disassemble, though there are a few versions of it floating around- and the pins on the receiver plate differ between vintages. I believe this is the newer style cover- but frankly I am not certain.

To prep the surface for cold blue, I sprayed it down with WD-40, and went at it fairly aggressively with 0000 steel wool. Once all the rust was removed, I polished with a paper towel and rinsed well. I then polished again with a paper towel, rinsed one more time, and dried the cover.

after cold blue was applied

I applied a liberal amount of Birchwood Casey Cold blue, and polished between coats with steel wool, rinsing each time. I did 4 coats with 1 minute of bluing each, and got a fairly even coating when everything was all said and done. Frankly I was pretty pleased with how the gun came out.

I contemplated removing the front and rear sight and throwing on some spare magpul flip-up knock-offs I have, but I know they would survive in the harsh farming climate for all of a week before being re-appropriated as a hammer, wrench, or impromptu nail backer.

Instead, I did my best to replace all the missing screws, and lock-tite them in place to hopefully extend their life span from several months to several years. I urged The Farmer to order some spare magazines, as I am

after cold blue was applied

willing to bet a dollar that too will go missing before the spring thaw.

Overall these little guns are very easy to work on, and very fun to shoot. Adjustments with the repaired sights showed respectable accuracy at 25 yards, and is both minute of coyote and minute of pigeon easily to 50 or so yards. Possible further, but we didn't have a chance to shoot it at distance.

I was impressed at how good the sight picture was with the stock sights, and actually liked having the charging handle on the left. As mentioned, the trigger was rough- but really was usable in a carbine. If it were a pistol, it would definitely need work- however you can be a little more forgiving in a rifle format.

Realistically, I'd give 2 c-notes for one of these guns in good condition. Gunbroker has a number of these for sale at impressively high price gouging prices, and Buds is sold out - but frankly I just don't see this as anything more than a 200 dollar gun at best.

If one were looking for a PCC for more money than that, I would take a hard look at MechTech carbines. If one had more money to spend than that, then I would just build a PCC rifle on an AR or similar platform; or maybe try to track down an older ruger or marlin carbine.

All in all, a good better gun that seems reliable and is fun to shoot, but not one I would really go out of my way to track down or own. The finish is just too rough, with too marginal a trigger pull. That being said, the 45acp HiPoint would definitely catch my attention more than the 9mm version. We can argue PCC ballistics, and the 9mm does benefit greatly from the 16in tube (more so than the 45) but I guess if the difference is between a 9 shot or 10 shot gun, I would just assume have a larger round and 1 less on tap than deal with a smaller (albeit flatter shooting) round.