Posted 9/06/2021
The Beretta Px4 Storm is one of the smoothest operating handguns offered in the defensive handgun arena. So many more guns have been offered in that market segment since the Px4 Storm made its debut, including more by Beretta, that sometimes the Px4 gets lost in the mix. That’s a shame. Offered in full-size, compact and sub-compact versions, there is something for every need. Mine is the full-size version, which I find a delightful concealed carry gun. Before I get too far into the details, I want to tell you about the Storm’s older cousin, the Cougar.
The Cougar 8000 was a Beretta product introduced in 1994 as a smaller alternative to the Beretta 92. When Beretta acquired Stoeger through its Benelli subsidiary, production of the Cougar, along with all the dies and tooling, was transferred to Stoeger. Essentially the Beretta Cougar and the Stoeger Cougar are the same product. It’s a shame it’s no longer manufactured as it is truly a fine pistol.
My Cougar, acquired in 2009, represents my transition from revolvers to semi-automatic handguns. It was the first semi-automatic pistol I bought. I can’t call it mine anymore because when I brought it home, my youngest son, who was also looking for a new handgun, announced that was the gun he wanted. He put the money in my hand to reimburse me for the cost of the Cougar, and I was sent back to the store to get another gun. That is why I have the Px4. The Cougar has remained in the family, and I’ve enjoyed shooting it on more than a few occasions.
There is so much about the two guns that is similar, although the Cougar is an all-steel gun while the Storm has a polymer frame. Cougar and Storm are what we call them around the house. I hope you don’t mind if I forgo trying to keep the naming convention right for the rest of this article and just refer to them using those titles.
The Storm is still in production and is offered in nine different configurations: Px4 Storm Compact Carry, Px4 Compact FDE, Px4 Compact Grey, Px4 Storm Carry, Px4 Storm Compact, Px4 Storm Full, Px4 Storm SubCompact, Px4 Storm SD Type F, Px4 Storm Inox. Each one can be purchased as a Type C, Type D, Type F or Type G, but are primarily offered in the civilian market as Type F. Type C is a single-action only pistol. The C stands for “Constant Action” — the spurless hammer is in half-cocked position. There is no decocker and no safety. This configuration is primarily sold into the police market. Type D is double-action-only, with a spurless hammer, no decocker and no safety. The popular Type F is familiar to most of us. It is an SA/DA gun with a decocker and manual safety. Type G is SA/DA with the safety feature removed so that the safety lever works only as a decocker. Somewhere along the way my Px4 Storm F was converted to a Type G. I’m okay with that because I rarely use the safety on an SA/DA gun.
The Px4 Storm SD .45 ACP semi-auto pistol was developed to meet the very demanding requirements issued by the US Special Forces Command (SOCOM) for their Joint Combat Pistol. They called for superior weather resistance, extended threaded barrel, dark earth frame, tactical case and additional accessories. Beretta answered the call successfully by redesigning the Storm’s internal components to meet and exceed all these requirements. The result is a pistol that satisfies not only SOCOM’s requirements, but the most demanding shooter looking for the absolute best and most reliable for personal defense, competition or carry. All of the Px4 pistols have been designed to meet or exceed NATO requirements and have been reported to have fired over 150,000 rounds with zero failures.
While the compact and subcompact models are very popular, I like my full-size model and find it comfortable to shoot and carry. Size wise it is 7.5″ long, 5.5″ high, 1.22″ wide and weighs 28 oz. The barrel is 4″ long. The Beretta website stretches these measurements a bit. Maybe my gun has shrunk over the years, but I’m giving you exactly what the ruler says. I think it’s probably more an issue of translating from metric to US measurements.
The Cougar is 5.5″ tall, 7″ long and 1.3″ wide. The barrel is 3.5″ long. This one weighs at 30.25 oz. because it’s an all-steel gun. As you can tell, these two guns are very similar in size and their measurements are typical of a mid-size carry gun. The heft is comfortable in my hands and not at all uncomfortable to carry in a good IWB holster. The slide is rounded everywhere there’s an edge, pronouncedly so on the top edges. Mounted on the slide are Tritium night sights. I honestly don’t remember if the gun came that way or if it’s something we added later. There are serrations on the flat part of the slide, which is the lower half, just above the rather hefty slide lock lever. On the back of the slide is an ambidextrous lever that doubles as a safety and a decocker. The safety totally disables the hammer and trigger.
The mag release button is in the customary place behind the trigger. Pressing it results in an aggressive drop of the magazine. The magazine is a 15-rounder, steel and strongly made. The grip frame is very comfortable to me. Being an all-steel gun, there’s no swapping of backstraps for fit. The gun came with a set of rubber grips. I gave my son a set of wooden grips for the Cougar for his birthday one year and that’s what the gun is now wearing. Vertical lines on the front strap and backstrap assist with grip purchase. In case you’re wondering, backstrap is one word, but front strap isn’t.
The trigger on the Cougar is a curved affair that sits forward. In DA mode it starts working with no slack. The pressure is steady for about .75″ and then you get a crisp, clean 9 lb. break. Follow-up shots in SA mode require .25″ take-up before breaking at an average 5.1 lbs. Tactile reset comes when the trigger is almost all the way forward.
One of the unique features of the Cougar, shared with the Beretta Px4 Storm, is the barrel operating system. While the Cougar and Storm are locked breech operating semi-automatic pistols, the way the barrel locks up is different. There is a locking block the recoil spring and rod go through. This block has a pin on it that fits inside a groove on the portion of the barrel that supports the “lock-up.” This groove wraps around the barrel so the pin travels in a rotational manner around approximately ¼ of the barrel when the gun is fired. This occurs at the start of the cycle to eject the just-fired cartridge and load another one. The end result of this action is that the first ¼ of the recoil cycle is rotational and does not present any kind of “kick” to the shooter. Does the Cougar have recoil? Yes, but it is diminished somewhat by the unique operating system.
Disassembly for cleaning or other maintenance is slightly different with this kind of barrel/recoil spring combo, but not at all complicated. After dropping the magazine, locking the slide back and checking to ensure the chamber is empty, there is a lever on the left side of the frame just above the front of the trigger guard. The lever has a locking pin which is released by pushing a button on the right side of the frame. Once this is done, the lever can be rotated clockwise a ¼ turn. Release the slide lock and the slide will come off the front. No trigger pull required. The recoil spring and locking block can be lifted off the barrel, the barrel removed and everything about cleaning, lubricating and reassembling the gun is standard, except you have to maneuver the locking block over the barrel to get the pin into the groove and that requires a slight compression of the recoil spring. It’s not much different than the way you have to compress the recoil spring on any semi-automatic to get it to drop into place on the barrel.
Everything I just described for the Cougar is true also of the Storm with two exceptions. Takedown on the Storm is done by pulling down two tabs on the frame just ahead and above the trigger guard, similar to takedown on a Glock. Only on the Storm no trigger pull is required before removing the slide. The difference is the grips. The Storm comes with interchangeable backstraps. I’m using the medium size on my gun.
is typical of the Storm’s performance at 10 yards.
If you don’t have your mid-size carry gun and can find one, the Px4 STORM will not disappoint you. I think any size would work fine. Problem now might be availability, but since it’s an older gun there should be some on the auction sites. The same is true of the Cougar. Just remember when looking at the Stoeger STR-9, it’s not the first mid-size 9mm Stoeger has brought to market.
David Freeman 