Star PD

The pistol in question is a handgun I have considerable personal experience with. I was an avid reader in school and first saw the Star Model PD on the cover of Guns and Ammo in 1975. A few years later I took an oath as a peace officer. I owned a Star PD chambered in 45 ACP by then. It was among a very few handguns I owned and at the time each had a specific duty. The Star was a life saver with its reliability, easy shooting, and a hardhitting cartridge. Jeff Cooper hit the nail on the head in his review.

He felt the pistol should be carried much and fired little. A 45 ACP handgun weighing 25 ounces could be controlled adequately for close range personal defense but it was not intended for long firing sessions. The Star PD was not expensive but was feed reliable from the factory. The pistol fed most any type of wide mouth hollow point even though many factory loads of the time were not well designed for feed reliability.

The answer if you wished to carry these loads in a Colt 1911 was to polish the feed ramp, a job commonly known as throating. Many pistols were ruined by gouging into the feed ramp with Dremel tools, especially those pistols with aluminum frame ramps. On aside note many of these factory 45 ACP loads threw standard load procedure to the wind. These cartridges normally demand an overall length of 1.250" for feed reliability.

A short open mouth hollow point was counter productive even when the pistol featured the proper 1/32" gap between the two halves of the feed ramp. Some expanded well but did not feed well. Others only expanded if they hit a brick wall. I experienced a critical under-penetration with the Speer 200 grain Gold Dot, at the time the darling of the popular press. It expanded to 0.83 when dug out, sure, but stopped in heavy bone and mus- Far On the right is an original Star PD magazine.

cle after four inches of penetration. The second necessary shot met less resistance. Many of us carried 230 grain hardball and I believe it is still a viable defense loading. The Star PD was manufactured from 1975 to 1990. It was difficult to Star PD Manufacturer Star Echeverria Eibar, Spain Type Locked breech single action Caliber 45 ACP Barrel Length 3.94 inches Weight 25 ounces Magazine 6 rounds find for some time and then became widely available by 1979 when I purchased my pistol.

The company, Star Bonifacio Echeverria SA, was headquartered in Spain. The pistol is basically a modified 1911 with the grip safety deleted. The pistol fea- Far tures a cocked-and-locked type carry with a positive slide lock safety and bears much resemblance to the Browning High Power in design. The PD retains the barrel bushing of the 1911, albeit in much modified form. The Star PD features proprietary six-round magazines and does not accept 1911 magazines.

Originally supplied with a fully adjustable rear sight, later versions featured fixed sights more suitable for a concealed carry handgun. The frame is aluminum, making the pistol light. While longevity is another matter, although it may be argued the pistol served its purpose as a lightweight carry gun not intended to be fired often, the Star PD proved reliable in service. Proof the gun and carry it was the rule. I handloaded my own ammunition for decades and this allowed a great deal of practice for a pittance.

The Star PD featured a well-designed recoil rod and spring that helped control the 25 ounce pistol’s recoil. There is a plastic buffer as part of the design. At the time, the PD’s recoil system life was five hundred rounds for the buffer itself and perhaps one thousand rounds for the recoil assembly. Replacements were readily available. As of this writing, I have found several recoil assemblies and buffers for sale at a reasonable price.

The buffer would begin to throw off shavings near the end of its service life ending up in the action. At this point the buf-

fer must be replaced whatever the round count. I have examined a Star PD that had the appearance of a pistol that was fired a great deal. The owner had fired some 1,500 rounds over a period of two years, which is not a great deal of practice for modern shooters. He had never checked the recoil spring and guide. The slide was quite stiff on the frame when I stripped the pistol for inspection as the recoil spring assembly had completely eaten away the recoil buffer with a few shards of plastic was all that remained.

The recoil guide assembly had worn a trough in the aluminum frame of perhaps 0.015" in depth. Yet, the pistol still functioned. Anew guide rod and buffer assembly was ordered and the pistol was sent back into service, with a warning to perhaps partially retire the pistol to less rigid duty—the owner had certainly gotten the measure of the piece by this time. The question of soft Basque steel has never been answered to my satisfaction.

A mentor remarked that the steel was fine but that the pistols were seldom heat treated properly. American Gunsmith Reader Services 1.

This was a rarity when introduced. He heat treated both Star and Llama self loading pistols with good results. The small parts take a beating in any compact handgun with a big cartridge and the Star PD is no exception. Every decade or so it was announced that the Spanish pistols were being built of good quality steel. On the other hand, I have examined vintage Astra 400 handguns that have the appearance of both fine material and craftsmanship. The Ruby and Llama are another matter!

As for the Star PD, inspecting the pistol isn’t difficult and it takes down simply. First, remove the magazine and clear the chamber. With the magazine set aside, retract the slide and lock to the rear using the slide lock. You may then use the take down slot by pressing the slide to the rear and locking the thumb safety into the slide. Press the slide stop out right to left as seen from the rear. Disengage the slide lock thumb safety and control the slide as it is run forward. Turn the slide assembly upside down.

A bit of pressure frees the recoil spring guide. A word of caution: the early model Star PD featured a two-piece guide rod that screwed together while later pistols differ and do not take the same type of plastic buffer. Regardless, I simply press the buffer off and replace it by pressing anew recoil buffer onto the guide rod. The trigger action is simple enough and never seems to give trouble.

Trigger compression on my example was a relatively smooth 7.0 pounds, average for the PD and common for single action pistols of the era. The pistol uses a simple trigger bar to trip the sear. I don’t see any way to easily address the trigger pull and I would not on old steel and especially on a Star brand handgun. If the trigger bar had an obvious burr where it met the sear, perhaps, but otherwise leave well enough alone and let the pistol wear in.

Any Star pistols likely to come into the shop are as well worn as they are likely to become. This pistol was fired with 20 rounds of Black Hills 230 grain FMJ ammunition and proved reliable. Fifteen-yard five-round groups of three inches were average. AG