Bersa Thunder 380 plus review

I've always thought with a name like "Thunder" a 380 should be exceptional. Now I am not knocking the single stack Bersa's, but come on if you gonna shoot something called thunder it should be thunderous. Enter the 15 round Bersa thunder plus. I have been looking for over two years for a plus version of this PPK clone, but lack of inventory and high prices, on the few out there hiding in little gun stores kept me from making a deal. Well finally the Argentine cowboys and RSA brought another shipment to the US. These are starting to show up in 4 versions; Black on black, the cool combat version with fde on black, the ole pinky on black version, and the pistol I purchased - the all chromed version.

I ordered this from my favorite retail shipper; Buds Gun Shop. They always provide quick shipping and and good prices. This one was $343 on the day I ordered it + a $15 transfer fee. So for $358 I got my thunderous Bersa.

The pistol comes in a cheap plastic box, with one magazine, a frame lock and a manual.

The chrome finish is a satin texture with maybe a bit of copper in the mix. The hard rubber wrap around grips are pretty good for control and look ok. The magazine has good internals, an alloy follower, but the sheet metal stamping is very thin. Loading the 15th round was hard, so I loaded up this magazine and the two extras I ordered with 15 rounds (my index finger is still in pain) and let them set for 3 days. FYI one of the mags has a hitch when trying to load past the first round, I was able to force it to break free , but will be asking RSA for a replacement.

Once you master the take down it is easy-peasy to take down and reassemble. I polished both the frame and breech feed ramps, the slide ramp and lightly polished the rails. I also ended up having to sand and polish sharp edges of the lower sides of the beavertail to keep it from hurting my fleshy hand. Here are the specs:

• 3-Dot Sight System
  
  for the perfect sight picture
• Micro-Polished Bore
  
  with sharp, deep rifling for greater accuracy
• Decocker
  
  for safer concealed carry
• Integral Locking System
  
  for the ultimate in safety
• Lifetime Service Contract
  
  for original owner
• 15 Round Magazine Capacity
  
  for plenty of firepower
• Combat-Style Trigger Guard
  
  Accommodates gloves or two-handed grip

• Weight with full magazine 26.3 oz's
• Trigger pull 8lbs DA / 4.5lbs SA

The frame is an alloy but all the controls, trigger, hammer, sights and internals are steel. It has rear cocking serrations and an easy to rack slide. The slide to frame fit is tight and the extended magazine release is easy to actuate and pushed the mags out with authority. This is a blow back pistol and the mounted barrel is steel with great rifling.

Shooting impressions; As usual there is little recoil with this 380, the sight picture is decent enough. I did have to move the rear sight a bit as you can see by the hits off to the left of the sticky target. But once I got the POI down, it tore the center out at 15 yards. There is about 5/8" of travel in DA before the hammer drops, in SA there is 1/8" of travel before the break. The trigger is not mushy, but not a crisp Glock like break either. So far I have put 150 rounds of Remington UMC and PMC ball ammo with no issues. Also 30 rounds of Fiocchi Xtrema XTP hollowpoints with no problems. But as with most of my 380's Fiocchi ball ammo will not feed.

I plan on running another 100 rounds through it before it will be ready for defensive use. But overall the Thunder plus does not disappoint and is worthy of a place in my rotation. Here it is with my other compact 380 the Walther PK380. They are pretty close in size and weight and are both good pistols for the 380 crowd.