Seriously thinking about one (if I can find any) and wondering what anyone's experience with it has been?
Pat
http://10mm-firearms.com/handguns/cmmg-banshee-10mm-500-rnd-report
I've been very happy with mine. I have the 300 because that's what was in stock, but I'd have preferred the 200, as the price difference isn't worth it for ambidextrous controls, to me anyway. It has proven to be fantastically reliable...I've yet to find a load it won't shoot flawlessly. I use the optional 8oz buffer for everything...put it in for hot loads and just never took it out. In the roughly 5,000 rounds I've run through it I can only remember one malfunction, which was caused by a cartridge I'd loaded too long.
It's very accurate. Accurate enough to warrant a magnified optic, in fact. With the right load you can get 10 rounds into a nickel at 25 yards, which is as good as I can shoot without magnification. It's also a great platform for a laser sight...it's the only weapon I've ever seen fit to put a laser on, and it works really well.
Because the chamber isn't fully supported where the bolt covers the case head, full-power loads will bulge the brass beyond reuse. Underwood, Federal Bear Claw, and book-max loads of Blue Dot, Long Shot, or Power Pistol will make the brass look like a belted magnum, though I've never had a case rupture or tear...possibly due to using the 8oz buffer all the time. CMMG acknowledges the bulging issue, and if you contact them they'll send a boilerplate document telling you not to shoot ammo that bulges. But they should be upfront about it from the get-go, and they're not. None of the reviews of the Banshee mention it either, which I find to be positively dishonest.
Reduced loads that are still on the warm side will bulge the brass on occasion, but so long as they'll go through the resizer and bulge-buster they're fine to reuse. The bulging doesn't appear to tear the brass at any point the way a smile does. Due to the longer barrel, reduced loads in the Banshee usually equal full-house loads in a handgun. Depending on the powder, the Banshee can deliver another 100~180 fps over my 6" KKM barrel, though it's not across the board gains. My normal plinking load is a 200 grain blue bullet over 8.5 grains of Blue Dot for 1211 fps, which never bulges the brass.
The 30-round magazine it comes with works fine, and they're cheap if you want another one. Personally I find the weapon is MUCH better balanced with a 15-round Glock magazine, and I rarely run the 30-rounder. Every Glock 20 or 29 magazine I've ran has worked perfectly...I can only think of a single incidence when the last-round-bolt-hold-open didn't work with a Glock magazine, though CMMG cautions that it's an issue.
Now the downside... What do you do with it?
Unlike a handgun, the Banshee is so easy to hit with that at pistol distances there's not much challenge. Ok...any challenge at all. If you go out to 75~100 yards then hitting a 10" plate offhand gets a little hard, especially without a magnified optic, but at that range and beyond there are better cartridges to choose from. I can shoot a handgun every day because it's challenging. The Banshee, not so much.
Because it's a "braced pistol" it's not legal for USPSA shoots, which is about the only type of shooting it's good for. I've considered buying a second lower and registering it as a SBR so I can shoot competitions with it, but that's a lot of money, and then there's the issue of loosing all those expensive 10mm brass while running and gunning. Unlike with handguns, there's no scoring advantage for a major power factor PCC, so a 9mm PCC makes a lot more sense for competition anyway.
It's a great defensive weapon...one of the best in my experience. With a 1000 lumen light, green-light laser and EoTec holographic sight it's about as good for things that go bump in the night as you could dream up. But home-invasion robberies and carjackings are pretty uncommon here in rural Montana, where the nearest paved road is nine miles away and the nearest stoplight is another 40 miles past that, so I don't foresee needing it in that capacity on a regular basis.
That said, if you want a 10mm carbine-type-weapon, there really isn't anything else on the market that can compare. Everything else out there seems to be either extremely finicky and unreliable, or such an ergonomic disaster (Hi Point) that once the novelty wears off buyers remorse sets in hard.
If you really want one you'll likely just have to order it from CMMG at MSRP and wait a few weeks or months for delivery. Not a lot of places cary CMMG, and fewer yet cary 10mm Banshees. I found mine for $1350 before the pandemic, but I think those deals are long gone.
Great write up, now I really want one 😀
Great writeup MUSKRAT. I agree with your comments, although I haven't tried any "hot loads". I thoroughly enjoy mine and feel that the cost was worth it. I sold my TRP 6" 10mm to help fund this purchase, and I have never looked back.
I have toyed with the idea of adding a Binary Trigger.. I have the BM FOSTECH ECHO and do really enjoy a nice mag dump. ;D
Thanks all!