Beretta 21 Bobcat Reviews

by **vezpa** » Mon Apr 26, 2010 2:20 am

I have tried about 10 kinds of ammo in my .22 bobcat over the past 2 weeks since I bought the gun. I have found the best ammo to use is NOT the stingers but Remington 22 Golden Bullet. This works out great because you can get this stuff anywhere and Wal-Mart has them for $5.99/box of 100. I strongly recommend staying away from Hollow point ammunition as they frequently get jammed on the ramp. I tried the white box Winchester ammo and the second bullet jammed followed by at least 7 others before I threw the rest of the box in the garbage. It was insane. Loaded more Golden Bullets and back to a normal gun. I like shooting smaller guns and find them more fun that big guns and I will be adding a .25 bobcat to my collection later this week, I just can't decide on whether to get the stainless version or another black one.

by **bocamoxie** » Wed May 19, 2010 9:55 am

I just purchased this 5 months ago, have not shot it yet because so many people told me I made a mistake getting it. It is not good for self defense, I'll just PISS the attacker off with a 22., they jam, the pop up barrel will jam, etc. What is the best ammo for it where it won't jam? I was told to get Stingers, now I read on this site they are not good to use, there hotter and will jam it. I have the outside box still because I am thinking of returning it to the gun shop. I am so confused. I also have a 38. Smith and Wesson which is to heavy to carry, Going back to Pepper Spray, forget all this.

by **GCX** » Wed May 19, 2010 8:29 pm

OK boca, lets get started on this. The debate on a 22 for self defense is as old as the 22 itself. I'm not sure I want to tackle it, but it really dependes on what your concerns are.

Statistics show that in a self defense stitution, a shot is fired only about 10% of the time. After drawing your gun and they know you're armed, most will give up the fight. And most low rent, hit n run street muggers wouldn't care what they were shot with.

All they know is they're shot and they don't want to get shot again. They're gonna bail.

Think of it as a "Get the hell off me" gun.

But... If you're in fear of your life because you've pissed someone off really bad and they're willing to do a death match with you, you may want more.

If you think you'll someday need to save the planet from a terrorist attack, you will need more. More than you can carry.

As for ammo, I like the CCI Stingers for carry and CCI Mini Mags for practice. I don't have any jams in my 21A with these two. I've tested several different brands and types of 22 ammo in my Bobcat and posted them here on 04/20/10 if you would like to read my results.

One member says he has had good results with Remington's Golden Bullet 22's. I haven't tried them but other Remington stuff has shot well for me so I'll take his word for it.

A 22 is an easy and fun gun to shoot. I get tired of reloading mine before I get tired of shooting it. And with the low cost of 22 ammo there is no reason not to practice enough to be able to shoot a bad guys eyes out. Good old fashion plinking is the best practice.

Almost 1000 rounds through mine so far.

by **vezpa** » Thu May 20, 2010 7:13 am

Boca

Take your Bobcat out of the box and get to the range and start shooting. The .22 is a great little gun that is both fun and inexpensive to shoot. Out of the 3 guns I own I like my little Beretta the best. I have so much fun with it I even added a Crimson Trace Laser sight to it and when I take it to the range I get compliments on how cool of a little gun it is. After owning one I will say you need to break it in and the more rounds you put through it the better it fires. The CCI Mini-Mag 22 LR HP bullets are the best I have used in this gun followed by the Remington Golden Bullet. I have fired 200 CCIs and have not had a misfire yet. They are only $7.00/100 rounds from Wal-Mart so shoot away.

I have put about 900 rounds through mine and I love the gun. I will say that after shooting 100 rounds through it that it needs to be cleaned but this is the easiest to clean gun I own and it can be taken fully apart in literally 5 seconds. The tip up barrel for the first shot along with a super-easy to use safety means you can safely carry it chambered in your pocket or purse. The safety on this gun is a feature that is non-existent on almost every other gun of the same physical size.

Keep it clean and stock some good ammo and you will have one hell of a great little pocket gun. As others have said nobody wants to have a gun of any size pulled on them so in 99% of any self-defense situation this gun will be just fine. You can fire off 7 rounds in seconds. You did not make a mistake, you bought a fun gun. Don't worry about what others say, go try it out for yourself.

Good Luck !

by **GCX** » Thu May 20, 2010 9:15 pm

Hey vez. I know what you mean about the compliments. Every time I go to the range to shoot anything I always have my Bobcat with me and shoot a few mags through it while I'm there. OK, a lot of mags. More times than not someone will ask about it and I've let a couple of people shoot it. Putting 7 shots on target in 2-3 seconds makes them curious.

Have you got that .25 yet?

by **jobpatto** » Fri May 21, 2010 6:25 pm

I had the .25 Bobcat because I thought a center fire round would be more reliable. It was not and I wish I had gotten the .22. I put 700 rounds through it and it experienced a 2%-3% failure rate, although I never had a misfire with the first two magazines on a clean gun. Using 50-100 rounds/session, the failure rate would increase when it got dirtier. It did decrease with break in as well. For what it is worth, nearly all failures were FTE/"stove-piping".

As for defense, I agree with some of the other posts. If you did have to fire on someone, especially if the attacker didn't have a higher caliber round to compare the sound with at the time, it is surprisingly loud and creates a significant muzzle flash at night. The lethality may be questionable but the deterrent factor is plenty high. I can't imagine anyone in their right mind that would want to advance on you if being fired at. If it is the first gun you fire at a range and people haven't heard anything else fired yet, they always guessed it was a larger caliber.

All of this being said, I did trade my .25 in because I found the Air-Lite 12oz S&W .357 Magnum that is bigger but only around one ounce heavier than the Bobcat. Also because I had to move from Indiana to the city of Chicago for seven years and I couldn't have any pistols in the city. I ended up trading it for a pistol-grip/top-folding stock Remmington 12awg because it was the smallest firearm that was legal to register in Chicago.

by **BudWoods** » Sat Aug 07, 2010 10:27 am

I won this [in .22LR] at a handgun competition years ago. It's not accurate with any ammo. I tried so I just keep it loaded w/ hypervelocity HP ammo. }It's likely not hyper from a 2+" barrel though.{ This is a "scare 'em away" gun. I don't recommend this other than an emergency pocket gun or purse gun. In this category, there are many others which are as compact but much more effective.

by **Patrol** » Sun Aug 22, 2010 2:22 pm

2010 Back again, tigerwelder never did get a chance to reply to your post. They have indeed had 9mm parabellum flip tops because Ive sold them when I was a college student working at a gun store. It was made for handicap people and those who had a hard time manipulating a slide to put a round into battery. I'm telling you and i have emailed Beretta as well, if they really wanted to get in on the pocket gun craze as of late they would release a Tomcat type flip top but in the 380 acp and they "can" do it because they did it back in the early 90's with their 9mm. As for this 21A still have it in the safe. Still going strong and I have shot nothing but hot nasty CCI hypervelocity stingers out of it. Awesome true back up life saver gun. Utterly reliable.

by **Rook** » Mon Oct 25, 2010 4:41 pm

I had my first FTF with my mom's Bobcat today. I was using CCI 22 LR HP rounds. My Jetfire has handled this ammo flawlessly, but her Bobcat failed on the 5th round out of the box.

To be fair, this was the first FTF out of more than 100 rounds of various types of ammo... but even one FTF is one too many in my opinion.

by **tigwelder56** » Mon Oct 25, 2010 4:56 pm

Seems like the majority of people here have the 22 rimfire model of this pistol. I purchased the .25 acp and wasn't impressed with it's performance at all. I purchased the centerfire over the rimfire because they are more reliable. You just have to have a gun that shoots them reliably. I had alot of FTE's and usually after a box of rounds, if not earlier, I started to experience the ejection problems. It would also prevent the flip top barrel from opening. It hated to be dirty and .25 ammo is plenty of that. I ended up trading it for a Ruger Mk III Target pistol and am thrilled with it.