Which came first, police P6 or commercial P225? I have been reading that the P6 was based on the P225 when I thought it was the other way 'round.

AFAIK, they were both introduced at the same time, with only minor differences between them.

Very close, but I'll say the P6 comes first, as it was born out of the W. German government's asking Walther (P5), SIG (P6) and HK (P7) at the time to come up with the new police pistol.

quote:

Originally posted by 12131:
Very close, but I'll say the P6 comes first, as it was born out of the W. German government's asking Walther (P5), SIG (P6) and HK (P7) at the time to come up with the new police pistol.

This is my understanding. They may have called it the P225 internally at the time though, so there may be some confusion. But as far as the commercial P225, it was introduced after the P6.

SIG-Sauer submitted the P230 in 9x18mm in the 1974 trials and was adopted by some police agencies along with the Walther PP Super in the same caliber. At the same time, the West German Border Police adopted the 9x19mm Walther P4.

Vetter shows the first P225 prototype as 1975, and it is designated as a P225, with the P6 designation coming along when the pistol was adopted for use along with the Walther P5 and the H&K P7. These pistols, along with a now-forgotten Mauser entry, were tested in the second round of police pistol trials in 1976. I've no doubt that SIG-Sauer saw the handwriting on the wall in 1974, that the P230 and PP Super in 9x18mm were merely interim solutions, and therefore were working on the P225 well before the P6 designation was applied to the pistol.


SIG-Sauer prototype, serial number 85930, manufactured in 1976 and marked P225. The slide has the early-type P220 pinched-nose slide construction and appears also to have the P220 non-rebounding hammer lockwork.

Many thanks!

Well, that is interesting, and something I did not know until today!

What year did the first production P6 get built?

1978 IIRC

Wow, mine is date stamped 03/79, so it's a pretty early one.

OTD might be able to nail some of this down a bit better, next time he's around.

There is not much more to say about it. There is no evolution between the P225 and the P6. P225 is the SIG factory designation, P6 is the German police catalog number.

The 85921 pistol was manufactured in the same version. There are at least 10 test pistols for the trials in Germany.

The P230 in 9 x 18 is an extensive development concept in which the aim was to achieve maximum performance with the bolt opening by adopting Mann's ideas for of a friction delay. However, its appearance was too late and therefore did not play a major role.

The Walther HSP was developed by the same person (Walter Ludwig) who developed the SIGSauer P220 and the Walther P88. However, the gun quickly lost attention because the level of development was not sufficient.

The P6 is a favorite.

When was the Swiss P-225 police pistol adopted? Any differences between the German Police P-6 and Swiss police P-225?

I think the biggest difference between the Swiss model and the P6 is the magazine release. The Swiss model has the heel release mechanism, whereas the P6 has the standard button. Other than that, I think it’s just the markings and the hammer (the P6 has that drop indicator).