Oops, mods, please move this post into the EAA/Tanfoglio thread.

The EA 380 is sort of a Beretta 70 clone, made by Tanfoglio, if memory serves.  It is blowback, open barrel, steel frame and slide, wood grips, single stack, single action only, 7 + 1.  

This is not a small 380, nor is it light, especially when compared to something like the LCP.  On the other hand it has milder, more pleasant recoil than a Sig 230, PPK, LCP, Llama and some other 380s.

What this gun does very well is that it is very easy to shoot accurately and it is pleasant to shoot.  It is not a defensive pistol, reason is that it has a frame mounted safety, a safety on the slide, a partial cock safety and a magazine disconnect.  It gets worse, the slide mounted safety is engaged by doing the normal 1911 sweep motion, it is also engaged accidently if your thumb slips off the hammer during cocking the hammer.  Chances of this pistol actually firing, when needed in a panic situation, are far less than 100%.   So that makes it a range toy, with light reloads it would be excellent for this purpose.  On the other hand, spent 380 brass is very hard to find, at least for me.  

Build quality was good, this gun was not the pretty polished and blued version, but was the more squared version with a dull, sort of parkerized finish, it has some sharp edges.  The squarish, dull finish sights gave a better sight picture than those on the polished, blued version give.  Reliability was 100%, for the 25 or so rounds I fired through it.

I shot a Llama, 1911 styled 380 for comparison.  Though it appears to have a locked breech, the Llamas recoil was worse and it had very unpleasant, painful trigger slap.  My shooting results were very good with the Tanfoglio, much better than with the Llama.  I also shot a Ruger LCP 380 for comparison, the LCP is much smaller and lighter, recoil was more than with the EA 380 but not a lot more.  The EA was the easiest to hit with of the three 380s, probably because of the very good single action trigger pull.



Conclusion: nice shooting gun that I like a lot, but don't have much use for.

I've got 2 Sars eaa's in 9mm, and for an inexpensive gun they are absolutely a pleasure to shoot and have never jammed.