Umarex P2P HDP 50 Compact Less Lethal Defensive Pistol

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The Umarex P2P HDP 50 Compact .50-caliber defensive pistol is a less lethal alternative to deadly force in certain defensive situations. P2P stands for Prepared to Protect. Under certain circumstances, the HDP 50 Compact can be the ideal self-defense tool. The HDP 50 Compact is a handgun-shaped semiautomatic repeater that launches .50-caliber balls. Payload options include solid rubber and powder balls for training as well as pepper defense loads for discouraging miscreants. The gun is powered by a standard 8-gram CO2 cartridge. The CO2 cartridge lies dormant in the grip of the pistol until needed. When called upon, the operator strikes the Quick Pierce knob on the bottom of the grip to puncture the cartridge and pressurize the weapon. The HDP 50 Compact then offers four rounds that are instantly available. Like a Glock, the weapon’s sole external safety is built into the trigger face, so you need not fret with switches in a crisis. The practical applications of this unique defensive tool are indeed thought-provoking.

It Was Dark and Stormy Night…

And Suzy Daniels had the munchies. Suzy was five foot four, athletic, and cute. She had participated in competitive cheer in high school. However, now that she was in college she focused on school. She was in her third year studying mechanical engineering, and she had a Materials Science final in the morning. It was nearly midnight when she perused the state of her kitchen cabinets and realized that drastic action was required. Her two roommates were going abroad for the summer, and Suzy was leaving for home as soon as she finished her Materials test. There was no food left in the house. The Quik-E-Mart was less than two miles away. Suzy’s parents, like most old people in their forties, were diagnosably paranoid. They had warned her never to go out alone after dark, but her two roomies were sound asleep. After a moment’s thought, she grabbed her phone and car keys and slipped out 
quietly.

The parking lot at the Quik-E-Mart was well-maintained and clean. There was an old beater car parked on the dark side of the building, but Suzy otherwise had the place to herself. As she rounded the hood of her car she saw a sketchy-looking guy leaning against the beater with his arms folded. His eyes followed her as she walked. He gave her the creeps. She settled on a burrito and nuked it for 90 seconds before paying the cashier, an Indian man named Sandeep with whom she was on a first name basis. She had some Gatorade at home. Suzy flashed Sandeep a smile and pushed through the door. Suzy had forgotten about Sketchy Man. As she climbed into her car, he began strolling her way. She fumbled with her keys, inadvertently dropping them to the floor. He was now right outside the passenger window.

Suzy opened the center console and retrieved the orange plastic pistol her dad had put there three years before. She slapped the base of the gun, and it responded with a quick satisfying pop. Then the passenger side window unexpectedly exploded. In an instant, Sketchy Man was leaning inside the now-shattered window groping for the door lock. Without a whole lot of conscious thought, Suzy reflexively raised the gun and shot the man four times in the face at a slant range of three feet. The inside of the car was instantly full of caustic pepper powder. It burned Suzy’s nose and eyes and caused her to cough. However, that was nothing compared to Sketchy Man.

The shock of being shot in the face with four .50-caliber pepper balls caused him to gasp reflexively. In so doing he drew a vile cloud of caustic pepper powder deep into his lungs. He fell onto the ground outside Suzy’s car gasping and gagging, snot now running down to his belly. Taking advantage of the moment, Suzy retrieved her keys and tore backwards out of the parking space, backing over Sketchy Man’s left ankle in the process. As she pulled out of the parking lot she rolled down her windows to help clear the air and retrieved her cell phone. By the time she circled the block the police cruiser had arrived. Sandeep was standing outside with his own phone. They needn’t have hurried. Sketchy Man was done. He rocked back and forth rhythmically groaning while clutching his shattered limb. A battered hammer sat on the ground beside him. Suzy watched as the cops cuffed Sketchy Man and then got out to make her statement. Maybe her ancient dad wasn’t so lame after all…

Tactical Considerations

Were I to face off against Sketchy Man in a dark parking lot outside the Quik-E-Mart at midnight I would ideally be packing a top-flight micro-compact 9mm pistol from a reputable manufacturer with at least a dozen 147-grain jacketed hollowpoint rounds on tap. If Sketchy Man broke out my side window to get at something inside my car I’d at least make him earn it. However, what if you live someplace where you cannot have a gun? Leftists run the American education system, and most Leftists fear and hate guns. They decree that college campuses will be gun-free zones and expect via magical thinking that the Bad Guys will somehow inexplicably care. The ones who lose in that equation are the Suzy Daniels of the world.

My kids went to college far away. I raised them. They could run a handgun, black rifle, combat shotgun, and submachine gun nearly as well as their old man when they left home. However, none of that matters if you live someplace where the Good Guys cannot have guns. In each case, I had to find them some less-lethal form of self-defense that would pass muster with a campus cop during a random traffic stop. A Taser is an option, but they can fail if not properly maintained. It also only works if you connect with the electrodes and your opponent isn’t already jacked up on something distracting. A stun gun requires physical contact with an assailant, which seems a suboptimal solution. Various gas and spray devices are certainly better than nothing. A can of wasp spray does not arouse attention in any of the fifty states. When fired into the eyes that vile stuff will make you get religion. However, we can still do better. That’s where the P2P HDP 50 Compact comes in.

Technical Details

The HDP 50 Compact looks sort-of like a pistol but not really. It really looks more like a big water gun. The grip is black, while the rest is bright blaze orange. You’d have to be blind to mistake this thing for a live weapon in decent light. Think of the basic mechanism like a ruggedized paintball gun. The HDP 50 Compact is not designed to fire paintballs. In fact, shooting paintballs through the gun will void the warranty. However, the concept remains the same. Pull down on the trigger guard to load the tubular magazine. Lock the spring-loaded follower to the rear and drop in four balls. Release the follower gently and then snap the trigger guard in place. Load up a CO2 cartridge in the grip using the included Allen wrench, and the gun is prepped for use. So long as it is kept dry, the weapon should remain effective for years.

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To fire the gun you first slap upward on the base of the grip. This activates the Quick Pierce mechanism and powers up the weapon. A little peg like a loaded chamber indicator protrudes out of the back of the gun when it is armed. The sights consist of a basic trough running along what would be the slide on a more conventional weapon. There are no external reciprocating parts. The sole safety is built into the trigger face like that of a Glock. Keep your trigger finger clear, and the gun is safe. Touch the trigger, and it is ready to go. The HDP 50 Compact carries four rounds onboard and will cycle through them as fast as you pull the trigger. The barrel is steel and smoothbore. The HDP 50 Compact offers fine combat accuracy out as far as you might reasonably wish to employ it. If the Bad Guy is more than a dozen or so meters distant you should probably just run away.

Practical Tactical

The hard plastic balls are designed to sting, a lot. The solid rubber sort will readily punch through light cardboard. I don’t love you guys enough to let somebody shoot me with one, but I do think it would be decidedly unpleasant. However, if somebody is after my wife or child I really want something more than decidedly unpleasant. That’s where the pepper balls come in. The HDP 50 Compact comes with hard rubber training balls as well as a tube of pepper balls for live defensive use. The rubber training balls are all black. The live pepper balls are red on one side and white on the other. Optional powder balls are also used for training. They burst into a harmless cloud similar to the pepper balls. Powder balls are half white and half blue and are charged with baby powder. No kidding, when fired they smell like babies. You’d have to be grievously colorblind to get the two mixed up.

With a little practice I could get the HDP 50 Compact into action almost as quickly as I might a live weapon. Slapping the base of the grip during presentation takes a little practice, but it isn’t hard. Out to about ten meters the gun shot as well as a typical subcompact defensive pistol. The gun is functionally recoilless and makes very little noise. Landing four rounds center of mass at across-the-room distances was no great chore. I found that the powder balls burst reliably against anything of substance and produced a generous cloud of dust. The live pepper rounds perform similarly.

I wasn’t willing to let anybody shoot me, but I did stand next to my Big Rubber Man (a realistic man-sized target from RubberDummies.com) and let a friend shoot him with a live pepper round. Holy snap. This well and truly sucks. I had snot streaming down my face and was crying like a teenage girl watching Old Yeller for the first time. One round up close buys you a little time. Several to the face and you can wander off at a leisurely pace. No kidding, up until that moment I had forgotten how horrible the gas chamber was at Fort Riley, Kansas, back when I was first learning how to be a soldier. Standing there weeping alongside the Big Rubber Man suddenly brought all of those dark suppressed memories back. That stuff is just miserable.

Pros and Cons

On the plus side, the HDP 50 Compact is probably not going to kill anybody. In a non-permissive environment, you’d have a much easier time talking yourself out of jail time if you got caught with this thing than a live weapon. In many to most locales the P2P is perfectly legal to own and carry. Obviously check local laws, but the fact that it isn’t a gun is its greatest strength. The HDP 50 Compact is the ideal tool for college students or those whose constitutions will not allow them to pack lethal iron. The down side is that the HDP 50 Compact is fairly bulky. It rides better in the glove box of your car than it might underneath shorts and a t-shirt. Additionally, the pistol grip was a bit small for my big monkey mitts. However, it would likely fit a young lady or student’s hands perfectly. That is obviously the target audience. Remembering to slap the bottom of the gun on presentation has to be practiced. In a real-deal life-or-death situation you will likely only remember to do that if you’ve rehearsed it. However, shooting the HDP 50 Compact is fun, and the supplies are cheap. If loaded with powder balls the HDP 50 Compact makes a fine training tool. The trigger is a bit longer and creepier than that of your favorite Glock, but if you ever have cause to use it for real you will never notice that.

Had the Umarex HDP 50 Compact been available when I sent my kids off to college they all would have left with one. At $119.99 including a starter batch of both training and operational ammo, the HDP 50 Compact isn’t onerously expensive. It’s not nearly as effective as your favorite Glock or SIG, but the HDP 50 Compact is infinitely preferable to foul language and pleading. It is the tool that will allow you to break contact or buy precious time to summon help. In that niche it is invaluable.

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