Stoeger Luger .22 Semiautomatic Pistol: Classic Plinking Fun

As a teen I had the opportunity to fire many of the newest handguns that my father had purchased, and a piece I remember well was the Stoeger Luger .22 semiautomatic. It was traded off long ago, but recently I was able to obtain an original example in decent condition.

The Stoeger Luger is an American-made .22 styled after the original German Luger. During the time period the Stoeger was introduced, a similar pistol was imported by Erma, but they are not the same gun.

Stoeger owned rights to the Luger name in America and introduced its .22 pistol in 1969. It is a straight blowback with a nicely designed toggle that recoils with the bolt. While the P 08 9mm actually uses the toggle for locking and unlocking, the Stoeger Luger .22 uses a heavy bolt, and its sheet-metal toggle is for looks. And it looks pretty good.

The majority of these pistols featured a 4.5-inch barrel. A very few were manufactured with a 5.5-inch barrel, but I have seen only one. Barrels are steel with a good-looking blue finish.

Aluminum Frame

The frame is aluminum, with a grip angle close to the original Luger. The anodizing in used examples seems to have held up well. The pistol features the stylized Stoeger emblem on the receiver and a nicely cut “Luger” inside a wreath motif on the receiver. Plain wood grips are nicely fitted and stained.

Based on legend and references, Stoeger made a Luger with a left-hand safety. While the safety is marked “F” and “S” for Fire and Safe on both sides, mine is a right-hand safety version with a standard push-button magazine release. The trigger action isn’t bad at all, breaking at four pounds on my used gun.

Magazines are metal types and seem to have held up well over the years. Occasionally spare magazines are seen at a fair price on eBay or GunBroker. Oddly enough my example features a magazine with a loading button to depress the follower on the right side of the magazine instead of the usual left. I cannot recall how the original was set up, but I think I would have noticed this.

By 1979 sales were low, and the original was discontinued. Reports of a steel-frame version being manufactured until 1985 persist. Stoeger doesn’t have records, and I have never seen even an image of a steel-frame gun or a similarly rumored target version.

Impressions

My pistol looks nice, but the safety lever doesn’t function. While the Stoeger Luger has had a bad reputation in terms of reliability, mine ran through several magazines without a hitch. It is fun to watch that toggle move quickly as you empty a 10-round magazine. I fired 150 cartridges without cleaning or lubricating the pistol.

Accuracy is pretty fair. It isn’t a Ruger Standard Model, but it isn’t a dog either. I would not purchase the gun as a shooter or for small game hunting; there are better and less expensive modern guns.

My sample was purchased for $200. I spotted one at Guns America for $395 as of this writing. I’ve seen others for just a little more with an original box and used examples in good condition for $250. The Stoeger .22 Luger is a fun piece and affordable collectible, and a pleasant diversion as a plinker.

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