[nickdrak]

Just picked this up on Monday. I ordered it almost exactly 3 months ago from my local LE S&W dealer here in IL.

Production date was two weeks ago. May have been one of the first of the new LE pistols shipped since they were announced @ Shot show in January. First one I've seen other than posted on FB & IG by Brandon Wright who is a LE rep for S&W and a member of team S&W.

The new LE market pistols no longer have "CORE" or the CORE logo engraved on the slide. They are no longer listed as "CORE" pistols either. The LE guns are now "Optics Ready".

The CORE option cut out has been revised and is approximately .050" longer than that on my 2019 4.25" LE CORE. The factory spacer plates are now made of plastic instead of metal. Thankfully C&H Precision has already made a new plate for the 2020 CORE pistols: S&W PERFORMANCE CENTER® M&P®9 M2.0™ C.O.R.E. PRO SERIES® to Trijicon RMR / SRO / Holosun 407C, 407C V2, 507C, 507C V2, 508T & 508T V2 - C&H Precision Weapons

Also new is the additional forward slide serrations, and a new more pronounced slide stop lever.

I had all of the following additions on-hand and ready to install as soon as the gun arrived:

• Trijicon SRO (2.5MOA)
• C&H Precision RMR/SRO CORE plate
• APEX Poly/Curved Duty Carry Trigger Kit
• HYVE extended magazine release
• Ed Brown (Floyd's Customs) magwell

 

[Smith Shooter]

I bought exactly the same gun through GrabaGun about two weeks ago. Mine is a 5" M&P9 2.0 CORE. There is nothing specific to LE about it but it appears almost identical to yours except is has suppressor height sights instead of night sights.

Mine came with 7 adapter plates and 5 mounting screw sets so it can mount nearly any current red dot, including the Trijicon RMR/SRO dots.

 

[nickdrak]

I bought exactly the same gun through GrabaGun about two weeks ago. Mine is a 5" M&P9 2.0 CORE. There is nothing specific to LE about it but it appears almost identical to yours except is has suppressor height sights instead of night sights.

Mine came with 7 adapter plates and 5 mounting screw sets so it can mount nearly any current red dot, including the Trijicon RMR/SRO dots.

Cool. It’s not “exactly the same gun”, but still cool. Yours doesn’t have the same forward serrations as mine. Your’s has CORE engraved on the slide, mine doesn’t. Mine came with 3 magazine, yours came with 2. Yours also has a different SKU#. So similar, but not the same exact pistols.

Here’s mine on the S&W website: M&P®9 M2.0™ Optics Ready Law Enforcement Only | Smith & Wesson

 

[ToolMaker]

Very good find.

Four prior M&P40’s, 2 I still have, were “LE” models. They had reasonably good triggers for an M&P. So I never saw what the fuss was over the triggers. There were rumors the “LE” guns had better triggers. I figured that was non-sense.

That was until I decided I wanted a target gun in 9MM. I bought a 5” Performance Center Core that had a terrible trigger. It went back to S&W twice, but they wouldn’t do anything. So do “LE” guns have better triggers? Mine did.

I already put an Apex trigger in mine, but its good to know these are out there now.

 

[Smith Shooter]

Cool. It’s not “exactly the same gun”, but still cool. Yours doesn’t have the same forward serrations as mine. Your’s has CORE engraved on the slide, mine doesn’t. Mine came with 3 magazine, yours came with 2. Yours also has a different SKU#. So similar, but not the same exact pistols.

OK, "exactly the same" was a bit of an overstatement but other than the third magazine and some minor cosmetics they are functionally the same gun. The OEM trigger on mine was very crisp and creep- free but too heavy at 5-1/2 to 6 pounds. An Apex sear and striker block improved it to 3-1/2 pounds.

 

[Scott B]

Original poster, that looks like a very nice weapon....maybe a stupid question, but that plate you got is not plastic, but rather is metal, right? In a matching black finish? And is the price just for a single plate?

If you have a picture of the sight picture with the night sights that would be nice to see....how do you like the SRO? Nice large window on that one....

SB

 

[nickdrak]

Original poster, that looks like a very nice weapon....maybe a stupid question, but that plate you got is not plastic, but rather is metal, right? In a matching black finish? And is the price just for a single plate?

If you have a picture of the sight picture with the night sights that would be nice to see....how do you like the SRO? Nice large window on that one....

SB

Yes. The plate I currently have the SRO mounted on is the V1 CORE plate from C&H Precision. Hence the small gap on the front.

C&H has their new V2 CORE plate in the works for the slightly larger 2020 CORE base. The price is for just a single plate but it is a huge improvement over the factory plates.

 

[ToolMaker]

The new adapter plates are plastic? That's not going to work.

 

[nickdrak]

The new adapter plates are plastic? That's not going to work.

I don’t think the polymer plates will be an issue. Keep in mind that the CORE plates are merely spacers and aren’t threaded in any manner like the Glock MOS plates are. Having said that, the C&H Precision plates are a much better solution than Han the factory plates for both the CORE and the MOS systems.

 

[ToolMaker]

I don’t think the polymer plates will be an issue.

I think the plastic plates will be an issue. I certainly don’t want to pay $45 for an adapter plate that should be included with the gun and should be steel. But anyway, it won’t matter to you, you bought a metal one instead of that garbage they sent you.

Dear Leupold, what would you suggest I torque my Deltapoint Pro to when its sitting on a plastic adapter plate?? Yes, you read that right, S&W has decided to use plastic adapter plates.

 

[nickdrak]

I think the plastic plates will be an issue. I certainly don’t want to pay $45 for an adapter plate that should be included with the gun and should be steel. But anyway, it won’t matter to you, you bought a metal one instead of that garbage they sent you.

Dear Leupold, what would you suggest I torque my Deltapoint Pro to when its sitting on a plastic adapter plate?? Yes, you read that right, S&W has decided to use plastic adapter plates.

18in/lbs isn’t anywhere near enough torque to crush a polymer plate. The FN 509T uses a polymer plate and they recommend 22in/lbs. I haven’t seen any reported issues with the 509T plate system reported anywhere. There are indexing lugs milled into the CORE cutout that would also prevent the poly plate from being crushed.

 

[Smith Shooter]

One question for the OP: Did your gun come with an owner's manual that covered the 2.0 CORE system and the red dots that go with the various plates? Mine came with the same book as the 2.0 pre-CORE pistols and it makes no mention of the CORE or how it's used. I was able to get some info from the old 1.0 CORE owner's manual but not everything.

I can't believe S&W didn't update the owner manual as these pistols have been out in one form or another for quite a while.

 

[Bikebit]

Funny, my new non-CORE PC full-size came with the manual that has a chapter on CORE...

 

[Scott B]

Funny, my new non-CORE PC full-size came with the manual that has a chapter on CORE...

How many adapter plates does it show a table for?

SB

 

[Smith Shooter]

The 1.0 table shows 5. S&W e-mailed me a .pdf of the newer table that shows 7. I guess another call to S&W is in order to get the updated owner's manual that I should have gotten in the first place.

 

[ToolMaker]

They finally have the new M2.0 manual with the new chart online.

https://snwcdnprod.azureedge.net/sites/default/files/owners-manuals/M%26P_M2pt0_Pistol_031220_3012548.pdf

 

[Smith Shooter]

They finally have the new M2.0 manual with the new chart online.

https://snwcdnprod.azureedge.net/sites/default/files/owners-manuals/M%26P_M2pt0_Pistol_031220_3012548.pdf

That's exactly what I should have gotten with my pistol. Thank you for the help!

 

[Scott B]

Thank you very much for this!

SB

 

[DCSigCZMP]

Thank you for sharing the features of the LE version of this. I shoot IDPA SSP with a 5” M2.0. The full apex FSS with flat trigger kit is the best ever Striker pistol action. It is astoundingly good, however, it is not SSP legal. So I’ve decided to get a C.O.R.E. 5” M2.0 and mix and match uppers and lowers to optimize the configuration for each class.
SSP gets the iron-sighted C.O.R.E. configuration and Carry Optics gets the C.O.R.E. Upper with an optical sight on top of my fully Apexed M2.0 lower. The problem is that I cannot find a 5” non-ported C.O.R.E. pistol on the interweb.
I’ll finish with a question. Don’t rip me for wanting absolute confirmation of something that seems obvious because stranger things have happened: I am not a LEO so I am assuming I cannot purchase the 12661 M&P9 M2.0 Optics Ready LE only version. Is that correct?
Thanks much for your help. DC

 

[DCSigCZMP]

@Smith Shooter: It sounds like you purchased the 11828 Pro Core. You said,
“The OEM trigger on mine was very crisp and creep- free but too heavy at 5-1/2 to 6 pounds. An Apex sear and striker block improved it to 3-1/2 pounds.”
Two questions:

• Did you try to reduce the trigger pull force by simply installing different, reduced power, Apex springs (if you have any left over from other kits you have picked up over time)?
• What Part number sear and striker block kit did you install, or what are the individual part numbers if you purchased them separately?

I ask because I shoot SSP and what you did to improve your pistol is SSP legal, therefore, I want to be certain of the kit or individual parts that resulted in that improvement. Thanks much!