I went to a gun show today and figured we should get some discussion going on the topic. I've been looking to buy a handgun that is fun at the range, good for home protection, and possibly concealed carry. I've been considering what kind of gun I'd want to spend my money on. I don't like a lot of buttons and levers on the outside of the gun, I'm left handed so I'd like a gun that can cater to that, I have a small hand but don't want my pinkie hanging off the end of the grip. Not too picky on caliber but would like either 9mm or .40, start your knockdown power argument there. Glock seems to fit the best with what I want, a model 19 or 23.

 

Ok. What you're going to have to do...is stop being so prissy about the ergonomics of your gun, and go out and buy a .44 Magnum. Dirty Harry style.

 

haha I like the way this man thinks. lol

I too have been contemplating a gun purchase. Already have a few guns, but looking to get a semi-auto handgun. Shopping around through the zillions of 1911's, but more just waiting until I get some tax return $$$ before I pull the trigger on one.

 

I used a Glock 22, 23, and 27. I carry the 27 off-duty. Its a 40 cal and super small. Easy to conceal and very simple to clean. I have big hands so I had to get the extended grip mags.

 

I'd go with the 23 or the 32. Really, I'd get the 23 and buy a .357sig Lone Wolf barrel for it. Then you can shoot .357sig or .40S&W and your .357sig cases won't have smiley faces on the bases and can be reloaded.

Another option that you may like is a stout 4" .357mag like a Ruger GP100 or a Taurus Tracker. Wheelguns offer a lot of simplicity and a few more options as far as ammo choice. Don't let the only 6-8 rounds thing fool you. Nobody thinks about how big your magazine is when they're being shot back at.

MustangV6: if you're looking at 1911's then check out the Rock Island models by Armscor. They're made in the Phillipines and are actually pretty awesome examples of a dressed up mil-spec 1911A1. Usually have scalloped frames and wide target triggers, adjustable sights and a bumper pad on the mag with the usual lightly extended controls. They're about 450-580 retail and you can't touch that with any other brand. Another brand option in 1911's that I'd recommend is Dan Wesson. They're made by CZ and are very nice. You pay a little more for them. Steer clear of the Kimbers and Les Baers. I own them and to tell the truth, they're no better as shooters than my chinese 1911's. Springfield Armory is awesome but the price is out in ******' space.

With all the guns I own I depend on a 4" Dan Wesson .357 that was made almost 40 years ago and a M1 carbine that was made closer to 60 years ago. Even my glocks stay in the boxes... don't want to send a 600 dollar gun to the evidence locker when my DW is replaceable for 300.

 

Haven't had any regrets going with my Glock 23. Go to a shooting range that rents guns and try a bunch out. It usually only costs like $10 for the rental.

 

I'd go for a revolver. Very simple, no jamming, easy and quick to load, and a plus side is if you ever get bored you can play Russian roulette.

And as far as good feel, I like peacekeeper 357's.

 

I would recommend shooting a few different guns first. Try a couple DOA, DA/SA, and SAO before you make a decision. I absolutely love the Glock platform but I just don't shoot them all that well. My favorite pistol so far is my Sig P239 in 9mm. I am considering getting a P229 for carry in the cooler months.

I recently traded a modified Glock 22 for this Ruger Service Six .357 Mag. I should be htting the range in the next few days. This would make for a great first gun if you don't plan to carry right away. They can be found in the $350 range and are cheap to shoot (with .38 special)

 

Id never get a 9mm for self defense. Your only going to be allowed so many shots before self defense turns to homicide. so because of that i want the biggest bullets i can get

 

Thats retarded... Let me shoot you with ONE 147+p HST round that I carry and lets see if you keep coming at me.

9mm is plenty with the right round.

Shot placement is everything.

 

Go with the Glock 19. I'm ordering a Glock 19 RTF2 myself next week ($425 with 3 magazines through GSSF). Going to be my 21st birthday present to myself.

There are so few ballistics differences between .40S&W and 9mm that the argument isn't even worth it. 9mm +P 124 grain ammunition is perfectly fine for any type of self-defense. You can argue about caliber all you want, but Zigganigga is right. In the end shot placement is what's going to stop someone from killing you. 9mm allows for some very quick follow up shots and with some practice you can become a great shot.

There's nothing wrong with the Glock 23, but the G19 is pretty much the AK-47 in the pistol world and has made itself known for its reliability, the other Glocks aren't quite so close to that point yet.

Do NOT buy a Gen 4 Glock, stick with the Gen 3 models.


edit: bitches.

 

I'll disagree with the last 2 things pcola said. I'll also spare you the long diatribe on why. Suffice it to say, there is much there to disagree with. For starters, +p is totally unnecessary.

 

What, about not buying Gen 4 and saying bitches? Regular JHP is fine, but +P 9mm gives you about 100 joules of energy over regular loads, bringing it up to what a standard .45ACP slug carries, that's a good amount of force that can be transferred into a person.

While I was gathering as much info on Glock 22s as I could, I just couldn't find enough information supporting the .40S&W caliber to make it worth it. It gives glocks snappy recoil, has a bigger effect on your follow-up shots, and doesn't produce much better ballistic results, and you lose a capacity of two rounds. It appears it doesn't fragment as much when shooting through windshields, which doesn't mean much to me. So I settled for the 9mm bitch round, whose nay-saying is mostly from people unable to forget the past, where 9MM was sub-par.

 

Gen 4 are just fine. There have been some quality issues especially with the extra small compacts but they're a good company and take care of you if they **** up.

You compare 9mm to .45 a lot... why not just get a .45? I'm betting personal perference. .40S&W does more permanent crush damage than 9mm which is what stops the blood pumping and subsequently the attack, .45ACP does even better and doesn't suffer the over penetration issues that 9mm and 40 do. Fact is yes, 9mm is fine, if that's all you can shoot well enough to use but the rule of the roost is use as big a bullet as you can accurately deliver fire with. All the bullshit about followup shots and snappy recoil is BS. Recoil is greater, not snappier and if you hold the gun right it's not a matter of concern anyway. Apart from that most gunfights do not involve careful lining up of sights, that's usually called murder. Once in a while you'll find a grizzly ol' sumbitch like me that has been shot at and shot and won't fire wildly but instead take careful aim and kill you, all the other times it'll be bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang bang reload bang bang bang "Ok I give up, stop shooting at me".

If you couldn't find enough info on the .40S&W then you didn't even look. FBI reports were pretty detailed. Sanow Marshall report pretty detailed.

What I'm saying is that you've provided advice that by the nature of the advice demonstrates a lack of experience sufficient to provide the advice.

9mm is a minimum, not a cure-all.

 

From personal experience, I have to say my Glock 23 is pretty bad ***. I don't see how it can be any less reliable than the 19 and so on. Either way, fire whatever is most comfortable to you. You can say a 9mm is a ***** round or whatever, but like people have said, a well place round will kill no matter the caliber. Hell I have fun shooting my .22 rifle. Ammo is cheap as ****. I plan on getting the S&W MP 15-22 just to have a little fun with.

 

hey russel... I just bought 8 complete AR lowers as part of a group purchase... if you want one they're 140 bucks and will be waiting to be registered at Rogers Relics in Santa Clara tomorrow. I have 2 extra in that 8 so you could pick up 2 if you want. Get your uppers later, the lower is the registered part.

The lowers are Plum Crazy composite lowers with 6 position collapsible stock and the whole trigger group and lower parts kit + a california legal bullet button.

I also got myself a really nice upper for 500 bones. I need to pick up a couple more uppers but gotta raise the $$$ first.

Here's a pic of the lower:
http://newfrontierarmory.com/catalog...va8on75bmrn457

 

.357mag with a JHP.

If you hit them in the torso you won't need an ambulance

 

Fixed that for ya.

 

The reason I feel so strongly about a .357mag as a home defence gun (I bring it up in most gun threads) is because it does very well in a few very important areas

1. Simplicity. If it's loaded you pull the trigger and boom for this reason you must keep it away from small children and when they get a little older teach them to respect it. (GUNS ARE NOT TOYS PERIOD)
If it's not loaded it is very simple to load

2. Power. They pack enough of it in a small enough frame to stop pretty much anyone without being cumbersome (shotguns while very intimidating and powerful don't go around corners quite as well)

3. Price. A home defence gun should not be a gold plated desert eagle that fires depleated uranium. And a 357mag isn't, you can even shot .38 ammo out of it which is about as cheap as you can go.

also note

In a home defence situation the inhearent accuracy (of the weapon itself) is a non issue. Unless you have a multimillion dollar house with 3000sq foot rooms if you can't hit something on the opposite wall from you with a 357 you can't hit it with anything.

 

it's what I use nowadays.

 

.357mag or gold plated desert eagle

 

All pretty good reasons. I keep my Ruger Service Six (.357 Mag.) loaded up with premium .38 spl +P JHP for my fiancé. I had it loaded with .357 until I took it to the range and it made my hand bleed, I don't want her to shoot those.

 

Man, why you gotta tempt me with sweet deals. haha. I'll see what I can do. The wifey might not be happy with me wanting another gun, but we'll see.

 

It's not a gun, it's just a lower receiver.

 

You are grossly misinterpreting me.

I gave one comparison to 9mm to .45ACP, saying that +P ammunition in 9MM provides as much energy as a regular .45ACP slug, and because of the smaller size of the 9MM round that means further penetration affects, you can't refute that. I'm also not saying that you might as well use +P 9mm instead of everything else, because of that. I'm just providing a point of reference for people that have no idea about ballistics. Now that we've eliminated .45ACP from the argument. ----

For your "crush" argument, the following are tests done by the FBI on .40S&W and 9mm rounds from various manufacturers. Granted it's from 1998, there may have been some changes in those brands and styles of ammunition used in the past 13 years. But since there is no more-recent fully conclusive test data like this, this will have to do.


The average expansion of .40S&W rounds tested by the FBI (part 3) for those that were listed (23) is .58" with an average penetration of 16.7" through clothed gelatin.

The average expansion of the 9MM rounds tested by the FBI (part) 3 for those that were listed (19) is .52" with an average penetration of 16.28", through clothed gelatin.



The highest expansion from .40S&W was the 155 grain Winchester Silvertip JHP with .71" of expansion and 13.15" of penetration.

The highest expansion from 9mm was the 115 grain Winchester Ranger JHP +P+, with a .65" expansion, and 10.15" penetration through clothed gelatin



The furthest penetration from .40S&W was the .40 S&W 180 grain Federal Hi-Shok JHP with 24" of penetration and .47" of expansion.

The furthest penetration from 9mm was 115 grain CCI/Speer Gold Dot JHP, , with 22.65" of penetration and a .44" expansion.

http://www.firearmstactical.com/ammo_data/40s&w.htm

http://www.firearmstactical.com/ammo_data/9mm.htm

For visual comparison:


For a round which is so visually larger, the ballistics affects really aren't much better. Now this is just factual info from the FBI, you may have some super-duty tier-1 report that says something else, but I can't find that. I just don't see enough factual or scientific data that says ".40SW>9mm always, rawrrrrrr" There's a lot more info out there subjecting 9mm to .40S&W and showing it's not inferior, but I'm not going to dump it all here. There are also plenty of AAR's detailing 9MM being just as successful as .40 would be, but the 9MM round has been around since 1902, I'm not going to doubt its abilities, it's killed more people than .45 ever has. Anyone that bases their views of 9MM off of military performance is irrelevant, the military is only allowed to use 9MM FMJ ammo which hugely lacks the ballistic potential of any JHP round. I know that .40S&W creates more pressure in the body, but again, since shot placement is what matters, that doesn't matter. Obviously if you hit someone's hand they probably won't become incapacitated no-matter what the weapon. If a person is hit center-mass, in the chest cavity or heart with a 9MM pistol, they will stop. If they don't, that's fine because putting 3 more rounds within the same area is as easy as can be in a matter of a couple of seconds.

In California, anything beyond one shot in self-defense may be considered murder. But FL and other states have castle-laws. In Florida it's called stand your ground. We can shoot the attacker as many times as necessary until he is not breathing, in self-defense. When you're shooting 3-4 rounds you'd better hope that you are able to put them all on the same target, quickly. So that bullshit about recoil and follow-up shots not being necessary is bullshit. Muscle memory through practice alone should allow you to be able to draw your weapon and already have the sights lined up with your eye on the target, if you draw the weapon and that doesn't happen, you either need to practice more, or you're holding it wrong, which is very possible if it's a Glock because the grip angle is different on them than most other handguns, so you have to get used to it. I can only speak from experience on Glocks, but I can tell you that the Glock 22's recoil is definitely 'snappier,' that is to say, harsher, than the Glock 17. It will affect your follow-up no matter who are you, unless your wrist has steel supports going through it. The Glock 19 just has better 'shootability' than the 23 because of the softer recoil, which again allows quicker follow-ups. That's not personal preference or opinion, that's just how it is for most people who aren't champion target shooters.

You said carefully lining up the sights is usually considered murder, and then you went on to say that you're the guy who takes his time to line up the sights..I'm not sure where you're going on that one so I'll just let it go, murderer.

I don't need experience in shooting people to be able to make an educated decision on what is suitable. By your logic, no one should be able to give advice until they have killed someone. I'm willing to bet a vast minority of CCW holders, scientists and engineers who make and test the ammunition, and cops alike have actually done-so. I've fired both of the pistols the OP discussed and both of their bigger brothers, and I've fired the G17 enough to become more than comfortable to trust my life to it out to 25 yards.

About reliability. If there's a reliability issue with a non Gen-4 Glock, chances are it's one chambered in .40S&W. That's not to say that they're unreliable, but that's just where the issues lay. There's a pretty big issue that if you have a weapon light mounted on a Glock 22, the change in weight will cause ejecting casings to stove-pipe, jamming the weapon. The Glock 22 is a very common pistol for LE agencies so that's a huge problem in my eyes, because a lot of them have weapon lights. The fix is a different magazine spring and a different magazine follower (I believe it's an 11 coil spring and #4 follower), but who wants to always be worrying what follower and spring is in the magazine they're about to buy to make sure their weapon will work reliably with it?

And then it boils down to plinking affordability. 9MM FMJ is as low as $8 for 50. .40S&W usually never gets below $14 for 50. That's a substantial price difference.

.380 bounces off the target
9MM lacks the fictitious "stopping power"
.40S&W isn't sure what it is
.45ACP can't reach the target
10MM goes through the target and the neighbor's house

Any of these are suitable for killing people, none of them are bad or ineffective. and they are what is realistic to be carried outside of your home for self-defense. But they're all a compromise. If someone broke into my house, I'd choose none of the above. I have a shotgun that will trump any handgun in ballistic performance, and not penetrate through every wall in the house.