I have seen 9 mm bullets expand to .45. That's why I shoot a .45.

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Riding, Shooting, and Truth

But assuming identical shot placement and penetration-which would kill you more???

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Forum consigliere

This is one of the better threads in a long time.

Have a gander at one of the 1911, Glock or general gun forums -- there's usually a knock down, drag out .45 vs 9mm thread every six minutes.

I don't see this as a 9 vs 45 thread. I see some smart conversation here. I visit the other forums, but spend the most of my time here.

While I was growing up in the 50's our family ate a lot of deer and elk killed with a 22 LR . it's all shot placement. I now and have for a long time carried a 44 spec wheel gun short bbl. An old time game warden told my father many years ago that if you have to make a hole in an attacker, make it a big one!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I still remember that to this day.

I don't wanna get into the caliber vs caliber debate either, and yes modern improvements make the differences less. I would like to mention that bullet wounds can be freaky and may vary greatly case to case. NO Such thing as a guaranteed 1 shot fight stopper caliber. I had a kid that shot himself in the upper thigh with a 45. He didn't die nor lose the leg, and was walking on crutches 2 days later. The bullet entered mid center thigh and exited his mid calf, it missed ALL major/important bones, tendons, nerves, arteries/veins, critical areas of the knee, etc, Very weird and a Very lucky kid.

If I'm reading you right, the 40 doesn't work for you because you can't effect a significant performance (Velocity) improvement by reloading. The barrier is caused by factory loads that are already at the limits. I can't get a decent velocity boost either, but I can get a reduction in muzzle flash in 40 and 357Sig with no deterioration in velocity. This is a real help for a newbe shooter that wants to move up to full house loads. I've also gotten the financial advantage by loading plated bullets.
I understand your decision. I made my decisions based in the needs of my students. I just thought that you found an angle that applied to me.
I never found it to be an issue (same with the .357 SIG). But its street performance doesn't appear in any way different from 9 or .45 (unlike the .357 SIG's, which I'm told has better barrier-defeating performance than the others and thus is appropriate for folks needing such), and it holds fewer than the 9, and it's trickier to load than the .45 (but costs as much retail) . . .
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I don't have Alzheimer's- My wife had me tested.

I shoot a .45 because they don't make a .46

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'Merica!

I too have found the 9mm and 45ACP easier to hotrod than the .40. The factories load the .40 close to redline, the 9mm and 45 not so much. I have reduced .40 and 357Sig muzzle flash with powder selection. I find this helpful with twitchy students. Thanks for the insight, though it doesn't apply in my case.

I'm hardly an expert in the field of ballistics. I'm a Joe who carries a gun every single day and gets paid for it.

I've done as much research as I can, and I shoot a 9mm. A Glock 34 and a Glock 26 for a backup gun. With modern premium JHP ammo, research I've found indicates that there's little enough difference between the 9mm, .40, and .45 that it won't matter. I can shoot faster, more accurately with the 9mm.

As the only guy in my agency NOT carrying the .40, I always hear guff from the other guys about it. Such was the case last week when we did our yearly qualification. Just like every other time, the talking stopped when we walked to the targets. I fired my rounds faster AND more accurately than any other shooter on the line. Some others were doing all they could to hit the silhouette target within the scoring area in time, while I was practicing failure drills (2 chest and 1 head) while operating within the same time limit. In a gunfight, I know that that means something.

In 29 years in law enforcement, I've seen far more shootings that I care to remember. I can say this with a reasonable degree of certainty: Ballistics are overrated. I have worked cases where a single .22LR ended someone's life and another where a gut shot from a .357 Magnum didn't slow the guy down. Shot placement is key & dead is dead no matter what velocity the projectile is travelling or what the bullet diameter is.......

I have many handguns and ,even though I'm allowed some choice in the matter, I carry my issued Glock 22 .40 caliber because I have practiced with it until I learned how to shoot it. No frills. Just reliable and accurate. It was well used when I got it (built in '97,I think.) with countless rounds through it. Every once and a while, I get the urge to carry something else for variety (or independence) sake. But, the Glock 22 always finds its'way back into my duty holster.

Having said all that, I'm not stupid. I have a back up gun in my pocket & a 12 gauge in the trunk of the car.....

I have never been in a gun fight or shot at.. I shoot well at the range,but paper targets don't move or shoot back,shooting under stress with someone trying to kill you is something I think no one is 100% ready for..the officer lived to tell his story and went home to his family.. that's what counts...he might feel more comfortable with a pistol with more rounds..which is never a bad idea.

I believe and adhere to this simple test for my SD handgun.
Hold in your hand one round of the caliber/calibers you are considering
to use. If you have done any reloading and know just a little about ballistics
and bullet energy this tells me whether or not i want to
trust my life to this particular round or not.
Nothing beats hitting what you are shooting at however.
Shoot what you shoot best.
IMHO bigger is always better.

Chuck

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They hold no Quarter

I carry the Glock 19. Never been in a firefight. I shoot it well.Don't like the Glock 21 for the grip is too big for my hands. I am one of seven officers with my agency who carry the G19 instead of the G21. Once again I shoot the G19 well. That's it.

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I type. Therefore I am.

What they said!

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... a little behind in my work

After a 10 year run (83-93) with the .45 ACP my agency switched to the 9 mm in Beretta & SIG forms.

Quarterly qualification's showed an increase from 15% "Expert" scores to 31%.

Street performance did not suffer in the least and even the bean counters were happy.

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NULLI SECUNDUS

I'm afraid you're not reading me right at all and you don't understand my decision: I don't want to hotrod the .40, and have never tried to do so.

My issue is that the .40 is a tricky cartridge to reload, and I'm certainly at least a journeyman handloader (having handloaded since the mid-'80s). Moderate loads with more than one powder show profound velocity differences (and presumably pressure differences) based on temperature changes. This is alarming, and shows how close to the edge the round is running. Because the .40 offers no performance advantage whatsoever over the 9 (unless you consider fewer rounds on board an advantage ), my feel is that it's not worth my time.

However, an adequately detailed discussion of the topic would require a lot more time than I'm able to devote right now, so - while I appreciate your interest in why I do what I do - it's probably best that you just do what you'd like based on your own circumstances.

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Now go make God proud...

Well, again, the fact that the only thing that seems to guarantee cessation of aggressive action (when discussing use of a handgun - rifles and shotguns are different) is direct damage of certain vitals (brain/spinal cord/heart/aorta). And the fact that any one of these rounds is capable of the shot-placement and penetration necessary to effect such. So . . . a valid question is - which round is most capable of delivering more hits to those vitals in a given interaction? Which is more controllable? Which has more in the gun?

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Now go make God proud...

In southern Arizona I carry a three inch 317 alloy eight shot 22 revolver with laser grips. It has 8 one shot kills. Two rabbits,2 rattlers,coyote in trap,1 wounded deer,1 rabid skunk and a stray tomcat. Two shots in the dark. I carry this gun religiously and feel confident even in South Tucson at night.

Darn it, wfsubking; now you've got me thinking about El Güero Canelo!

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Now go make God proud...

Wow, this old thread lives again!

Lots of good intelligent discussion here, too.

I made this observation in another thread, but it seems to fit here, too. I've worked violent crime on Indian reservations for most of my career. Real rezs, not the casino kind. Most of our murder weapons are knives, axes, fists, feet, gravity, and whatever else is handy. Quite a few are shootings, though.

A while ago some fellow Indian Country guys and I were comparing notes, and discovered that one type of firearm had proven to be 100 percent effective in rendering someone dead. Keep in mind we also work non-fatal shootings, too, so its not like we don't see a ton of those, too.

Every shooting with a .22 rifle had proved fatal. I had the closest thing to a non-fatal - a guy drove past the War Bonnet bar on the Blackfeet rez and shot up the front. A guy was just lifting a shot glass to his lips and a round hit that, causing glass to cut his lip. Since the bullet didn't hit him, I didn't count that one.

All the others resulted in me standing over a rapidly cooling corpse. Usually there were multiple hits to the torso. Of course many of these were straight up murders, not self defense situations, but those folks were still DRT. I can't remember that any of them continued doing whatever caused them to get shot after those little bullets started making entry.

I'm sure plenty of cops have seen plenty of shootings that run contrary to this. But in our little group, the ubiquitous Marlin Model 60 will get the job done.

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“What you got, ain’t new.”

Yeah, multiple .22 hits from a rifle seem to really work - one of those little buggers is going to hit "the good stuff."

And there's a lesson there - with the difficulties of targeting those crucial vitals given a moving aggressor, isn't it a good idea to have multiple tries for the necessary hit? So what platform gives you the best ability to make those multiple targeted launches?

BTW, another DRT rifle (from the cases I've worked) is the SKS - holy smokes, but those things are effective.

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Now go make God proud...

Whew !!
I'm glad we got this topic cleared up....again.

Prediction? Next year another caliber vesus caliber thread.

This is from yesterday.

1204131330.jpg

This is not slow shooting. This is rapid fire. at 15 yards

If I can do this with 24 rounds in .40 cal , Aimed rapid fire ......with a reload...point shooting at . With 1 flier.

Sadly this thread does not make me very confident in todays LE force lol

Old guys, were taught quality over quantity, trained on a .357 highway patrolmen. Only 6 rounds to get the job done. While I am not old.......a mere 28. I was taught by Old timers from the first gun I ever shot.

Does it seem to anyone else that the NEW Law Enforcement is taught that spray and prey is the way to go in a lethal force encounter?

Just sayin....

hmmmm ... "the spray and pray way of today" .... kinda has a ring to it

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it just needs more voltage

I am an OLD LE person and was not taught "spray and pray as the way to go in a lethal force encounter" in 1971. Then, I was a newly created civilian after 2+ years in the US Army and an 11B light weapons infantryman, it was an interesting transition from an M60 in a helicopter to a S&W Model 15 in the police academy. In fairness, the tracers helped a lot but I learned trigger control w/ the PD.

More to the point, my older son is a 7 year police officer and, according to him, he was never taught the "spray and pray" method either. I would be curious as to which agencies teach that system in their firearms training curriculum.

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... a little behind in my work

I also was not taught "spray and pray" now was any other officer I've met. I've noticed those that tend to bag on cops for their "spray and pray" response have never heard a round coming back uprange from close by. That has a tendency to mess with your aim.

I'm sure the S&W Forum (like many other forums) has it's share of steely-eyed killers who would shoot the bad guy through his right eye with one round while ignoring those incoming rounds.

I'm not your guy! I usually got a really dry mouth, tunnel vision, a gurgling in my innards, and a little difficulty breathing when the plexiglass exploded in a shower of little sharp pieces or I could hear the sound of a breaking pencil as the round sailed over my head. Nope, you can just call me a sissy!

Oh, yeah...just sayin'

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... a little behind in my work

I'm new but it feels like I have been in this forum before. I'm a laughing 2 pages in.

But my first response when I read op: he switched because when the gun fight ended He wanted to pull the trigger more and was out of ammo while reloading he realized he did not need more ammo. But if there is ever is a next time he will have more ammo in the mag. IMO

More bullets = better IMO

And to take a spin on your forum handle, you know that in the Sixteenth Century, men were discussing how a

Guy switches from long sword to rapier after sword fight!

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Now go make God proud...

I have never shot a 45acp.

One thing that surprises me about my Glock 19 is how fast I can shoot it, and put them in about a pie plate.

I tend to believe in a big or real fast bullet for one good knock down shot. But maybe in real life, you are more likely to do a bunch of shooting as fast as you can. Just keep shooting until its over, one way or the other.

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Beware the man with one gun.

Note that this was 35 yard confrontation, where it is harder to hit, and multiple shots may be needed. At close range, I tend to think the gun with the most knock down on the first shot, would be best, speaking from my bowels.

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Beware the man with one gun.

Concur with Sig. Worked a homicide down in the southern portion of NM on a Pueblo...one resident was attacked by two knife wielding assailants. Two shots from a .22 SHORT; one DRT, the other made it a couple hundred yards. No charges due to bona fide self-defense.

I have never killed anyone with a handgun. I have been shot at. Anyone who doesn't get excited is either an idiot or stoned on some serious drugs. I have shot lots of animals, from rabbits to elk. I use an appropriate round for different sized animal. As I have witnessed some interesting failures to drop with good shot placement. Elk that have been seriously lung shot, deer with 308s through the chest doing major damage and the animal still runs 50 yards or more.. A deer that took 2 solid chest hits with a 357 went farther. If it ran the 50 yds in just 3 seconds.That means a bad guy could crank off several rounds. Every one I have shot with a 44 mag or a 45LC has dropped. Some of it was a slightly better hit and some of it was what the animal was doing when hit. As I have aged I have went to bigger rounds and I will continue with them. Nothing goes very far when I hit it with my 338. Ya, the 9mm has been improved, but the 45 didn't exactly stand still either. I agree that you should shot what your good with. I am a big guy, with big hands and arms and have never had recoil problems. I will keep packing my 44s and 45s. As a civilian living where I live, the odds I will ever need more than 5 or 6 is huge. Each to his own and the best of luck no mater what you chose if it comes down.

I must say that if I ever was on the winning side of a pistol encounter I would be hard pressed to change what worked.

No *****. I get the idea of learning, man is supposed to be able to do that.

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Beware the man with one gun.

You know..... I can't recall a single time that I could just look at an entrance or exit wound and definitively say what caliber caused the damage. Granted, most of these were in the middle of the night securing the scene & waiting on investigators sometimes with little illumination other than my flashlight. Caliber really didn't seem to effect the outcome. The only other factor not mentioned so far is the physical condition of the person shot. Someone who is on PCP etc. is a lot harder to convince to cease any behavior including breathing.

What the heck is a generic Glock .40? Is that like a generic Smith .38 Special?

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- Change it back -

Standard issue is either G22 or G23, depending on when graduated from Quantico.

Bigger holes are better more often than not. No doubt a 9mm hole that hits the brain or heart is pretty much as effective as a .45ACP that hits the brain or heart.

A .45 that hits the shoulder will most likely be more damaging that a 9mm that hits the shoulder. If we did not believe bigger holes were better we would all shoot FMJ rounds, but we don't. We shoot hollow points that expand and make bigger holes.

So the "shot placement is everything" logic is flawed. Shot placement may be the most important thing, but bigger holes are also important.

Still if you hit better with a 9mm then that is what you should shoot. But if you shoot both well, I would go with the bigger bullet diameter.

If size were not important we would all shoot .22LR in FMJ. We don't.

I spent most of my life trying to convince young ladies that size did not matter, and now here I am trying to convince old shooters that it does matter.

Now that's funny right there. I don't care who you are! Lmao.

Nice weather we're having.

A guy by the name of Greg Ellifritz spent quite a lot of time collecting information on handgun self defense shootings. From .380 on up the results are remarkably similar.

An Alternate Look at Handgun Stopping Power | Buckeye Firearms Association

Never really noticed it before but I want this George Washington 25 caliber round.

That thing'll make holes the size of a quarter.


[/LEFT][/QUOTE]

Lad

Interesting data. Certainly supports my choice of a 12 gage for home defense.

Agreed, even my Astra A-80 (aka P220 knockoff) .45 is scary accurate.

I'm a police officer. I am a firearms instructer with my department. I and my fellow instructors do not teach the "Spray and Pray" method. Not at all.

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I type. Therefore I am.

Well now, every caliber is lethal and the other way around, also. The object is that the other guy dies---even if you have to use a trenching tool.
Blessings

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TEXAS, by GOD

If the choice was a .45 1911 or a 9mm Beretta FS92 for example,
I am personally going to go with the 9mm .
The reasons being are as follows..
I would much rather have 17 rounds than 8
I prefer the ability to get back on target as quickly as possible (less recoil)
9mm hollowpoints do the job as long as I do MY job , which is
shot placement .

Lewis