F.B.I. why .10mm. over .45ACP. ?

[SnidelyWhiplash]

When I attended FLETC we discussed the Miami Massacre and the FBI changeover to the 10mm. The lead instructor gave his opinion on that...he felt since the FBI had already denigrated the .45 ACP and adopted the 9mm they couldn't be seen as being wrong and going to the .45 with their collective tails between their legs...so they went with a completely new round to their specifications...the 10mm "Lite" with the new pistol.

It goes without saying there has always been some unfriendly competition between the FBI and other federal agencies (and local as well)...so his opinion might be considered slanted. But...the FBI does have a tendency to bigfoot over other agencies when they can claim credit.

 

[SG-688]

.41 Questions

For those asking about the .41, a discussion of police handguns in general and the 41 in particular is in the 1973 book by Allen Bristow, The Search for an Effective Police Handgun, published by Charles C. Thomas, Springfield, IL.

Chapter 5 covers testing and use of the .41 by several police agencies. Many liked it, including LAPD and Chicago PD. Besides the cost of the revolvers, availability and cost of ammunition for duty and practice was reported as a factor against the .41.

Separately, .41 advocate Tom Ferguson wrote about 70's quality control problems at S&W and Remington. His department gave up in 1979. [Gun World articles in 1976 and 1986.]


The book is in PDF form at archive.org.

 

[SGT ROCK 11B]

... why not immediatly arm the F.B.I.field agents with .45ACP. handguns after the 1986 Miami shoot out

I'm just looking for the logic & history.

Agent Charles Winstead shot John Dillinger with a WWI USGI 1911 loaded with .45 ACP 230 grain FMJ. That was in 1934 and .38 Super was also popular in the 1930s.

I think LE and FBI was using a chapter from the US Military's Industrial Complex Playbook. Millionaires becoming Billionaires by reinventing the wheel.

 

[SGT ROCK 11B]

Well, I'll bump it another couple of years. If you look at current production, you'll see there are more 10mm's being made now ...

I think a better indication of a caliber's popularity is the List RCBS use to put out of their Top Twenty selling Reloading Dies.

A S&W 357 or 44 Magnum revolver is really a better choice for everything. JMHO

 

[rosewood]

It seems to me that the 10mm as adopted by the FBI is not all that different from a 185-200 grain .45 ACP. I am sure that there was some inclination to have something different, but that the incremental difference was not important.

The 1076 broke and broke a lot. I was issued one, and they were deeply flawed. (The FBI had to fly some of their pistols back to Quantico for work.) Mine had very few rounds through it as it had been issued as a replacement to have for after an OIS and sat in the Sergeants' office for quite some time before I had it. I liked shooting it, as the Sig style decocker was handy for a lefty. The data on failures was not collected and at least one armorer was relieved because they did not keep the data and so replacement was hard to justify. They were replaced with the 4566 and they broke a lot too. I saw a couple come out of the box broken when issued.

At the time we could buy our own HK USP 45s and that was a terrible experience - HK's customer service was awful and they would not get off their backsides to get us pistols with our specs. It was so bad that at least some cancelled their orders and did fraud complaints with the State AG's office. I angered some folks in HK as I wrote a scathing letter and sent it FedEx to their main office.

When you say the 1076 broke and so did the 4566. What broke? Certain parts? Feed issues. What was the problem? Did S&W fix this problem in later models?

Thanks,

Rosewood

 

[Frank Black]

It seems to me that the 10mm as adopted by the FBI is not all that different from a 185-200 grain .45 ACP. I am sure that there was some inclination to have something different, but that the incremental difference was not important.

The 1076 broke and broke a lot. I was issued one, and they were deeply flawed. (The FBI had to fly some of their pistols back to Quantico for work.) Mine had very few rounds through it as it had been issued as a replacement to have for after an OIS and sat in the Sergeants' office for quite some time before I had it. I liked shooting it, as the Sig style decocker was handy for a lefty. The data on failures was not collected and at least one armorer was relieved because they did not keep the data and so replacement was hard to justify. They were replaced with the 4566 and they broke a lot too. I saw a couple come out of the box broken when issued.

At the time we could buy our own HK USP 45s and that was a terrible experience - HK's customer service was awful and they would not get off their backsides to get us pistols with our specs. It was so bad that at least some cancelled their orders and did fraud complaints with the State AG's office. I angered some folks in HK as I wrote a scathing letter and sent it FedEx to their main office.

Neither my 1076 nor my 4566 ever “broke” over thousands of rounds fired. Replacing springs on a regular round-count basis is key.

 

[Doug M.]

I doubt ours got shot enough to need new springs. Malfunctions (jam goes on toast, a feed stoppage is a malfunction) were not the simple to fix with an immediate action drill type. Broken parts, especially extractors were a regular problem. Dead triggers, as I recall. I saw one issued during the transition that was broken right out of the box; I no longer recall the precise problem. There was always at least one that had a gunsmith/armorer level problem at in-service. S&Ws QA/QC problems are not new.

The FBI had a couple incidents in which the 1076 would lock up loaded and sending them to Quantico (because they were too messed up for anything less. I'll admit I never saw any problems with the 3rd gen/4 digit 9mm platforms. That may have been because the Illinois State Police beat the tar out of them in the work they did that resulted in the transition from Gen 2 to Gen 3.

 

[Bambihunter71]

I think a better indication of a caliber's popularity is the List RCBS use to put out of their Top Twenty selling Reloading Dies.

A S&W 357 or 44 Magnum revolver is really a better choice for everything. JMHO

As I mentioned previously, popularity doesn't always equate to better. There are many examples of this in cartridge history.



I like both of those rounds just fine, I have a .357 mag Coonan and Desert Eagle, and a .44 mag Ruger Carbine and Desert Eagle. The .44 mag in particular has a place. The .357 mags position has largely been diluted by newer options that are shorter and rimless. I won't disparage it though, for revolver guys the rimmed cartridges of these old special/mag combos are effective. This combo is part of the reason I like the 10mm auto. It effectively has that capability from a semi-auto platform.



Personally, I just don't like revolvers. I have 3, and 2 are broken. One is seriously out of time to the point of shaving lead, the other has a broken main spring. So much for the reliability edge everyone touts.

 

[Bambihunter71]

It seems to me that the 10mm as adopted by the FBI is not all that different from a 185-200 grain .45 ACP. I am sure that there was some inclination to have something different, but that the incremental difference was not important.

You pretty much quoted the whole problem with the FBI 10mm implementation;
"the 10mm as adopted by the FBI is not all that different from a 185-200 grain .45 ACP" and "the incremental difference was not important".



By the time they neutered it down to .40 S&W levels, it wasn't much better than what was already available. I've got quite a few boxes of the original Norma 170 and 200 grain loads still and have shot up a lot more. It wasn't until the likes of Double Tap and Underwood that ammo finally got back to those original levels.
It's like if they released the .44 mag, but spec'd it only slightly better than a 44-40. It wouldn't have taken off real well either.

 

[BLUEDOT37]

1990 M1006 Torture Test: 10K rounds in 6.5 hours

.
Back in April 1990 American Handgunner put 10,000 rounds of Winchester Silvertip thru a 1006 in 6-1/2hrs!

These guys were in a hurry to finish apparently.

.

Probems encountered:

- broken safety lever,

- broken trigger play spring (duh!),

- broken ejector tip (brass still ejected & landed along side the shooter instead of the next county.)

.

The staked on guide rod end did not fail but the recoil spring (not replaced during test) was shorter & weaker.

The barrel got to 430°F during testing & was cleaned every 500 rounds except during the last 1000 rounds it was not cleaned.

The rifling was noticeably worn but was able to shoot a 11" x 5-1/2" group at 50yds from a Ranson rest.

.

You can read the whole article in this related thread on the forum here:

https://smith-wessonforum.com/141695299-post14.html

.



.

 

[jimmyj]

FBI AND THE 10MM:
My only experence was a FBI agent requested me to look for a wanted felon in my area (Patrol deputy in a rural large county). The agent rode with me. As we were driving I did not observe the agent's weapon. I inquired and he stated his weapon was a 10mm but he did not carry it as it was too heavy and he left it in his vehicle. I loaned him my 2" 38 which he liked.

 

[Brian Parrish]

I love the resurrected threads!

 

[Autonomous]

FBI AND THE 10MM:
My only experence was a FBI agent requested me to look for a wanted felon in my area (Patrol deputy in a rural large county). The agent rode with me. As we were driving I did not observe the agent's weapon. I inquired and he stated his weapon was a 10mm but he did not carry it as it was too heavy and he left it in his vehicle. I loaned him my 2" 38 which he liked.

So, this fed was hunting a fugitive but wanted someone else to do the heavy lifting ... er ... detain and take control of him?
Sounds like management material to me.

 

[Frank Black]

I love the resurrected threads!

Yeah, from 2007. Quite a blast from the past.

 

[Left Twist]

How much of our taxpayer $ have the professional nutcuppers @FBI spent to determine that monkeys can throw poo through the bars and get their man?

Disband and start over. It doesn’t matter what they carry. I could care less.

 

[Doug M.]

FBI AND THE 10MM:
My only experence was a FBI agent requested me to look for a wanted felon in my area (Patrol deputy in a rural large county). The agent rode with me. As we were driving I did not observe the agent's weapon. I inquired and he stated his weapon was a 10mm but he did not carry it as it was too heavy and he left it in his vehicle. I loaned him my 2" 38 which he liked.

*
Not a shock. I have met some serious FBI folks, but also some like that. That is a combination of poor selection and training, bad management that allowed that mindset to exist, and frankly a poor choice of platforms. On a duty belt as a uniformed deputy, it was not a bad platform. For plainclothes - very much suboptimal.

 

[Frank Black]

I CCW a M1066 in cooler/colder weather. It’s quite do-able. The right belt and holster combo is the key …. as well as dressing for it.

 

[SnidelyWhiplash]

I CCW a M1066 in cooler/colder weather. It’s quite do-able. The right belt and holster combo is the key …. as well as dressing for it.

"Dress for the gun you carry...not carry the gun for how you dress."

A lot of truth there.

 

[WR Moore]

Revisiting this thread brings back memories. I don't live all that far from Quantico and had friends there, so I got copies of some relevant memos. We'd also jumped on the 10 mm bandwagon along with the VSP.

Short answer to why the FBI adopted the ten: politics. Both internal and external, the agency wanted to be seen as both "doing something" after Miami and being the flagship LEA.

I still recall a memo by Urey Patrick (might be more than one for the full message) that I've either trashed or misfiled. I recall a few items. The first was a clear message that whatever the service pistol question, THE 10 MM WAS THE ANSWER! The rest of the memo had the content/tone of something that should have been filed away for awhile and revisited before hitting "send".

About the gun. Some examples had extraction issues of varying degree. My issue piece was one, there was no pattern to the problem and it was generally rare. I did wonder if they'd initially just used the .45 extractor/spring without mods. By the end of production they'd gone through 3 extractor versions and (?) the same number of springs. By that time my example was completely reliable. Our lead armorer went through both our guns and made sure they had all the parts upgrades before they were phased out and we bought them.

BTW, the VSP "had magazine issues" with their 1076s. S&W gave them all new, we bought most of the used ones for $5 each from S&W. Only found 1-3 mags that were really bad. The rest worked fine (may have had the follower upgrade).

 

[Farmer17]

The Smith M&P 10mm 4" is my favorite handgun and I've owned over 75 handguns. I shoot it mostly with Sig 180 grain ammo at 1250 fps and it's very easy to control and my 5-6 120lb enjoys shooting it also and is quite accurate with it. I think it would be an outstanding LE gun does anyone know if its issued to any law enforcement?