Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Who prefers a 40?

Never have shot the .40 much at all....maybe 100 rounds max...

Picked up a brand new 23 upper for my 19 and after shooting it can understand how a lot of non-shooter LEOs have a hard time qualifying. Recoil is a lot more than a 9mm. The other .40 I have is a multi-caliber Kimber Stainless Target II....in that gun the .40, even with heavy loads, is a pussycat....

The .40 story is kinda like the .41 Magnum... 210 grain bullet at 950 to be the be-all and end-all for LE firearms... The experts however failed to understand that because 90+% of the LEOs are not gun people and have little interest of becoming so on their own anything with more recoil than a 9mm or .38 Special just isn't tolerable....

...thanks God for the new Magic 9mm Bullets or where would we be....

Bob

I realize most if any don't, i load 200gr XTP and Nosler hp's in my 40 to 1030-1050 fps, was floored at the amount of penetration here in home made test media, pick 'any' expanding 9mm slug, it will be a fun contest.

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Yes, correct.



See post above (https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbt...3951631/re-who-prefers-a-40#Post13951631). Can a 9mm pump out a 115gr slug at over 1,400 fps or a 155gr slug at over 1,300 fps? Not even close.

MMDV (my Mileage Does Vary).



9mm can’t do that.

I carry a 9mm Sig P938 95% of the time because it’s small. So, I’m not anti-9mm. Great round for what it’s worth, which is much.

But it does not come close to the versatility of the .40 S&W round, especially at the high end. With a full-sized pistol, the .40 S&W can exceed 600 ft-lbs and all kinds of other things that the 9mm can’t do.

LOL at this guy! Only "stronger load" if you aren't comparing apples to apples. Compare top end loads in both calibers and the .40 will blow it away on all counts. With the same weight bullet, 40 is faster, when using heavier bullets = more energy, yada, yada. I prefer shooting the 9 for lots of reasons, but will opt for the 40 if I am in the woods.

This whole debate is kinda like comparing a 300 WM to a 338 WM. Numbers are bigger obviously, but the percentage difference between the two and between the 40 and 9 are about the same.

Only problem is, fortunately or unfortunately depending on a how you want to look at it, Shooters have voted with their feet. Take a look at any big gun shop that's got a large inventory of used guns and you'll see tons of 40s compared to the number of 9 mm. And the smaller the guns are the more forties will sit on the shelf for a longer period of time.

It isn't that 40 isn't a great round the problem is the guns are all based on 9mmm platforms and just kick the snot out of people. And since 95% of the people who own handguns aren't what I would call Shooters the less recoil that they have the more they like it.

Bob

There are several 40 S&W living at the house, all of them shot regularly. Recoil isn't especially bad, though it's not as soft shooting as a 9mm. The main reason I prefer it would be its ballistic twin the 38 WCF. I'll allow as how the New Service is more pleasant to shoot than a Glock 22 for equal horsepower.

.40 S&W out of my Glock Model 20 (with or without the .40 S&W barrel installed) is a real pussycat to shoot. Out of my Model 22, however, I find it not nearly as capable of quick and accurate shot-to-shot placement, too often (unless I'm concentrating quite hard on preventing it) even requiring a readjustment of my two handed grip between rounds. Yet I don't have this issue whatsoever with my Glock Model 30, which is chambered in .45 ACP. I handle that about as well as my Glock 17 9mm.

That's an apt comparison.

Good info, so a 45 in say a Shield is easier to manage recoil, f/up shots, than a 40?

I don't know. The Glock 30 is built on the massive slide of the 21, just shortened, rather than having a Model 23 sized slide. That could be part of why I find the recoil more manageable than that of the .40 S&W in a Model 22. I'll have to compare slide weights to see if this could be the explanation.

Unless you are experienced on them any small, 40 or 45 pistol will require some effort to master.

For everyone else, there is the 9mm.

I taught frail little girls, for God's sake, to qualify--and shoot well enough to save one of their lives under fire--with 40 caliber duty guns.

Some of those G22's saw 8-9000 rounds of duty ammo over 11 years, and none of them broke.

Agreed Sarge, that tank P226 40 of mine continues to neatly pile brass 4 or 5 yards off my right shoulder, and that's with 200gr XTP's at 1040 fps, makes a damn good garden pest control gun too ; ]

That's cool to know.

PS Just to clarify, I can do just fine with a .40 S&W Glock 22. I just find that a lot more concentration on maintaining the grip, shot to shot, is required than is required with any of my Glocks chambered in 9mm or .45 ACP. This is why I don't particularly like shooting or carrying my Glock 22. Not because I can't easily put rounds where I want them to go, which I can, just as easily as with a 9mm Glock.

I'm not saying everyone should carry/shoot a 40. It was an issue item and that's what we trained with. It is a bit much for some folks and when we updated the policy, I plugged a rider in to allow personally owned 9mm's as an option, within certain parameters of course. I think two officers (both younger males) used that option for duty guns in the 8 years I was there. We always had people qualifying with 9mm backup/off duty guns.

I'm retired and my personal guns are all 45 ACPs these days. I find a 230 flat point at 850-900 fps does 95% of what I need from a handgun. And the brass is a damn sight easier to find in the mowed strip of hayfield I use for a range

Its easy to shoot but IMO when you get used to the dependability of a wheel gun a semi auto is a hard pill to swallow. It "probably" won't jam when your life depends on it so odds are "mostly" in your favor!

I did own a CZ999 9mm that I fired 1000 consecutive rounds thru without cleaning or jamming. My custom 1911 Springfield 45 was extremely dependable though it did jam a couple times. Ive owned a 40 glock and 10mm glock! Both glocks jammed on occasion.

My 686 Smith and Wesson has not had a FTF since I bought new it in 1994


Trystan

I've owned a total of fourteen Glocks since the early 1990s. Today I have ten. My experience on the reliability question is that if a Glock shoots without a hitch on the first range trip, it will simply never malfunction. Just my experience. I know that eventually, given an infinite number of rounds fired, it will fail in some way or other. But my experience is 100% reliability, if it has no issues on its first range trip.

Here are the three Glocks I've had that had issues: An early edition of the Glock 42, which was 100% fixed with the latest rendition of the magazine (Glock admitted that their first magazines for it caused issues); a Glock 21 that malfunctioned from day one, which was sent back and returned to me 100% reliable; and a Glock 30S, which had the issue of locking open before the mag was empty, which Glock wasn't able to fix, so the gun got sold. On the last one, Glock insisted that I must be contacting the slide lock under recoil, which I wasn't. All the others have been 100% since purchased, several of them having been fired untold thousands of times.

I'd compare their reliability to any wheel gun you have.

PS I've also had revolvers that failed at the range, one locking up from pulled bullets, one from residue accumulation under the star, one from a damaged firing pin port, others from action lock ups of unknown cause, at least one of the last type was brand new from S&W and required sending back.

Semi autos have there virtues and thats why many gravitate toward them. As reliable as a wheel gun? Your not going to convince me of that and I think its a hard sale to most who have experiences with both.

As far as who prefers a 40. I'd take a 40 over a 9mm every day of the week. I put thousands of rounds thru my 9mm but only 6 rounds into an animal. My wife shot a deer with a reduced recoil 270 load that didn't kill the deer but made it very sick. After 5 shots to the temple from 10 feet away I was starting to wonder if a 9mm could kill a deer. Thankfully the 6th shot made it thru! And to think I'd been carrying that little 9mm around for bear protection 😅 JMO



Trystan

What ammo?

I don't trust autos as much as revolvers either.
Irrational? Maybe, but, I am spooked by the occasional top-tier jam-o-matic that even the manufacturer has trouble diagnosing.