Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns What you REALLY need from a personal protection handgun

More bullets equals fewer witnesses. 9mm wins again.

Didn't say nuthin' about makin' the 1st move; you're the one that mentioned it.................

MM

Just wondering about some questions. Not posted specifically to Kevin, just because he seems to have great experience. I numbered questions so people can answer specific questions.

1. If caliber is not important, why use HP ammo, why not just FMJ?

2. If caliber is not important, why not use .22lr for cheaper cost? Or is there a gradual difference?

3. Is power of a cartridge important? Penetration seems like it would matter too.

4. Is there a mixture of things to consider? Like 147gr HP 9mms may penetrate better than .45 HP's? But a FMJ 9mm will penetrate even more, but will not work as well as HP?

Certainly there is some caliber or power or bullet construction that comes into the decision. I don't think anyone here would handgun hunt black bears with a .25ACP when a .44 Mag was available. I agree that the modern bullets in HP have made the "defensive" calibers much better, but I don't want to be in a robbery waving a handgun around saying "it starts with a 2, it starts with a 2".

1.) With modern ,expanding JHP ammo, there is not enough difference in the common defensive calibers to make a difference.

2.) Common calibers are 9mm, .40S&W, .357 Sig, and .45ACP. I suppose 10mm, .357 Magnum, and .38spl could be lumped in as well, but they really arent common anymore.

3.) FBI tests, and real world case studies show that 12" is the golden depth for penetration. Deeper may or may not be more effective, depending on a number of variables, and shallower rarely is as effective. Bullet design plays as much a role in this as power/muzzle energy/velocity, but both of these factors work hand in hand.

4.) This is where it gets less fact based, and more emotion driven. The manufacturers have done a pretty good job of leveling the playing field through bullet design. How each caliber, and its respective load accomplish this is a combination of the above factors, working to achieve the same goal. One must decide which method he prefers.

Some folks are saying that .45 ACP and 9mm are close in stopping power because what one lacks in velocity it makes up in bullet mass and size of hole, and vice versa. I don't think anyone is saying that .22 lr is equal to .44 Magnum.

IME shooting game with an expanding bullet in the 9mm penetration suffers. I have also noticed that the 45 is quicker in putting down game. Dr. Martin Fackler states that bigger is better, but does not qunatify how much better. I concur with that statementbased on my experience taking game with both calibers

Yea, I agree with that. And the example of 243 and 30-06 on deer, well I'll bite that they could be close. But what about 243 and heavy bullet against 30-06with heavy bullets against grizzley. Maybe 9mm to 45ACP is pretty close, but 9mm to 44 mag with proficient shot placement with both is not likely to be equal. There are definately differences if you look at the extremes...knife vs. thermonuclear warhead. I agree that the "defensive" calibers have gotten both better and closer together. Round count vs. bullet mass are things I always think about...9mm, 40, 45, 10mm right now.

Too counter anecdotes with anecdotes, I have shot three dogs in my career. Two with a .45, one with a 9mm. The two .45 hits were with Gold Dot, one 230gr, and the other with 200gr +P.

One was a straight on chest cavity shot, and a follow up shoulder shot. I chased the dog nearly three miles before I lost it. There was more blood than I though possible.

The second, with the 200gr +P was a solid shoulder shot, from above, facing toward me. Entered high left shoulder, exited right armpit. Dog continued to try to bite me, and had to be kicked off of me. He ran several blocks before expiring.

The last was shot with a 9mm Winchester Ranger-T 124gr. Much the same shot as above, little lower on the shoulder. The dog continued toward me, then collpased about a foot from me, still trying to bite me. It was dead within 30 seconds.


You know what the moral of the story is?









I need to start shooting dogs in the head.

That was funny. I get your point. Or, you could carry a 12ga with buckshot (not to say a 12ga is better than a 9mm or .45 due to avoidance of flame wars).

Trust me, if I had of had time to get to the shotgun, I would have..a pistol is NEVER the thing I want to have to fight with.

I have mostly black bear problems here, probably 6 over the last 13 years. Have had some act aggressive, one broke a window out, frame and all. One little one tried to swat me from the back deck when I was looking out of the back window at night to see what was making noise. Window did not break, but bonked me in the head pretty good when the window flexed. I am not looking at 9mm for carry around the house. Still looking at 41 mag and 44 mag options. Maybe 10mm.

I dont blame you one bit for that one.

For scenarios like that, Im a pretty big .45LC fan.

Sorry, but this just isn't true. There are plenty of .38spl and .357mag revolvers still out there being used for self defense. And the muzzle energy difference between the two is better than 2-1/2:1.

I agree there too. My wife has a .357 with 38 spl practice because she can't work the slide on any of my semi autos.

The vast majority of empirical data is gleaned from law enforcement shootings. In law enforcement circles, any caliber other than the big 4 is basically irrelevant, due to the minute amount of data. It was not my intent to say the calibers are no longer commonly used, but simply not common in the context of these sorts of studies.

As for your other clarification, muzzle energy has nothing to do with lethality. Much like Taylors Index or Hatchers Theory, its a good yardstick to measure one caliber against another, but it has no correlation to anything in the real world.

You really should get out more.

Seriously, I'm sure you have a lot of experience, but now you're arguing simply to justify your previous (frivolous) comments. Energy has nothing to do w/ lethality?
OK, if you say so.

OK, perhaps I worded that wrong......no perhaps, thats looks retarded.

What I should have said is that muzzle energy in and of itself is irrelevant except as a yardstick against which to measure comparable cartridges. The number itself means nothing, its just a number.

Of course relative power is a factor, just as expansion and penetration are factors. However, one you cross that threshold of acceptable power, and the other factors are within their envelope of design, the argument becomes moot.

That matches my intuition, also.

In most every instance that I said caliber isn't important, I said within reason; there's always someone who just HAS to take things to an extreme just to make a point.

It's more a matter of penetration sufficient to reach the vitals; and that's consistent with both Fackler's and the FBI's methodology. So if the .243 bullet reaches the vitals and manages to destroy them, then there will be no discernable difference to how fast the animal dies if you use the .30-06...again, this is all within reason.

You could immediately jump to an extreme of .243 vs. .50 BMG; the comparison of the two just become rediculous.

With combat handgun cartridges, the assumption is that we're being reasonable in our discussion and not jumping to extremes. Pack a .600 Nitro Express revolver and everythinig I have said flies right out the window. But for some, it's more about winning the arguement than getting to the facts. If it's all about winning the arguement, I'll just concede now and be done with it. But I like the debate because it always stimulates brain cells (a rare thing for me), and makes me (and hopefully others) re-examine what I "know" (more like think I know) to be true.