Anyone else begrudgingly packing a 9mm

Status
Not open for further replies.
Really not a big fan of the 9mm, much prefer the 38 Super and 1911's in general but in the extreme heat of summer I find the Sig P365 perfect for front pocket concealed carry.
Just curious about what others think about packin the punybellum? ;)
I think begrudgingly is the term I would use also.
I am a .357Mag revolver fan. I cast the bullets, reload the brass, repeat.....
My main carry gun is the sr9c. Yeah, it is lighter...and more capacity...and thinner....and quieter....and accurate....longer sight radius...and quicker to reload....with a light rail....and loaded chamber indicator....fully ambidextrous......
HO HUM.
I cant deny the advantages, but.....yeah.
 
.357 Sig than .40 for me.
I shot USPSA and 40S&W brass was readily available and reloadable. If I didn't shoot competition and reloaded, .357 Sig would be a fine choice over the 9mm (Same 9mm bullet that travels faster for greater terminal velocity? Especially for shorter barrels that reduce muzzle velocity? Yes).

Conversion barrels are a great thing.
For me, gives you the best of both worlds shooting option.

My first handgun was M1911 in the service. As a civilian I started with a 45 acp Colt and then went to the Beretta 92F shortly after they came on the market.
Same here ... introduced to 1911 in the service and left just before transition to 9mm Beretta. While I admired the 1911 platform, my introduction was mixed as I was the person who had to make them reliable for my unit, especially those new out of the box and understood why some welcomed the switched to 9mm Beretta.

9mm ... It will get the job done if you use the right ammo
As to 9mm is "good enough" due to "modern improvements" to bullet construction, I believe if manufacturers improved the 9mm bullets, they must have improved the 40/45 bullets also ... ;)

Don't get me wrong, I LIKE 9mm as a caliber (Especially for PCC) and I am glad to have many shooting options to choose from.
 
As to 9mm is "good enough" due to "modern improvements" to bullet construction, I believe if manufacturers improved the 9mm bullets, they must have improved the 40/45 bullets also ...
Sure. There are premium .40 and .45 loads that pass the FBI protocols.

But twe are told that they provide little, if any, advantage over the 9 in teems of wounding effectiveness, and we know that in comparable service pistol, they are not as conducive to rapid controlled fire.
 
"Begrudgingly"? No. I carried a couple of different types of 9mm pistols in afg on active duty and as a contractor after I retired. Even had the opportunity to actually "use" a pistol a time or 2. Served me well- even though I wasn't happy with the design of all of my issued 9mm pistols, what happened on the other end was just fine.
 
.45 Shield is what you seek. Mine’s never missed a beat.
I’ve never felt 9mm was weak, neither does most LEOs. But they have to factor in capacity as well.

used to own a Kahn PM45, a love-hate relationship. Fit my hands well for a pocket carry, good trigger, VERY accurate, but after 300 rounds of every type of fmj ball .45acp I could find, nothing was reliable.
 
I do have to ask, OP, what about the extra 200 fps of .38 Super appeals to you over 9mm +p.

I haven't found, apart from possibly assuring penetration and expansion, a reason to value roughly the same bullet going a little faster so much over the 9mm+.

A bigger bullet like .45 or .40, sure I get the reasoning, you've got momentum or energy or diameter or other measureables, but with a 9mm that hits the FBI standard, what gain does a few hundred FPS at best get you?

It's a serious question as I have a .357 Sig barrel for one of my guns largely unused and if I could find a concrete reason to bother, I'd use it for my CCW.
 
I do have to ask, OP, what about the extra 200 fps of .38 Super appeals to you over 9mm +p.

I haven't found, apart from possibly assuring penetration and expansion, a reason to value roughly the same bullet going a little faster so much over the 9mm+.

A bigger bullet like .45 or .40, sure I get the reasoning, you've got momentum or energy or diameter or other measureables, but with a 9mm that hits the FBI standard, what gain does a few hundred FPS at best get you?

It's a serious question as I have a .357 Sig barrel for one of my guns largely unused and if I could find a concrete reason to bother, I'd use it for my CCW.

JR24, go take a look at Lucky Gunner ballistic tests.

https://www.luckygunner.com/labs/self-defense-ammo-ballistic-tests/

Find the 9mm and 9mm+p 124gr Federal HST tests, and the .357 Sig 125gr Federal HST. Very similar bullets in terms of construction and weight. The 9s are shot from a shorter barrel, but we're looking at the difference velocity makes. Penetration and expansion are similar across the board. But look at how much each load makes the gel block lift. That's kinetic energy at work. It's even more pronounced of an impact in the 125gr Speer Gold Dot .357 Sig, which doesn't penetrate as deep (but about as far as many of the .45s do) and dumps that energy hard and fast.

Now I can't say that a kinetic energy dump like that actually has an effect on human physiology, to the point of stopping a threat quicker. But thinking about my torso taking that kind of hit isn't pleasing. There's no evidence that kinetic energy transfer stops fights even momentarily. But there's no evidence that it doesn't either, because how could anyone measure that.

However, my personal take on it is that if I hit an attacker with that kind of energy, and also poke a hole in them which bleeds, that's not a negative. If that amount of energy transfer temporarily shocks their nervous system enough to slow them down or stop them for a few seconds, that's just more time for their blood pressure to drop. Maybe that won't happen, and I'm just shooting a snappy and harder to control 9mm with no benefit. Hard to say.
 
"Begrudgingly?" Nay. Willingly. Yes. A few years back, arthritis, tendonitis, tendonosis, shredded rotator cuffs and torn labrums absolutely forced me to put down The Man Gun (.45 ACP) for regular carry and shooting.

Given what we know about the effectiveness about current 9mm ballistics and bullet technology, I cannot believe that anyone who's actually been paying attention lo, these last ten or fifteen years, would have any qualms about carrying a handgun chambered in 9mm.

No disrespect to the OP, but why do we even need to ponder this question anymore? I realize we all have our pet calibers (and for sure, mine was always the 45) but let's not let emotion and sentimentality get in the way of science and actual results.
 
Given what we know about the effectiveness about current 9mm ballistics and bullet technology, I cannot believe that anyone who's actually been paying attention lo, these last ten or fifteen years, would have any qualms about carrying a handgun chambered in 9mm.
I can't figure it out either.
 
The price structure of factory ammo makes owning one 9mm a necessity.
That ship has sailed, local range is charging $40 bucks, on sale, for a box of 50 Sellar Beloit's which has forced me to reload them like in the Obama shortage.:(

I do have to ask, OP, what about the extra 200 fps of .38 Super appeals to you over 9mm +p.
In a 4.25" barrel shooting a 124gr. XTP bullet with a dose of VV-N105 I'm getting an honest 1400fps which puts the Super in the 357mag realm.
Problem with the 357Sig is the bottleneck case which makes it a pita to reload for.
In addition for me the Super is significantly more accurate than any 9mm I have ever owned and I have had quite a few, currently shooting a CZ 85Combat for a target pistol it is the most accurate 9 I have ever owned but it doesn't come anywhere near the 2 1911 Supers I own. The Dan Wesson Guardian has become my favorite CCW gun everywhere except in the woods where I prefer a 45 Colt revolver.;)
 
In a 4.25" barrel shooting a 124gr. XTP bullet with a dose of VV-N105 I'm getting an honest 1400fps which puts the Super in the 357mag realm.
.....In addition for me the Super is significantly more accurate than any 9mm I have ever owned
But those things have little real relevance to self defense, which is the subject of the thread.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top