Would you rather have 15 round of 9mm, or 8 rounds of 45 in your carry gun

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Preferably ironclad, irrefutable, quantitative data sets proving this point.
30yrs of killing critters. I'm not at all saying the 9mm won't work, hell I carry a .380 more often than anything. But the undeniable fact is that bigger bullets make bigger holes and bigger holes incapacitate quicker than smaller ones. A small bore like the 9mm absolutely relies on textbook expansion to do its job. With a .44 or .45, expansion is a bonus but not critical. They 'may' all work on the average human in the average gunfight but they certainly do not all work "the same".

I'll let the armchair self defense experts worry about "data".

All that said, equipment takes a distant backseat to skill and mindset.
 
Personally I'd rather have 45acp defense loads than 9mm. That being said I carry 45acp, 9mm Luger, 380(9mmshort) and in the past even 22lr stingers. It just depends on time of year, dress , location etc. I feel in just as accurate with 45acp in my 1911 as any 9mm or smaller. To me anything over 8 or 9 rounds is a non issue unless you're in L. E.
I've never had a 9mm on the nightstand at night and have some that hold 16 Rnds.
No matter what I CC, I always have a 45 in the car. 95% of time it's a 45 on the nightstand at night. But on rare occasion it's a 357 mag (6 rnd)or a 380 (7rnd).
 
In this case what I think is irrelevant. Carry what YOU like in your gun.
 
I've tried them all - five rounds of .357, six rounds of .357, seven rounds of .380, eight rounds of .45, nine rounds of 9mm, thirteen rounds of .40, thirteen rounds of .45, sixteen rounds of 9mm, eighteen rounds of 9mm. I may have left something out. Five rounds of .357 is the most comfortable to carry, and what I carry most often, but probably the least comforting. The idea of taking on two opponents with a five-shot revolver is daunting, to say the least. This is fresh in my mind because of a couple of aggressive dogs that were loose in the neighborhood again today. I refer to this excellent thread: http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=665883

Two adversaries, 5 rounds, I fail to see the problem. Hell, I could double tap both and still have a round left. :D
 
Two adversaries, 5 rounds, I fail to see the problem.

Yep, any number of skilled & experienced folks often remark they carry their 5-shot snubs in anticipation of only having to deal with 1-2 attackers, and back when we carried 6-shot service revolvers it wasn't unknown for skilled folks not to consider themselves ill-equipped for facing 2-3 attackers with a revolver.
 
Assuming we are at the "point and click" phase of any serious social encounter, I would prefer more rounds of 9mm. However, in my entire life I have never drawn down on anybody, and doubt I ever will. I anticipate a whole lot of carry and precious little, or none at all, shooting. For that reason, my preferences lean towards the least objectionable shootin' iron that I can conceal and access if needed.

For that reason I would choose the 1911 over a high capacity auto pistol, and oddly enough, I actually prefer a revolver to a 1911.
 
No matter how fast you can reload you cannot do it faster than a trigger can be pulled. After 8 .45ACPs don't end the fight you can expect a guy with a 15 round capacity 9mm to fire a few more rounds at you before you fire your next shot. If you are not behind cover reloading your .45ACP good luck may be the only thing that keeps you alive. Think about this: even if you have a shot-reload-shot time of 1 second your opponent only needs to fire one shot to kill you and probably has the ability to fire more than one shot during that 1 second that could be the last second of your life. The .45ACP may or may not be a more effective round for self-defense, but if it is more effective it is not effective enough to out weight the benefit of having more rounds of an almost as effective cartridge. Despite what Jeff Cooper' Relative Stopping Power Short Form equations and Julian Hatcher's RSP formula indicates, the 9mm is not only 64% as effective as a .45ACP. The difference, if any, in effectiveness is too small to make 8 rounds of .45ACP a better choice than 15 rounds of 9mm in a gun fight.
 
I carry a SR40c. I wanted something >.380 and at max .45acp. The SRc frame fit my hand and I loved the trigger. I went with .40 because even in the height of the shortage, it was easily available. Find what feels good to you. Caliber, up to a point, doesn't matter.
 
Bonus points to anyone who used the formula for the calculation of the volume of a right cylinder before selecting their carry pistol caliber.

picture-formula-volume-of-cylinder.png

That is a great formula! I used it daily for several years to determine gallons, psi, flow rate, and force. The formula is much more useful for that than for selecting a carry pistol caliber. Volume is almost an insignificant factor when selecting a carry pistol caliber. If it was significant, paint ball pistols would be much more deadly.:D
 
This would be directed more towards a confrontation that just occurred without warning.
I want to have a gun ;) ... and between the 2 suggested I am in the .45 group.

Dependent upon the day, the weather, what I am wearing, where I am going, etc I will be carrying a 9x17(6+1), 9x19(7+1) or a .45ACP(5+1) ... and I only carry an extra mag with the 9x17 because I have modded its pocket holster to accommodate same.
 
If it could be proven 100% without a doubt that one handgun caliber was better than all the rest we would all be using it. It can't be proven because the truth is that any bullet with enough penetration placed right will work regardless of caliber. Pick a gun, and practice.
 
If it could be proven 100% without a doubt that one handgun caliber was better than all the rest we would all be using it. It can't be proven because the truth is that any bullet with enough penetration placed right will work regardless of caliber. Pick a gun, and practice.



Even though I prefer 45acp I believe this statement to be 100% true. That's why I still feel well armed carrying my p238 at times.
 
My personal preference would be 7 rounds of .45 ACP or 5 rounds of .44 Spl. But I wouldn't feel terribly disadvantaged if all I had was a Ruger MK II with 10 rounds in it, shot placement being the most important factor. If faced with more than two adversaries my 1st priority is going to be 1) find some hard cover, get behind it and make them come to me and - 2) get the hell out of there.
 
I carried a Sig P220 for a number of years, I switched two years ago to a Sig P229R. I decided the 16 rounds (15+1) would offer more for me than the 9 (8+1) rounds of .45.
Just my personal preferance.
 
Actually my 1911 45's that are 8+1 and 7+1 sometimes are loaded with 6+1 and 5+1. They're full right now, but 3 or 4 shots if that would usually be needed. In reality 1 or 2 shots should be enough unless you taking on a street gang
 
Bullet design has virtually eliminated advantage between calibers of decent defensive value. Yes, I am throwing the popular .380 under the bus. Defensive calibers in autoloaders start at 9mm. and go up from there. Pick a gun you can handle and shoot well. End of story.

There may be a ring of truth to this..........
 

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Given how generic the question is, I'd take the .45 ACP. If the auto I have is 100% reliable with hollow points I'd be fine with 9mm. But, I have trust issues. Seriously. Prefer a revolver, then, a .45, then, a 9 mm with hollow points.

I'm sure I'd be fine with any option. It's the sitting around carrying them when I build up insecurity.
 
When I was a soldier I was definitely all about capacity.

But as a civilian I don't sweat capacity so much.

As for caliber, 9mm Browning and above are all fine with me.
 
When I was a soldier I was definitely all about capacity.

But as a civilian I don't sweat capacity so much.

As for caliber, 9mm Browning and above are all fine with me.

Are you referring to 9mm Browning Short or 9mm Browning Long? I assume you mean 9mm Browning Short since that is the metric designation for .380.
 
I would prefer carrying an FNP-45 with 15+1 or a Sig X-5 TAC with 18+1 (with a Mec-Gar mag), but they are heavy. I've tried it. Doable, but heavy. I'd need 4 or 5 mags on the opposite side of my belt to balance the load day after day.

I still like my Rohrbaugh.

John
 
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