.40 S&W going the way of the dinosaurs?

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Nom de Forum said:
What everyone is forgetting is that the .40 is like the .45; a red, white, and blue, U.S.A. through and through, American as apple pie and mom caliber that will be used by red blooded Americans of strong mind and body until phasers are available. The 9mm is a decadent, wicked, teutonic wench of a caliber that has been seducing naive and weak minded Americans and foreigners for a century. :D
Click to expand...
Funny, no one ever says that .38Spl, .357 mag or any of the other Magnums are good American cartridges.
 
It's not going anywhere. Like so many other calibers, it started out as a government/LE round, and the public bought into it. It makes since. Good enough for the Feds and LEOs, should be good enough for civilian defense.

There are just too many handguns chambered for it out there. I actually really like the caliber. It's been a welcome addition when 9mm and .45 were nowhere to be found.

14 rounds of 180gr is formidable.
 
It's here to stay.

I tend to think the sweet spot is the 155-165 gr. bullet weight rather than the 180.

There have been a lot of threads on this theme the last few years. All of them sparked by the rising cost of ammo leading folks to sell their guns that shoot more expensive ammo and so more of those guns showing up in used gun racks. Oh well.

tipoc
 
Why would one expect .40 to go extinct even if LE moved away from it? .45, .38, .357, etc have not disappeared.
 
Is it going extint? I highly doubt it. But its popularity compared to other defensive rounds might be going down.
 
When an autoloader barrel gets below 4", make mine a .40S&W, good as the .45ACP is, I worry about it losing too much velocity in short barrels to have adequate penetration.

So it'll never go away for my carry guns.
 
The government is irrational and wasteful with your and my money. In my experience in the military, and from hundreds of stories of waste I've heard/read, perfectly good equipment would be wasted, traded in, or otherwise disposed of needlessly so the budget would remain the same going forward.

It's unlikely the .40 is being replaced. It's more likely that there are budget excesses that need to be spent, even if new guns aren't necessary.

The .40 is here to stay, and is my top choice for personal SD round.
 
I think the .40 S&W will always have a niche of being between a 9 and .45. It's got decent capacity compared with the .45, especially in some comparisons (i.e. those who don't want a double-stack .45) and it's not a 9mm for those who want something bigger than a 9.
 
Yes, in the same way that the dinosaurs are still thriving (albeit in smaller, feathery-er forms), so too is the .40. The realities of departmental procurements, and their effect on the used pistol market has already been touched on.

There really are some killer deals on police trade-ins out there. I almost snapped up an M&P .40 for under $300, but in the end I couldn't get past the magazine safety.
 
Police Departments have officers that are "small stature" and / or not into shooing; 9mm may be chosen based on meeting the needs of those officers.

Not everyone thinks 9mm is just as effective as 40.

I still prefer 40 and 357 Sig over 9mm, despite any LE trends.
 
Almost every major Federal agency uses it, including the FBI, DEA, US Marshals, IRS, Border Patrol/Customs/DHS and the ATF. I think they are all using Glock 22s, 23s and 27s. Maybe a few Sig P229s or Beretta 96s.

Here at the Wal Marts near me in South Florida, the largest ammunition retailer in the USA if not the world, the 40 S&W is always on the shelves. I also think it is cheaper than every other center fire handgun round except 9mm and possibly 38 Special.

Since you can still readily buy 45 Colt, 38 Super, 10mm, 32 ACP, 41 Magnum and even 44-40 from major ammunition companies, I cannot see the 40 S&W going extinct even if it was inexplicably dropped today from all the major law enforcement agencies in the country.
 
Ok, maybe not going to go the way of the dinos, but I think its popularity has waned due to the development of better 9mm cartridges. From what I have read, more departments are switching back to 9mm. Right or wrong, some departments prefer higher capacity to slightly more energy.

Regardless, there are some really good deals out there on lightly used G22's & M&P's. I think I will take advantage. :)
 
Better

If the 9mm has gotten better due to advances in bullets and powders then how is it that the same advances haven't made the .40 better also?
Shoot anything other than paper with both and it's clear that .40>9mm.
 
If the 9mm has gotten better due to advances in bullets and powders then how is it that the same advances haven't made the .40 better also?
Click to expand...
Of course you are correct. But the point is that if you can get the same performance out of 9mm that used to be only available from .40, then what's your motivation for continuing to give up capacity and dealing with extra recoil? If you were happy with the performance you were getting before, now you can have that same performance but with more capacity and better shootability.

After all, if it was just about increasing terminal performance to the maximum available and nothing else mattered, then we'd all be carrying .460 Magnums around.

We get so focused on terminal performance sometimes that we forget that there are other parameters that are important when selecting a sidearm.
 
I just don't like the caliber. Personally I have been a .45 ACP fan, but the wife shot the 9mm better so the XD9 Service got the duty. Now I have a 1911 A2 that I enjoy shooting more than any pistol I have.
Still carry a .380 ACP though.

What cities are having Glock 22 and 23 for $350? I have some friends who think the .40 is the end all cartridge.
 
Well right now at my local Walmart 9 and 40 are plentiful. They can't seem to give it away. Now the problem is 45, can't hardly keep it in stock anymore. I don't know what's going on with that, unless they just ordered so much 9 and 40 and it's finally caught up with demand and now they have a ton of it in stock. As far as 40 going away, hahahahahahahaha! Keep dreaming my friends
 
Well right now at my local Walmart 9 and 40 are plentiful. They can't seem to give it away. Now the problem is 45, can't hardly keep it in stock anymore.
Click to expand...

It's always a problem when you try to draw any broad conclusions by looking at one or two stores. Too small a sample to mean anything.

tipoc
 
But the point is that if you can get the same performance out of 9mm that used to be only available from .40, then what's your motivation for continuing to give up capacity and dealing with extra recoil?
Click to expand...

Because handgun effectiveness has always been a marginal proposition -- use the maximum *you* can handle! Any improvements that help the 9mm would make the .40 & .45 even better!
 
The LE I was with traded for new every so many yrs. cal. was still 40 S&W. We used
Glock 22s. I carried that + owned one at one time. Not a Glock fan, I now carry
a PPQ in 40 as my PDW.
As Mark Twain said, " The news about my death has been greatly exaggerated".
Same for the 40.
 
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