9mm vs. .45

9mm, .45, or other?

  • 9mm

    Votes: 137 43.2%

  • .45

    Votes: 145 45.7%

  • other

    Votes: 35 11.0%
  • Total voters
    317
  • Poll closed .
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I have no faith in size/diameter/weight of any round.
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Obviously, if you don't hit your target, it doesn't matter what you miss with. It does, however, matter what you hit with.:)
 
.45 hands down.
Since most gunfights end in a few rounds, I want the largest and most brutal weapon available.
 
Well, if I had a true preference, I'd probably choose .30 Carbine from an AMT Automag III. But I can't afford that pistol yet, so I'll choose .45. Truth be told, when you come down to it, it's probably the better caliber. A lot of people are running on lore from the earlier days, back when cops switched to 9mm because the recoil was more manageable. Modern .45 pistols tend to have a milder recoil and return to target quickly, whereas some older .45's could jump around a bit depending on your arm and wrist strength. While the 9mm has gained some power with +P ammo, so has the .45. It's worth noting that you see a lot of police departments upgunning themselves again, either to .40 or back to .45.
 
I tend to be a 9mm guy for the most part. My reasons:

--I shoot my Glocks better than my 1911's, and they happen to be 9mm. I've shot several Glock 21's and shoot them better than any 1911 I've shot (other than a TRP)
--The cost of ammo has something to do with it
--My wife feels comfortable with the 9mm Glocks, isn't comfortable with the 1911's
--With modern hollowpoints, I trust the 9mm for defensive work
--My 1911's have had just enough problems to make me leary of carrying them. They are reliable, but not AS reliable as my Glocks have been.

So, the 9mm gets my love not because I think it's a better round. Rather, it's mostly because of the pistols I own.

Most of the bad rap the 9mm gets is based on instances that don't fully apply to civilian CCW today. Most of the departments with dismal 9mm results were either carrying FMJ or the heavy subsonic 9mm's which are not great defensive choices. Same with the military, who carries FMJ only. Again, not the best defensive choice. Now, we civillians can choose what rounds we carry and hollowpoint design has come a long way in the past 15 years.
 
I still shoot my DW 1911 better than anything I have tried and for close quarters, personal defense I feel good about any type of .45 ammo with good shot placement.

I would fell pretty good about my Beretta 92 as well (especially with 15 JHPs) but I am more accurate with the .45.
 
10mm is my other pick because:

I have a long lasting obsession with it since the Bren Ten was the featured gun on the first gun magazine I bought.

I reload, so available variety of bullets weights/velocity is not an issue.
I cast my own bullets from free lead for plinking and practice, so cost is not an issue.

Despite what Hags said (tongue in cheek I bet), my two 10mm have well over 200 rounds through them and still shoot just great. Probably more like 2000 rounds each.

I can light load to easy to shoot 40 ballistics, or I can tickle the mid-range of 41 magnum, all from the same gun.

I have nothing against either 45 acp, or 9mm. I have owned both in the past. I was really tempted by a PT 845 I handled Saturday. But for me, the 10mm fits all my forseable needs.
 
Agree on the 10mm being a superb round. It and the 45acp are the only pistol rounds I mess with. For fun, I shoot the ten almost exclusively, for CCW I rely on the 45acp as all my tens weigh a ton and get tiresome after all day on my hip iwb.
 
It would be easy to argue that the 10mm is one of the best autoloading calibers out there, with the only drawbacks being availability and cost. I voted for the 9 because the capacity is nice. The 45 is still an awesome round so nothing against it. I do dislike the 40 short and weak. Its way to snappy for a caliber that can be matched with 9mm+p. With the S&W 1006 on my hip, i have no fears of it dying before i get to the 20,000 round mark. The only Glock that would interest me is the 29. But i cant shoot a glock to save my life
 
.45 all the way. I wont go into WHY, there are too many reasons. An interesting side note, however. My wife and I went to the range the other day and shot both her newly acquired P239 (9mm) and my P220 (.45 ACP). Lets just say that the P220 won for the day..(16 shots within a 3" to 4" group @ 10-12 yards). Did I mention it was her first time EVER to shoot a 45?

Im not saying the 45 is easier to shoot or that it is inherently more accurate vs the 9mm. My P220 is a full size weapon vs her semi-compact 9mm. Therefore, "balance" may have had something to do with it. But, I (as does my wife), feel that the 45 is a very well shooting and accurate round, along with exceptional/superior HD characteristics when compared to 9mm (this goes for +P ammo as well). In my mind, the main advantage of the 9mm is ammo cost, mag capacity and (usually) recoil control/accuracy. These are the main reasons I bought her a 9mm in the first place. But, as stated before, the accuracy thing may just sometimes depend on the weapon and not necessarily the caliber.

Either way, Ill take the .45......

Oh..and relating to the "cartoon" pics of the 45. Yeah, the 45 round may have the trajectory of a frisbee, but it packs one helluva punch when it hits. Ive managed to maintain regular/accurate hits out to the 50 yard range with my .45. Are other handgun calibers capable of this and more? Sure. Is more than this really necessary, particularly for HD use? Nah......At that point Id switch to a rifle. :D
 
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Since most gunfights end in a few rounds, I want the largest and most brutal weapon available.
Click to expand...

He should have said "the largest and most brutal, yet controllable weapon". Then, the 45 would make much more sense. Of course, the 12g shotgun trumps this, but..you get the idea.
 
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punkndisorderly said:
Most of the bad rap the 9mm gets is based on instances that don't fully apply to civilian CCW today. Most of the departments with dismal 9mm results were either carrying FMJ or the heavy subsonic 9mm's which are not great defensive choices. Same with the military, who carries FMJ only. Again, not the best defensive choice. Now, we civillians can choose what rounds we carry and hollowpoint design has come a long way in the past 15 years.
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The thing I like about .45 is that it's historical reliability isn't "round dependent". If I have to scrounge for ammo...
 
A .22 is as deadly as a .50 BMG in the right hands...
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Ok, you take the .22, I'll take the .50 BMG and we'll start 2000 yds apart and we'll see who wins......

:D
 
9mm or .45?!? :cuss:

.40S&W!

That's like asking if you should buy a one ton pickup for hauling heavy stuff or a half ton pickup for good fuel economy and not considering a 3/4 ton that splits the difference!

Although, really, they are all excellent for different reasons...
 
Not another 9mm vs. .45 thread. To those that say 9mm is worthless, ask them to stand in front of your target, at ANY range! Each one has about the same time frame and each has been proven to be effective over time. If the AWB becomes a reality once again, and IF we are forced to carry no more than 10 round magazines, then a .45 is probably superior to a nine. Either would be fine.
 
9v45postermi0.jpg


It's worthy of consideration if you truly are undecided between 9mm and .45 with no other biases to appease. For those of you who labored through this already, I apologize (although it is an easy read).

---------------------------------------------------
I lifted this from another ex-cop and don't have the credits to include, although it's supposedly authored by Gabe Suarez.

MAGAZINE CAPACITY FOR SELF-DEFENSE

I think the truth of the matter is that all self defense handgun calibers (excluding the pocket pistol category) are basically the same when it comes to dropping an adversary. That being the case, should we carry a pistol that only holds seven marginal shots, or one that holds as many as twice that number?

Magazine Capacity

I suppose this will be yet another highly controversial issue, but what the heck. Controversy makes for interesting discussion, no? The issue is to look at whether high magazine capacity gives you a tactical advantage, or if we are better served by carrying an equally sized weapon with a smaller capacity of bigger bullets. Before I answer my own question, let me put forth some facts as seen both in force on force training and on the street.

Point One - Pistol bullets, regardless of caliber are all, what one colleague calls, "iffy". None can be guaranteed to drop an adversary in his tracks reliably. The notion of a one shot stop is an urban myth dreamed up by those with a vested interest in such things. I have seen 45s work and fail, and I have seen 9mm both work and fail. For the record, the only one shot drop (excluding head shots) I have ever seen with a pistol was fired by a good friend as we entered a crack house during a SWAT raid. He shot the bad guy squarely in the heart with 9mm +P+ out of a SIG P-226. He only fired once because the bad guy fell before my friend could reset his trigger for the next shot!

If we look at the most prevalent calibers we see that there is very little difference between them. A 9mm (also .38/.357) is only one little millimeter smaller than the 10mm (aka .40 S&W), and that is only one little millimeter less than the vaunted 11mm (aka .45 ACP). And before we get into the high speed light bullet versus the heavy slow bullet argument, lets remember that you can only drive a pistol bullet so fast without drastically affecting its integrity. Moreover, since penetration is affected by weight, sacrificing weight for speed will not yield good results. Finally, you can only make a bullet so light or so heavy. There are limits to what you can shoot out of a pistol.

I have seen every one of these calibers fail at one time or another. There are those who disdain the 9mm as unsuitable for anything larger than squirrels. With modern ammunition, this is simply not true. There is also a myth and a cult grown up around the .45 ACP in this country. Sadly, it is not the deadly hammer of god its proponents suggest. This is not new. Read Fairbairn's Shoot To Live. He writes of two separate times when the .45 failed to work any better than anything else. Although one millimeter may give you a slight edge in a less than optimum body hit, under most circumstances, there will be very little difference between the effectiveness of the various calibers when modern anti-personnel ammo is used. Trauma injury doctors and reputable terminal ballistics experts tend to agree with this statement.

Point Two - Private Citizen CCW Operators do not go looking for trouble. If they are called to fight it is either because they have inadvertently crossed paths with bad guys while they are doing bad guy stuff (walking in on a robbery in progress as an example), or because they have been specifically targeted and stalked (such as a carjack, or home invasion event). They will have to use extreme violence to fight off the surprise attackers. When we translate the conversion of fright and startle into a firearm application we wee that definition is high volume of fire. You will shoot a lot, and until the threat is no longer there.

While these events share slightly different dynamics, the common thread often seen is that of multiple adversaries. The lone criminal or terrorist is an urban myth. If your fight only involves one, consider yourself lucky. More often than not you will be outnumbered.

Another point is the time frames in which these events take place. Think three seconds. After this, either you will be dead, or your adversaries will be dead. Urban gunfights do not go for hours. Unexpected, short duration, high intensity, extreme violence, multiple adversaries. That is the back drop.

Point Three - Our staff has collectively been in a large number of gunfights ranging from police, citizen, and military events. We draw on those experiences to set up mock gunfights in dynamic, unscripted force on force training drills. Although the surprise factor is missing (you generally don t know you will be in a gunfight until it is upon you), the dynamics of its evolution do not change much. Here are some other observations from watching hundreds of those drills.

1). Defenders will fire their weapons until the threat disappears. That means that until the role player falls down (simulating effective hits delivered), or runs away (removing the target), the good guy will keep firing. The concept of school solutions, controlled pairs, or otherwise artificially limiting the number of shots (as one does in a firing string on the range) does not hold up even in guys who've been extensively trained to do it.

2). When a training gun stops firing (due to running out of pellets), the shooter is still in the fight and still trying to shoot his enemy as well as trying to not be hit by him. We see them continue to try to work the trigger for one or two times before there is a realization that there has been a stoppage (malfunction or empty gun). This is followed by a visual examination of the gun, and only then is remedial action taken.

This can take upwards of a second and a half before anything is even attempted to fix the gun, and then the additional time needed to reload. Thus the idea that one can read the gun s feel and immediately realize a need to speed load simply does not hold up. Running out of ammo is usually a fight ender if there has been a failure to stop, or there are multiple adversaries at hand.

3). Participants in these reactive mock gunfights are debriefed immediately to get a clear picture of what happened before any rationalization takes place. Besides a shoot them to the ground firing process, most shooters do not remember seeing the crystal clear sight pictures they learned on the shooting range.

We see a great deal of point shooting, and gun index shooting. I have yet to see anyone strike a classic shooting posture and press off a carefully sighted pair in these room distance drills.

The point to remember is that in a fight such as what are likely for the private citizen, one can easily develop Bullet Deficit Disorder , and that this can have deleterious effects on the outcome of that fight.

The idea that a pair or trio of quality rounds carefully delivered onto a high scoring target zone will stop the action fails both the terminal ballistics test as well as the applications test.

A truth of gunfighting - Having more ammo immediately on board lessens the likelihood of ever needing to reload. Not needing to reload translates into more time delivering lead and less time manipulating the weapon. More trigger time increases likelihood of hitting, which increases survivability.

So the question is this. Given that there is a limit to the size pistol one can carry, do I want that pistol to hold more rounds? My answer is a strong YES!

Consider the similarly sized Glock 36 in .45 ACP, and the Glock 23 in .40 S&W. The latter holds nearly twice the ammo of the former in an almost identical package. The Glock 19 is an even more drastic comparison with 15 shots available. Of course there are also high capacity 45 pistols for those so inclined and for those who can wield them. I would argue that if your choice is a 45, a gun holding 13 would be better than a gun holding 6. And if your hand is too small for the 13 shooter, rather than decrease capacity, I d decrease caliber.

I have a colleague is South America who has been in High Risk Police Service for close to three decades. He has been in over three dozen verified gunfight . His weapon was originally a Browning Hi-Power and later a Glock 17.

I was very interested in hearing more so I asked him about the load he used. He said he had always used military ball full metal jacket. Astounded I asked him why he chose that. That is all we can get here. Hollow points are illegal .

I shook my head and told him that there was a belief in the USA that 9mm was an anemic caliber, especially in the load he d chosen. He shrugged and said that his adversaries must not have gotten the word. He said he fired a burst at the chest and if they didn't fall fast enough, he fired a burst at the face. He never needed to reload and had enough on board so if he missed a shot or two he could catch up in the fight. And before we hear the careful shooter versus the spraying prayer, this man is one of the best shots I have seen and competes on an international level. Even so, he knows the chaos in a gunfight can play havoc with even the most gifted marksman. Perhaps we need to take a lesson from him.

I still carry a Glock 17 with 17 rounds of Corbon DPX ammo in 9mm.

Gabe Suarez
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I chose a .45 ACP semi auto because that is my preferd caliber of choice. I am by no means undergunned with a 9mm.
 
I did not vote because your poll is too vague.

I love the 9mm, but I don't carry it. I carry 45.

I have several 9mm pistols and I keep some magazines loaded with "home defense" rounds just like I do for the carry 45.

I tend to be more accurate with my 9mm pistols, but I'm not a bad shot with the 45 either.

So if you want a better answer to your poll, you're going to have to let us know what application you want to use either for.

Both are excellent rounds; both have their advantages and disadvantages.



As far as limiting yourself because of price, we had a discussion on THR a while back and this was my solution:
1) There isn't that much difference in price to begin with.
2) If you are choosing a caliber based on your wallet, you are placing a monetary value on your life.
3) If you choose a caliber based on research and personal preference from shooting experience, then you are making an educated decision.
4) You can afford to shoot whatever round you want. Make a few lifestyle changes. Don't super size, change your own oil, etc. and you will find that you have the extra few cents per round difference.
5) You should also look into reloading or at least saving your brass and sending it to a reloader.
 
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I own both. Voted for the .45 but the job requires 9mm so I carry a SA XDM, 19+1 rounds of 9mm is plenty to get whatever job is needed done. At home I sleep with a 1911 on the nightstand and I sleep soundly.
I reload both so that keeps range ammo costs down and hollowpoints aren't cheap no matter what caliber your shooting these days!
 
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