I don't quite understand using a rifle for home defense

[ssr]

I have always thought I would use a handgun or possibly shotgun for home defense. I have many ARs, but never thought of using them in a defensive situation. Then I took a 3 day tactical rifle course, basically just for fun, and it opened my eyes to the use of ARs or other rifles for home/self defense.

Penetration? As stated earlier, depends upon ammo, and defense rifle rounds work great and will be stopped by walls/bad guys just like handgun HPs.

I also started looking at it by analyzing situations. Such as, in a home invasion, what tool would work better for taking out bad guys. If someone was in the house and say had my wife or daughter hostage, would I rather confront them with a handgun or shotgun, or an AR with red dot optic? I would say, AR (as long as you know the point blank POI versus 50 or 100 yards). Defintiely I don't want a shotgun there, if someone is behind a loved one.

Also for home invasion, it is generally not tactically a good idea to start clearing your house by yourself if you don't need to, if you know someone is there. Better to sit in you room or top of stairs or wherever, and then, what would be better? AR or handgun? I say AR. Although a shotgun is good there too .

Everything, of course, depends upon the situation. Handgun, shotgun, and rifle all have pros and cons for any given situation. But for many self defense and home defense situations, a rifle is a great option.

 

[ArmedBear]

Correia, here's the deal.

I live in a 1073 sqft 3-story townhouse. You probably have never seen such a thing in a saner place like Utah, but that's what it is. There are exactly two places where I could take effective cover: the tops of my two just-barely-wide-enough-for-building-codes stairways. They're both walled in on both sides, and they both face in the direction that would allow me to shoot a pistol one-handed with my right (dominant) hand. Because of the oblique angle, the studs in the walls would stop any bullets fired at me unless they hit the small exposed part my head or hand.

Because of the layout of the place, these are the also the only natural funnel points where a home invader would HAVE to go to hurt my wife or me, and it would be remarkably easy to shoot them, especially since even multiple home invaders would have to come up single file if they're armed. Furthermore, any misses would go into the floor, not the neighbor's place or another room in my place.

A carbine would be unwieldy, not because I can't get around a corner with it, but because I can shoot one-handed with a pistol from about 90% cover, whereas shooting a carbine would require a periscope or exposing a lot more of myself.

The four places (stairways, bed and door) where I would be likely to use a gun all favor a pistol IN MY CASE.

Furthermore, I can keep a pistol in a quick-access safe where I sleep, so I don't have to worry about securing and unsecuring it all the time. I live in a safe place with 24 hour security; it's unlikely I'll ever have to use a gun. So it would be easy to get complacent. With the quick-access safe, though, it'll still be there for me if and when I DO need it, and it won't be readily available to a burglar.

I HAVE thought this through.

Regarding overpenetration, I did some looking around and apparently a 5.56 bullet DOES behave differently from every other rifle bullet. I'll take some drywall to the desert and find out. Interesting. Thanks for the info. Of course, anything that penetrates two layers of drywall and keeps going at lethal velocity still requires special consideration in my place, so I'm not convinced that a 5.56 will be far superior to a pre-cut 9mm JHP. Time for some bubbalistics testing with drywall.

However, overshooting is a different story. I live in a densely-populated area between the beach and the harbor. A pistol bullet fired horizontally will slow down sooner and hit the ground a LOT sooner than a 5.56, which is a flat-shooting varmint bullet when it's wearing civvies. If I have to go to the door with a gun, the pistol is simply a much more responsible choice than a 5.56, since my door looks out over a long residential street.

I am not a SWAT team. If I have to shoot my way anywhere, it'll be OUT of my place, not into it. I won't be too worried about "clearing" it. If I have to shoot my way through a stairway, I won't have backup.

Now I would love to do some serious training with SWAT-style instructors. Anything I can learn, and I could learn a LOT, I'd like to learn.

Addendum for the record:

On Sunday, I tied for first place overall in a special match at our club where we shot steel plates rapid-fire with pistols for time (took 1st), rifles time-fire for groups (took 2nd), and 5-stand -- clays in all directions, not easy-to-hit stationary targets -- with shotguns (did mediocre, since I misunderstood the event I'd be shooting and I brought my little quail popper, not a longer, heavier 12 Gauge that swings and reaches out far better for the long shots).

I don't think I'm a great shooter. There are plenty of people here who could outshoot me. However, I can say with confidence that I can competently shoot whatever gun I think will work best and I would choose a gun accordingly.

I like my 5.56 carbine (Mini-14). It's fun to shoot hand-thrown clay pigeons with it. I would have no qualms about defending myself with it. Target acquisition is really fast with it, at least for me, on stationary and moving targets.

It just isn't my first choice for defending MY current home, given all the factors above, and neither is the AR I have on order.

 

[Correia]

Armed Bear, that's perfect. You have some very specific needs, and are doing everything you can to address your specific situation. That's awesome.

I've got no problem with people doing what works for them. It is all about picking the right tool for the job.

I still stand by the fact that your handgun sucks. (i.e. the varmit bullet or buckshot is going to be superior) but if your situation mandates one handed use, you've got to run whatever you can. Then you've got to use whatever works.

 

[ArmedBear]

Oh, I won't deny that my handgun sucks. I should get special karma points for not rubbing it in too hard last Sunday when I beat a bunch of guys with custom 1911's and expensive Euroguns with my all-original 30-year-old German Army surplus POS that people in the pistol forum say can't shoot well or even stand up to normal use. It's nothing to look at, but it's what's in my QA safe, because I know I can acquire and hit a target with it, and because it's never failed to feed or fire.

The best summary of defensive firearms use I've read went something like this....

A gun is not a death ray.
Shot placement matters.
Even a weak rifle round is more powerful and more devastating to the target than any manageable handgun round.
At close range, nothing hits like a heavy load of buckshot.
Each individual situation has its own considerations.
The gun you have always beats no gun at all.

 

[mpmarty]

2 cents more

I would much prefer to have my AK in hand than my 10mm or 45acp house gun. That said, I choose not to leave my long guns out of the safe where they collect spiders, dust and grime. I have the safe unlocked during the day when I'm home and it is three paces from where I sit drinking coffee, typing on my keyboard or reading and there are three loaded AKs in the front row of the safe as well as my mossy 500. If I ever need armed response to a threat at night I'm sure I'd prefer to have one of the AKs rather than the 10mm w/ sixteen rounds and the XD45 with fourteen rounds and the 90 lumen light but life is full of compromises. My wife and I just can't live at defcon four day in and day out so we settle for less than ideal hd weapons at the ready.

 

[ArmedBear]

To piggyback on what mpmarty said...

DR Zinn and I TRIED to get my electronic long gun safe upstairs to the bedroom, but, due to the home layout described above, failed miserably. There's still a chunk missing from a wall as a sad reminder of our failure to clear said wall. It WOULD have been a good quick-access way to secure loaded long guns in the bedroom, but it didn't work out.

There's always a tradeoff, too, between providing loaded firearms to an intruder (or a curious visiting child), and having them available for your own use.

 

[ctdonath]

Ah, more details emerge - and make sense!

Once again, what's optimal for one is intolerable for another, which makes sense if both would quit banging their opinions over the others' head and actually explain the basis for the opinion.

Kids? Laws? Apartments? Floorplan? all may validly explain choosing pistol over rifle. If you do have the option, however, rifle usually wins.

 

[EBRDude]

I use a .308 AP4 for home defense with 19 155gr TAP. A 10mm goes with me when I am mobile. How's that for overkill? Anyone offended? I want the person I may have to shoot to explode if possible. Fair fights mean you planned poorly.

 

[2RCO]

This is the Thread that Never Ends! I still haven't bought my M4gery yet but this could soon change. I do know this if I am using a rifle it is going to have a combat flashlight mounted on it.