If you were an LEO...

Would you carry a revolver on duty (LEO) in 2016?

  • Yes

    Votes: 72 29.0%
  • No

    Votes: 176 71.0%

  • Total voters
    248
  • Poll closed .
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I am not a police officer, but if I was, I think I'd be happy with either an auto or a revolver. No doubt the auto has some advantages over a revolver (i.e. higher capacity and faster reloads). However, revolvers are still capable weapons, with training the reload speeds can be improved (though an auto will still be better), and they have advantages of their own (better reliability, and with a 4-6" fixed barrel revolver you may have marginally better accuracy, though autos are still great in both departments).

I have a few questions for current and former LEOs:
  • How often have you actually had to draw your weapon?
  • How often, after you have had to draw, did you need to fire your weapon?
  • How many of those times did you need more than the 6-7 rounds of a typical medium-frame revolver?

Some of my thoughts are similar to Jenrick. In a situation where you draw and that is enough to diffuse the situation (probably pretty common) a revolver will probably be better than an auto. There is something quite intimidating about a 6 shot .38-.45 revolver with many of those rounds visible in the open cylinder.

LEO are more likely than civilian CCW holders to need to shoot through barriers. I think a .357mag, .41mag, .44spl, or .45LC would be quite capable for that role.

These days, I don't think very many cops are out there with only the one duty gun on their belt. Many carry backup guns, and if you aren't fully comfortable with the capacity/reload speed of a revolver, you could carry a Glock 26/27 with extra mags as your BUG. If I was a cop who carried an auto duty gun, I'd probably carry a J-frame BUG (something I gather from here and other gun forums is quite common among LEOs). I'm guessing that most of you have a shotgun or carbine in your trunk should you pull up on a situation where you know you are likely to need to use a gun. Either way, you can have options to combat the disadvantages of whatever your main duty gun happens to be.
 
Maybe if only 6 rounds we stop this spray and pray and learn to shoot. .Fire 15 shots and hit BG maybe 3 times. Shoot over 100 rounds in to a car kill 2 unarmed people. . I would have no problem with a old Model 19 4" as a carry weapon .

Some Police seem to want you to believe from time they report for duty till end. Their in running battles. All shifts and need more firepower . Bad guys attacking from every point on compass . Every day almost Custer last stand. Truth is many never draw their weapons and from shooting results must never practice either.
I worked with a PD in mid 1970's for little more than a year I carried a 1911 I never felt under gunned with 7+1 and 2 spare mags . Now their officers carrying almost many rounds as my basic load out in Nam .
Oh, okay. When most officers were carrying revolvers, you felt the need to carry a semi-auto and yet want to criticize officers today for doing the same thing? All due respect but one year of law enforcement in the 70's doesn't make you knowledgeable about the issues faced by today's police officer. Please don't tell us what we are thinking or what our attitude is because you haven't the slightest clue.

Some of you people need to disconnect from the internet and go out and actually meet a few officers. Ride out with them and see life from their point of view. It may actually change your own.
 
So I worked 6 years of patrol in the worst sector of one of the 20 largest departments in the nation. I've spent the last couple of years teaching firearms and tactics for both cadets and officers as my full time gig at the same agency.

To answer chaim's questions above:

How often have you actually had to draw your weapon?
Easily in the the low thousands. For a while pretty much two or three times a night wasn't uncommon.

How often, after you have had to draw, did you need to fire your weapon
Never yet, but there where probably about 13 situations where I would have been completely legal justified in shooting and it would have been a good shoot all the way around.

How many of those times did you need more than the 6-7 rounds of a typical medium-frame revolver?
None yet. Out of all of our recent shootings, I don't thing we've had a pistol shooting that took more then 6 rounds in years if ever.

The reality is the handgun is what we carry because it's portable. It sucks for gun fighting. I don't care the caliber, I don't care the capacity, I don't care the mechanism. A shotgun or rifle is a far superior weapon system, but it is too big and bulky to haul everywhere and the citizens wouldn't care for that. On the average if you are a solid shooter, with a level head, then 6-8 rounds in your pistol will likely be plenty. If you are a poor shooter, or can't stay calm under life or death stress, 20 rounds in your pistol probably wont be enough. Once you step out of the middle of the bell curve though, 20 rounds in your pistol might not be enough even if you are John Wayne. I also think that for your average officer, who is no more a gun person then your average citizen, a semi-auto striker fired pistol is your best bet to train them to be effective. The manual of arms is reasonably simple, and can be beaten into even the thickest of rookie skulls before the academy is over, the trigger is reasonably shoot'able, and manipulations are simpler for those who won't/don't practice.

A revolver in any modern service ammunition and of a reasonable caliber is just as effective as a semi-auto ballistically. If the officer carrying it puts in the effort and time to learn how to shoot it's DA trigger effectively, and practice their manipulations to reload it quickly, they will give up little if anything to the semi-auto shooter who doesn't practice. If an officer likes wheel guns and will practice and train with one, versus not enjoying semi-autos and failing to train with one, then a revolver is certainly a better choice for that officer. Conversely if they are just you average apathetic officer who won't train regardless of the gun their given, a semi-auto is probably a better answer.

Generations of American law officers fought the good fight with wheel guns when faced with everything from lever action rifles to assault rifles and machine guns over the years. Multiple assailants, heavily armed, and willing to shoot it out, is not a new phenomna in American LE. From the frontier days, through prohibition, into the depression, on into the counter culture wars and mini-revolutions of the 60's and 70's, the beginning of the drug wars in the 1980's, and through to today we have always faced criminals who had access to better weapons then we did, and yet the revolver sufficed for the millions of men and women who wore the badge and rode/walked/drove their beats and posts. In the annals of police history are there occasions where a G17 and 2 spare mags might have changed the outcome? Absolutely, but there are vastly more officers names inscribed on monuments across the country and in DC, where even an AR-15/FAL/etc. and a bandoleer of magazines wouldn't have helped any.

To quote John Steinbeck "The final weapon is the brain, all else is supplemental." Any officer who falls into the fallacy of thinking that one piece of gear on their belt or person is what will save their life, is in for a rude shock. What you will train hard with, what you will be the most proficient with, and what you will be willing to use when your life or someone else's life is on the line, is what you should carry.

-Jenrick
 
No. My on-duty sidearm is the Glock 19. However my backup is a S&W Model 49 revolver.
 
"the modern autoloader has been brought to such a state of perfection that malfunctions are so rare as to not be an issue" You actually believe that? You should work on auto loading pistols and shoot competition with one for a few years and then see what you think. There are so many things that can choke an autoloader that you could write books about it. Most of the big name smiths have. Don't get me wrong I love 1911s as much as anyone but I have seen so many of them choke on people during big money matches that I only carry revolvers.
In my 25 years of being leo, we've never had any problems with our sigs nor glocks.
 
I will say that when we first transitioned to the M&P's, I think a Lorcin would have run better. The first cadet class with them, sent at least half of them back to the factory before it was all said and done. Horrible reliability. I will say the ones we gotten since have run fine, but that first batch was a nightmare. Took a long time and a lot of rounds to get people over the perception that they were unreliable (and to be honest it was a fair opinion of that first batch of guns).

-Jenrick
 
Would I choose to carry a revolver on duty today? No. More to do with size, weight, gun cost, and maintenance. Most autos are less expensive and have more caliber options when compared to new S&W or Ruger revolvers.

This argument of revolver vs semi was already debated, fought over, and won by the semi.

If you want a round count debate then again go decades back to the 1911 vs the wonder nine debate and revisit that argument now that we have the new high tech bullets.

I am guessing the next argument will be about shotguns. Standard capacity 4 shot 870's vs the extended tube tactical guns.
 
I am one, and carry a S&W 442-1 as a bug all the time. I just recently started carrying a S&W 329 night guard for plane clothes duty. My normal gun is a gen. 4 Glock 20 which is department issues.
 
I am one, and carry a S&W 442-1 as a bug all the time. I just recently started carrying a S&W 329 night guard for plane clothes duty. My normal gun is a gen. 4 Glock 20 which is department issues.

You are issued a Glock 20? Wow. You must be in Alaska?
 
Post 85, the fella in Post 84 has "Montana" as listed location, thus a 10mm not totally out of the question. ;)
 
Yeah I'm in Montana. I've drawn my gun several times, however only had to fire it during one incident. In total at least 25 rounds exchanged between good guys and bad guys.

Our duty round is the 155gr xtp loaded but underwood ammo.
 
I carried a revolver my first tour in Viet Nam, a Colt M357. As an Adviser, I was not issued a handgun, only an M2 Carbine. That Colt is why I'm still here. But on my second tour, I was a Company Commander and carried an M1911 -- and that's what I've carried ever since.
 
Yeah I'm in Montana. I've drawn my gun several times, however only had to fire it during one incident. In total at least 25 rounds exchanged between good guys and bad guys.

Our duty round is the 155gr xtp loaded but underwood ammo.
Very cool. Are there dangerous bears/animals in Montana?
 
Drail said:
Don't get me wrong I love 1911s as much as anyone but I have seen so many of them choke on people during big money matches that I only carry revolvers.

Either 1 of 2 things is happening here: Either 1) You don't really know much about competition shooting at all -or- 2) You aren't being fully honest with us. Competition guns, especially "big money matches" are run with highly customized guns that have had all of their springs replaced or recalibrated, ports cut, slides lightened etc. etc. etc. to make the guns run quicker and smoother at the cost of reliability. Then they run minimum power floor ammunition through it, designed to only have enough oomph to cycle the slide thus reducing recoil. Race guns are inherently finicky because they are built to run on the ragged edge of not functioning. That's why they have to be babied and primped and have loads custom tailored to them.

Your post was essentially saying that since you saw a car with a Chevy logo on it wreck in NASCAR you won't ever buy a Chevy.
 
Most of the time it would be a auto but

Rural with a AR in the car as back-up, then nothing shoots as well as my original (python action) Colt trooper .357 (same as the above M357). More often than not, sometimes you just need one good shot. Urban, semi with 3 mags. without a doubt, when you cant go back to the car.
 
Perhaps but only as a backup gun. I carry a Glock 19 with 46 rounds of ammo as my main carry rig. I figure that should be enough for most situations I can think of.
 
I voted no. Only as a backup, where I'd still take something like a 642/442 or similar over a tiny single stack semi
 
Let me ramble for a moment. Started police work back in the mid 70s. You could consider that era the dark ages as it was pre 40 S&W and pre-Glock. We had to supply our own gun and mine was a 4" Mod-19 S&W which worked just fine for years. It was even my PPC gun while I was going to those matches .

Shot it so much some of the internal parts wore out and needed fixed which caused me to buy a factory new Colt 1911. Once a gunsmith worked it over it actually became an accurate and reliable gun. Carried the government for a few years but the Chief really did not like the .45 at all. Probably because of the Cocked and Locked making bad politics. Expecting to be told to get rid of the Government i had an N frame Smith in 45 colt ready to go but instead of telling us the autos had to go he issued .357 686 revolvers.

When the Chief gave the ok for a new Auto he sent 3 of his better shots to the range to pick the new pistol. Glock was just becoming popular but they had the limp wrist jamb and the magazine would not drop free from the gun on its own. Glock has long fixed those issues but we picked the S&W double action only auto and it worked well but I think the rest of the world went with Glock.

Eventually we too went .40 Glock like everyone else. I was never a fan of the .40, not because it was not capable but in my mind it was an unnecessary compromise between a .45 acp and 9 mm. Just my opinion at the time.

That's my back ground and I am well experienced with both revolvers and autos. Autos have come a long way in function and reliability but I do have a soft spot for revolvers. A couple years ago for the retired qualification I shot both a 26 Glock and a 2.5 inch Smith Mod-66 and I expected the revolver to out shoot the Glock. Nope, group was tighter with Glock.

Could I go back to a revolver; Yes.
But I have no intention of doing so willingly.
 
I was on patrol from '08 - '16. Absolutely not. I've been watching this thread and biting my tongue at some of the responses.
 
I was on patrol from '08 - '16. Absolutely not. I've been watching this thread and biting my tongue at some of the responses.
Can you please elaborate Blue? I would love to hear input from someone who just did 8 years of patrolling. Thank you for that, btw.
 
given the chance id take our S&W m65 back and they could keep the S&W mp40:cuss: then i dont work in a high crime, gang, violent area. i once did the qualification course point shooting only (even the 25 yard shots) with the 65, i wounldnt even try that with the m&p.
 
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