Anyone still .40 S&W?

[ViniVidivici]

I shot and reloaded .40 for years, still do once in a while. Carried a G23 daily.

Right now that G23 is converted to 9mm. That gun is carried every day also.

[tangolima]

I shot and reloaded .40 for years, still do once in a while. Carried a G23 daily.

Right now that G23 is converted to 9mm. That gun is carried every day also.

Right on. I'm doing the same. One pistol can shoot 4 different calibers. Occasionally I load up some .357 sig and .22TCM9R just for fun. A poor man's 5.7mm.

Sorry for going off the tangent a bit. Have you tried pocket carry the G23?

-TL

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[markm]

Good grief, man! That's awful!

I think the absolute minimum a person should practice with their carry gun is 50 rds 4 times a year. And that's for poors or people who just don't like to shoot.

I know. I joke about it because it's ridiculous. I shoot other guys 9mm all the time, but I've got a small flinch I really ought to work on.

I shot and reloaded .40 for years, still do once in a while. Carried a G23 daily.

Right now that G23 is converted to 9mm. That gun is carried every day also.

I just can't see down grading in caliber. I get that it's cheaper and easier to shoot, but if I have to shoot for defense, I'm liking the larger caliber.

I don't want to start a caliber war, but my son watches these body cam shooting videos all the time and is always bothering me with them. The one thing I noticed is that since everyone carries 9mm these days, these videos almost always involve a high volume of good guy fire. Just a casual observation. I know each shooting is it's own incident, but it seems like mag dump city for almost all of these videos. The threats are not stopping very quickly at all.

[Defaultmp3]

I agree. But, a lack of preparation and the inability to reload was not my point. Variety is sometimes a good thing when the pinch is felt.

The money spent on a different gun and associated accessories (mags at the very least) could easily have paid for several thousand rounds of 9mm. A couple cases of 9mm really don't take up much space at all.

I just can't see down grading in caliber. I get that it's cheaper and easier to shoot, but if I have to shoot for defense, I'm liking the larger caliber.

I don't want to start a caliber war, but my son watches these body cam shooting videos all the time and is always bothering me with them. The one thing I noticed is that since everyone carries 9mm these days, these videos almost always involve a high volume of good guy fire. Just a casual observation. I know each shooting is it's own incident, but it seems like mag dump city for almost all of these videos. The threats are not stopping very quickly at all.

There is no war at this point. 9mm has won for all practical purposes compared to all other calibers for practical self-defense/duty use. There simply is no advantage to the .40 S&W for self-defense except in extremely niche situations (specifically barrier penetration), while it has many small disadvantages compared to 9mm.

If you think threats would go down perceptibly faster if LE had stuck with .40 S&W, then you are simply flat out wrong.

[markm]

There is no war at this point. 9mm has won for all practical purposes compared to all other calibers for practical self-defense/duty use

No. I mean a caliber argument on the forum. Just a general observation of 9mm ineffectiveness on a regular basis with the body cam videos.

I remember when we convinced ourselves that modern ammo in 9mm was "just as good" and that the abstract ideas of "knock down power" were laughable. I'm just starting to wonder if there's actually some merit to a larger caliber being better.

[Defaultmp3]

No. I mean a caliber argument on the forum. Just a general observation of 9mm ineffectiveness on a regular basis with the body cam videos.

I remember when we convinced ourselves that modern ammo in 9mm was "just as good" and that the abstract ideas of "knock down power" were laughable. I'm just starting to wonder if there's actually some merit to a larger caliber being better.

And I'm saying there would be no meaningful caliber argument, unless the forum really has gone to absolute shit, given the absolute advantage that 9mm Para has. There is absolutely no reason to doubt the effectiveness of 9mm Para in practical self-defense use. The "ineffectiveness" you're observing is simply the fact that handgun calibers are largely ineffective in general; the plethora of video is simply due to the fact that there's so much more body camera footage available now, when 9mm Para is dominant.

Does .40 S&W, hit for hit, have better terminal ballistics performance than 9mm Para? Absolutely. But that slight increased performance is easily offset by the larger recoil, less capacity, and higher cost of ammo, to say nothing of less options for durable and reliable handguns. Any place that you hit that's an immediate incapacitation with a .40 S&W, you will almost always get the same result if hit with 9mm Para. If you don't get immediate incapacitation, wouldn't you much rather to be able to follow up more quickly and more accurately, rather than rely on the smidgen of extra terminal ballistics performance that .40 S&W has? Then there's other issues that more recoil also makes more difficult, such as a compromised grip (e.g., flubbed draw, hands are fatigued from prior events, hands are sweaty or muddy, etc.) or shooting one-handed (e.g., holding a child, injured hand or arm, etc.).

You do you, but if you insist on sticking with .40 S&W just out of some warm fuzzy feeling it gives you rather than any meaningful performance metric you can point to, and then literally never practicing your carry gun or a training equivalent with the same recoil, then, well... yeah.