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shootthesheet wrote:Great BUGs and "Only-Choice" guns but if I was limited to .380 the gun would be bigger and heaver with proper sites and better accuracy.

And if you're going to go with "bigger and heavier," why not also go with more powerful caliber?

handog wrote:I have a girls gun ?

Not at all. I own two of them. They just aren't my go to choice for concealed carry because of mechanical reliability and lack of faith in the cartridge. As long as yours isn't pink, it's not a girl's gun and you can look at yourself in the mirror.



Joe, I can't argue your point either.

joe817 wrote:I think I posted this article by Massad Ayoob one other time. It's on topic and a very good read. This article is but one valid reason to not discount the lowly .380 as an adequate self defense round. It's a good read.

Joe, please understand, I'm not discounting it. As I posted, I'm not exactly volunteering to step in front of one. I just think that there are better choices if one can accommodate them into one's lifestyle, that's all... ...and I suspect that Massad Ayoob would agree with that. In fact, his article all but so states that premise, noting that Elaine Wingren was a petite Asian woman who carried a .380 Sig because that is what fit in her hand and in her purse. His article also says that her 6'4" husband carried a full sized P226. At no point in the article is Ayoob advocating for her 6'4" husband to carry a small .380 designed to fit into a small woman's hand.

In this particular case, Elaine Wingren behaved admirably. She said and did all the right things, and I hope that I am able to act with her sang-froid if faced with the same terrible decision. That said, discarding what is essentially the "miss" which hit the BG in the arm, Elaine Wingren was extremely fortunate to have gotten a 1 shot stop with a .380. She had to have hit his aorta to cause instant incapacitation and nearly instant death like that. The aorta is maybe an inch in diameter in the average man, and she hit that on a moving target. Even from just a few feet away, that was a lucky hit (for her). Two inches to her left, and that bullet goes into the BG's right lung and doesn't even slow him down; and she doesn't have time to get a third shot off before he's on her.

If she had missed the aorta like that with a .40 or a .45 (or a +P 9mm, or a .357, etc., etc.), it is not unreasonable to expect that the sheer magnitude of the impact might cause him to pause, even if only for a second or two, giving her time for a followup shot to the vitals. Yes, her shot killed him, but it is equally true that she was very lucky to have escaped going to ground with this guy on top of her and grappling for the gun.

austinrealtor wrote:I'd love to try some Pow'rball some time. Anyone know where to buy it without having to put it on layaway or take out a loan?

Will it feed in my revolver?

handog wrote:Next question: What do you tell your wife when she asks why you need so many guns?

You answer a question with a question: "why do you need so many shoes?"

I own two .380 pistols. One is a Keltec, the other a Colt Government. Neither has ever been even close to 100% functionally reliable, regardless of ammo type, and they represent both ends of the value spectrum. Shooting ball ammo for its penetration has been mentioned previously in this thread. All I can say is that both of my .380 pistols actually feed JHP more reliably than ball, and JHP reliability is not that good in either.

The Colt Government is a really nice, well-built pistol with a slide like butter. The Keltec is a cheap piece of junk which has the habit of self-ejecting the magazine during carry. All I can say is, my life is worth more than what either gun can provide me in terms of self-defense, if there are other choices available... ...and there are other choices available to me.

I fully understand that my J frame 642 is not as flat as either pistol (although it definitely weighs less than the Colt), but it isn't that much bigger either. It is dwarfed by my 3" Kimber, which is itself a pretty small pistol. But when I combine the "nearly as small-ness" of the J frame with the higher power of the .38 Special +P cartridge, and the rock-ribbed reliability of a revolver, it is very hard for me to mitigate in favor of carrying one of my .380s.

I hang onto the Colt because it is a beautiful gun and rapidly becoming a real collector's item (mine is cherry). I hang onto the Keltec because.... because... I don't know... maybe just against the day when simply nothing else will do, as hard as that may be for me to imagine. But I find it very hard to justify carrying either one when I have better alternatives available to me.

As to the caliber's effectiveness, I'm not volunteering to step in front of one, but anybody who has worked in an ER long enough (as I have) will tell you that the .380 is not the most effective round. It just isn't. And although this horse has been flogged many times on this forum, and although no pistol caliber is guaranteed to be a 1 shot man-stopper, as caliber increases, the odds of that being the outcome do go up considerably. The simple truth is that caliber is not a guarantee, but all factors being taken into account, including the psychological processes involved in being shot, the bigger the bullet, the more likely the incapacitation. I pray that I never have to shoot somebody. I really don't want to have to do it. But if I have to do it, I want the person to stay shot and be hit hard enough that, if not physically incapacitated by being shot, they will be at least psychologically incapacitated. Based on what I know from 6 years of working in an ER, I just have greater confidence in more powerful calibers in that regard, and the .380 doesn't really inspire that kind of confidence in me.

I realize that it is fine for others... just not for me.