Why doesn't the 10mm get more love from the manufactures

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I think the history of the 10MM cartridge has been beaten to death here so I won't go into it. However, I will make a case for why more manufacturers haven't gotten into it. Fairly simply, it's economics.

The cartridge has a pretty fair sized OAL and doesn't fit in the typical 9MM frame size that most manufacturers are using for 90% of their production. There's a reason why .40 S&W, .357 SIG, and 9MM are your leading auto calibers: They share the same frame size of the handgun. Take a look at the G20 frame sometime and compare it to the G17. It's bigger in the grip area, has wider rails, and the slide is as beefy as anything Glock has ever made. It would require another section of tooling / molding to make something for the 10MM round. Most companies probably don't see a return on investment from sales generated by the 10MM cartridge.

There are really only two companies out there making guns for the 10MM that aren't 1911s: Glock, and EAA. The Glock 20 is probably Glock's most versatile handgun as well as with a simple barrel swap you can chamber the gun in .40S&W, .357 SIG, and 9X25 Dillon without changing magazines. I have a LoneWolf Barrel in .40 S&W and it's shot 100% without any issues. While the EAA Witness has had some problems that are well documented, but it still seems to sell.

I'd LOVE or hell, even settle to see the 10MM offered at the very least as a custom shop option for the XD/M Series, the M&P series, and anything else that's not a 1911.
 
I agree that there is a place for it. It is more powerful than both 45 ACP and 9mm, and for capacity, fits between them.

The current trend is for tiny guns that are hard to shoot. Maybe in the future, there will be another trend for larger guns that are hard to shoot. (we already went through this with revolvers)

I think they would do really well if they offered 10mm guns with two springs, and ammo loaded to two power levels. The lower end would be the same power level as 40 S&W, and the higher end would be full-house 10mm. Later on, maybe even add a 10mmT (target) with an even lighter spring and ammo just for the purpose.

This is really an untapped market, limited only by the creativity and marketing prowess of the manufacturer. Some day, someone will figure it out.

Add to that the advantages of an auto pistol: capacity, slimness, lower recoil, faster follow-up, better trigger action after the first shot, etc. There is room for it.

My understanding of the 10mm Glocks was that their chambers don't full support the case, which can lead to kaBOOMs if brass is re-used. That design flaw would need to be fixed right quick.

1911Tuner: The problems you mentioned with 10mm in a 1911 package, does those apply to the Delta Elite as well? I noticed that Colt is still making them, and I'd be surprised if they kept right on making them despite durability problems.
 
I'm thinking the Delta Elite Colt's are not shot all that much. I have a couple 10mm Colt Autos that only have a box or two of ammo through them. I would guess the majority of the ones I've seen are considered collector's items. Even the Colt 45 Autos do not seem to be shot that much.
 
The simple answer is the cartridge's overall length.

As others have noted it cannot simply be stuffed into a wonder 9 frame. The .40S&W could be stuffed into the wonder 9 frames that dominated the market, so it required no new firearm design, no research and development, and minimal tooling difference.
While .45ACP guns don't need to be built to withstand much because they operate at such low pressures, and were already produced.



The last thing manufacturers wanted to do was have to make all new frames after investing in mass production of wonder 9s when everyone was transitioning to automatics.
So they certainly played a role in discouraging the 10mm when it was poised to take over the market as well.
Glock prepared for the transition, designing a reliable frame based on the cartridge, but all most manufacturers did was adapt .45ACP guns intended for much lower pressure.
The market then based how suitable the 10mm was on how it performed in a .45ACP frame with a high bore axis, often under sprung increasing perceived recoil, and


Then there is name. Face it, most of the market is not very educated on firearms. Things as simple as name play a huge role in popularity.
"10mm" sounds like just 1 mm more than "9mm". It does not sound impressive, is metric, and simply fails to market itself in the American market.
If it was called the .40S&W Magnum, which is what it is, then it would be much more popular. Unfortunately it came before the .40S&W, as the .40S&W was an attempt to use a weaker version in 9mm frames, so the 10mm was named first.






The 10mm is very similar to the .357 Magnum in an automatic. Which was an American staple for generations for a reason. Yet is softer shooting because the action disperses felt recoil.
The 10mm shoots very flat making shots at range easy, is a hard hitter up close or far away, and has good capacity.
For the increased power I find it ironic that it is actually even more comfortable to shoot than the .40S&W. The .40S&W being all snap, with the 10mm being a more balanced snap and push. A benefit of the added case capacity with which to generate pressure over the .40S&W.
Many of the 10mm autos shortcomings are from a past of simply changing the caliber of firearms never meant for the round, then being less than impressed and having to fix unanticipated problems. Shortcomings you don't see in guns made specifically for the round, like the Glock 20 and 29.
(And even guns like the Glock 30, a Glock 29 intended for the 10mmauto that was converted to .45ACP, making it one of the better .45s because it is much tougher than most guns intended to fire .45ACP.)
 
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The trend is to sell guns and ammo to everyone. The weak and the strong.
I own and shoot a 10mm. Why? They dont make a 11.
S&W made 10 mm pistols, you could shoot one of them all day long and it wouldnt break,the 1006 a 5" 1076 4" I liked that one, had both+ a revolver had 2 cylinders,10 and 40 before it became popular, all that way before the new 10mm revolver, the 610. You can buy them now probably in like new condition. The FBI tried using the 10 to be big shots but the trend then, Hoover died, was to disarm the FBI, the liberals had snuck into law enforcement and were well there in the early 60's, we dont want anyone shooting, equal rights, females must be allowed, they must shoot the same guns, so instead of powder puffs came the 40.
I reloaded and shot the Smith 10's in both combat and pistol competition until the caliber was banned, was so much more accurate out of the box than a 1911 45 ACP. Draw some 3 or 4 inch circles on the back of target paper, send it to 25 yds, with no work done, the Smiths 10 mm bullets always went into the circles, i USED 35,150, 155 180 GRAIN BULLETS, WHICH EVER WAS CHEAPER.
If you get a chance to shoot a smith you will never use a glock, no,NO, I dont work for smith. I sold all my smith 10 mm pistols some years ago.
However, I didnt sell my Colt Delta Elites in shiny hard polished SS. When you open the blue box,ahhh, these shoot smaller than the Smiths, only a little bit.
 
Yes sliclee we have covered the politics for transition to .40S&W before, and it is unfortunate.
The law enforcement market followed the FBI. The FBI tried a high bore axis gun in 10mm, with .45ACP recoil springs causing the slide to snap the gun backwards and forwards like a pendulum.
This combined to give much greater perceived recoil and muzzle flip, making it a handful for anyone, and very difficult for the weaker wrists of women to control.
At a time when sexual discrimination lawsuits were being filed everywhere and winning for even the most minor of allegations, and women were just entering the mainstream workforce in large numbers.
So when female agents threatened to file suit because they had trouble qualifying with the gun that men could that spelled the end of the full power 10mm Auto.
They then downloaded it to levels of a completely different cartridge, rather than fixing the spring and ergonomics of the gun that was the problem to begin with, and would have solved the problem while retaining the power of the round.
But that combined with manufacturers' desires to keep using the 9mm frames they had invested in rather than accommodating the larger OAL of the 10mm in a new frame resulted in the .40S&W taking over, and the much better 10mm auto failing to take its place even after all the research leading up to its initial adoption showed it would be much better.
 
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Zoogster said:
Yes sliclee we have covered the politics for transition to .40S&W before, and it is unfortunate.
The law enforcement market followed the FBI. The FBI tried a high bore axis gun in 10mm, with .45ACP recoil springs causing the slide to snap the gun backwards and forwards like a pendulum.
This combined to give much greater perceived recoil and muzzle flip, making it a handful for anyone, and very difficult for the weaker wrists of women to control.
At a time when sexual discrimination lawsuits were being filed everywhere and winning for even the most minor of allegations, and women were just entering the mainstream workforce in large numbers.
So when female agents threatened to file suit because they had trouble qualifying with the gun that men could that spelled the end of the full power 10mm Auto.
They then downloaded it to levels of a completely different cartridge, rather than fixing the spring and ergonomics of the gun that was the problem to begin with, and would have solved the problem while retaining the power of the round.
But that combined with manufacturers' desires to keep using the 9mm frames they had invested in rather than accommodating the larger OAL of the 10mm in a new frame resulted in the .40S&W taking over, and the much better 10mm auto failing to take its place even after all the research leading up to its initial adoption showed it would be much better.
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Stop repeating this crap. It's absolute BS. I'll repeat myself, the FBI never formally tested or adopted full power 10mm. They tested and adopted the FBI lite load right from the start. The replacement gun was smaller and weighed less than the Smith, while using a round that was a ballistic twin of the 10mm lite. The problem was the size and weight of the Smith.

http://www.firearmstactical.com/pdf/fbi_10mm_notes.pdf
 
I'd love to see a semi-auto carbine made in 10mm that takes the Glock mags. I'm sure it would make an excellent short range deer cartridge that could share ammo and mags with the Glock 20!
 
There are a lot of cartridges that have barely hung on or fallen to the wayside . The biggest reason for their demise is just plain economics. If they dont sell strongly to the mass's the manufacturer's wont keep making them. They arent in business to lose money.
 
ohwell said:
If they dont sell strongly to the mass's the manufacturer's wont keep making them. They arent in business to lose money.
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It is a bit more complex though. The manufacturers that offer less common rounds sell them for more.
This results in fewer people buying them because they are more expensive. 10mm Auto has a lot of reloaders, which do not contribute to perceived popularity because they are not feeding their guns with commercial rounds, keeping the overall perception of the 10mm market lower than it is.
The flip side is manufacturers need to manufacture rounds in huge quantities to sell at low prices, and they don't take that leap of faith in investment and potential loss if there is not a large solid number of expected buyers.
But once much of the market has already invested in reloading they are not a reliable market because they can still typically produce rounds for slightly less (just as they could in other calibers.)
It is a catch 22. Reloaders kill the profit potential in the market.

Cartridges used by police and the military having a significant edge over other calibers, and is not based merely on the merits of the caliber. Rather it is a safe cartridge to mass produce with little risk of being unable to move the product in quantities that enable one to stay in business with minimal profit per round.
A few additional well established calibers of similar low risk to manufacturers, like say the .22LR are also not a leap of faith to mass produce with a narrow profit margin.



It is like the proverbial 'what came first, the chicken or the egg?'.
If LEO or the military adopt a cartridge on a large scale suddenly it is safe for manufacturers to jump in for little minimal profit margin per round, and then the round is inexpensive and becomes even more popular with civilians.
If not then it can be a dangerous playground for manufacturers to work in with mediocre profit margin, and so they charge more, further reducing the popularity of a round which wouldn't cost much different to mass produce than cheaper more popular rounds.

The 10mm Auto is a great round. It shoots flat, is powerful, and in many properly setup guns is really no more difficult to shoot than a .45ACP or .40S&W, and much easier than similarly powerful hot loads of .357 Magnum from a revolver.
However many of the shooters that have learned how great it is are also the type of shooters that reload ammo, and so make a poor market to make a profit on.
The result is significantly less ammo sales in that caliber than the size of the market, and a resulting lack of perceived interest and manufacture of new guns in that caliber.

Bottom line? Reloaders kill perceived popularity of a cartridge and don't really count in the ammo market, drive up commercial ammo prices by being nearly non-existent customers, and result in the demise of their own favorite calibers, because they don't buy more expensive commercial ammo that results in greater and less expensive mass production of ammo and guns in that cartridge.
It is quite an irony. The calibers most favored by the knowledgeable gun owners that could make or reload any round they wanted and are invested enough to reload or make their own ammo have a greatly reduced commercial profit potential, and so are not a reliable customer base.
 
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I've been agreeing with most everything what Zoogster has been saying. I believe for the 10mm to really take off either a larger LE division, or the Military will need to adopt the 10mm cartridge. If that happened then the cost of 10mm ammo would likely go down some, but with that said if you can afford .45 ACP then you should be able to afford 10mm as the cost tends to not be that much of a difference between the two.

It may be just another round, but it a very good one. Most people enjoy the type of recoil it produces compared to other rounds, it shoots flat, far, fast, hits hard, has a wide range for its load and the weight of the bullet it fires, and it can house as many rounds as a .40 cal. In fact the only thing a .40 cal has on 10mm performance wise is .40S&W will fit a 9mm frame, but I would rather have a 9 than a gun developed to be a .40 off a gun that's already a 9mm. That's one cool thing, and one of the reasons a G20 is such a good 10mm is it was designed from the get go on a clean sheet of paper to be a 10mm. It wasn't a .45 converted to a 10. BTW if your hands are big enough to handle a .45 then they are big enough to handle 10mm.

Also some people like to bash the watered down 10mm loads that fire with about the same energy as .40S&W, but I love that stuff. It turns my Glock into an extremely smooth, easy to handle operator, and .40 cal ballistics is plenty powerful enough to put a human being down. IMHO my G20 with the FBI loads is as easy to handle as my 9mm. I do have a 22lb recoil spring in my Glock for the factory type loads though. As for the type of recoil the G20 produces it doesn't really snap, and jerk your wrists back and up like most other semi-auto's I've fired tend to do, as much as it manages to make your whole arms work as shock absorbers. It kind of throws your arms back and up and pivots your elbows more than flipping your wrists. This is an extremely desirable type of recoil, and make even hot loads very manageable. I much prefer the recoil of my G20 with hot loads to a 1911 with +P ammo.
 
ohwell said:
There are a lot of cartridges that have barely hung on or fallen to the wayside . The biggest reason for their demise is just plain economics. If they dont sell strongly to the mass's the manufacturer's wont keep making them. They arent in business to lose money.
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+1

The 10mm is my favorite cartridge. That being said, If you don't handload and you're not readily able to spend ~41 dollars/50 rounds (Double Tap FMJ Match), a 10mm is just not practical to regularly shoot. Too bad for us 10mm fans, because if the cartridge were more popular, ammunition would be more readily available at more affordable prices.

If the 9mm or .40 were not so popular with LE and/or the military, it too would not be affordable to shoot. If more people shot the 10mm, the cheaper the ammo would become, but since people don't shoot the 10mm, it remains too expensive for "regular" shooters (kind of a catch 22).

(I handload and rarely buy factory 10mm, so I also contribute to keeping 10mm prices high.) Fewer and fewer gun manufacturers are making 10mm weapons because there isn't enough demand for them. :( So I suggest all the 10mm fans push the 10mm merits on all their friends and buy more 10mm ammo and more 10mm guns! :D
 
During the early '90s, Smith & Wesson made approx. 50,000 stainless steel 10mm auto pistols, in 6 variations. These were specifically designed for full power loads. If there was any interest (potential profit) in them, they would never have stopped making them. Now they are collector's items. The biggest problem is that the 3rd Generation pistols were hign in craftsmanship, using lots of forging and machining. They cost nearly 3 times as much as a glock to produce.

Their 10mm revolver is back in production, but it has the dreaded lock on it so interest is not what it should be.
 
For all the reloaders of the 10mm.... where does the brass come from since so few shoot it and how many times can it be reloaded? It has to be purchased "new" at some point to generate the used casings....
 
I don't reload yet and I knew they sold new brass but then I began to ask myself if you pay for the new cases and bullets is it still that cheap to reload? I will get into reloading when I retire in a few years and wish to learn all I can over the next few years.

If I can ask, if you shoot 500-1000 rounds a month, mainly 9-40-45-357, what type of press would you get to start up with and is there any reloading site for good, used systems? Without going from 0-100 right off the bat, how would you start up a reloading setup?
 
Originally Posted by rbernie
Given the lack of supply, the obvious conclusion is that there is just not enough demand to justify the investment on the part of the gun manufacturers.
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Agreed.
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Yet, I can't buy something if it isn't for sale, so there's no real evidence that the market isn't out there. It's kind of a reverse Hobson's Choice - you can have our new semi-auto in any caliber as long as it isn't 10mm. :D

As for S&W - I find it both ironic and humorous that Taurus built their business by copying Smiths, and now Smith is copying Taurus with their version of The Judge. The real pity is that S&W already knows how to build a good 10mm, all they have to do is make some more with the tooling and expertise they have and get them on the shelves. I suggest they start by throwing confetti and blowing horns, announcing the "Return of a Smith & Wesson Classic" in the NRA and gun magazines with a limited edition of slightly fancied-up safe queens, and take it from there using the nearly-instant sellout to justify to management putting out some production models for dealers' shelves.
 
larryh1108 said:
I don't reload yet and I knew they sold new brass but then I began to ask myself if you pay for the new cases and bullets is it still that cheap to reload? I will get into reloading when I retire in a few years and wish to learn all I can over the next few years.
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It depends on the caliber and what you consider your time worth.
It is almost always cheaper in materials to reload per say, but you have to consider what your time is worth and if reloading is work just so you have shooting ammo, or is itself recreation to you.
If it is just work to you to reload then it is often cheaper to trade an hours paycheck in the form of buying rounds.
The money made in an hour of overtime would probably be a lot more than many would save by reloading components for an hour.
So in that way it is not cheaper if you factor in labor costs for manual work.


As for the cost itself:
10mm auto can be reloaded for just slightly more than .40S&W. The increased powder is an insignificant cost difference, and you can use many of the same bullet weights. Although 10mm can also use heavier bullets, and common .40S&W bullets top out at about 180 grains, 180 grain and below .40S&W bullets can work fine for potent range ammo.
Since .40S&W is so common there is plenty of mass production and price competition in .40 bullets.
So you get the brass and it cost about as much as .40S&W to reload.
Some calibers are a clear waste of your time to reload like those mass produced and sold at highly competitive prices by everyone, you work for far below minimum wage per hour in terms of savings. While other calibers are a larger savings. But you will always get the exact performance you want tailored to your specifications.



The price of components fluctuates. It went up a lot during the Obama panic of 2009, but has been going back down as the hoarders and SHTF predictors can only buy so much and are forced back into reality.
The market will charge what it can bear, and it could bear a price hike a couple years ago, manufacturers hate to reduce prices once they get them substantially higher if people will still pay them, but they can only fight the market so long and the price has been steadily going down towards reality.
However transport costs of heavy lead are subject to fuel costs, and hazmat costs of primers and powders can be a substantial percentage of cost, and are proportionally larger the smaller the purchase.
If you buy online there is more to cost than the sticker price, and it includes shipping and hazmat.

Be careful of those quoting actual savings or cost per round. Many that cite their cost per round won't be including original brass cost, shipping costs, and hazmat costs in their exaggerated savings formula. They certainly won't be including labor cost per hour. And of course the equipment you invest in takes thousands of rounds in savings even while working for 0 cents an hour to break even.


It also takes someone that can pay attention and has a level head to keep from blowing their gun up. Someone not prone to always pushing the limits, because there is always a little room to push further until something goes wrong. You can also remove all margin for error and then have no safety net when something like some water gets in the barrel, or a bullet gets set back slightly during loading or while cycling.
Some people don't have the personality or attention span to be assembling individual explosives that cause harm if you get them wrong. You can get them right 10,000 times, but that one time you get them wrong will offset all the savings when the gun is destroyed, and especially if there is medical expenses or a lower quality of life due to injury.
 
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Thanks for a solid answer. There were no surprises and I totally agree that 99% accuracy or even 99.9% accuracy is not acceptable. Personally, I have an attention to detail so I won't have an issue there. Also, I don't charge myself "labor" if I'm working on something I enjoy. If I find it tedious then I'll move back to buying it from the store like I do now.

What is a good estimate for a startup for the major handgun calibers mentioned above so one can make safe reloads without it taking forever. I do know that you can always
add on components as you go but to start from scratch is it $500 to get up and running? $300? $800? That's for the equiptment, not the components. I may even sell one of my guns (not desirable) to get set up but if the cost is reasonable then I can avoid that. It seems quite a few people reload so I'm sure there are many benefits. I also spend a lot of money on ammo so if I don't shoot for a month and I can buy a decent setup then all is good. Any suggestions?
 
I picked up a Colt 10MM when they first came out.
200 factory rounds & the slide stop broke--scared the hell out of me.
I took it back to the shop & traded it for a Ruger 45-big-heavy ugly---super accurate.
 
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