Your Favorite Semi-Auto Pistol Caliber and Why

What is your favorite semi-auto pistol caliber?

  • .50 ae

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • .44 mag (semi-auto)

    Votes: 1 0.3%
  • .450 corbon (or similar)

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • .45 acp

    Votes: 115 35.4%
  • 10 mm

    Votes: 27 8.3%
  • .357 mag (semi-auto)

    Votes: 3 0.9%
  • .357 sig

    Votes: 10 3.1%
  • .40 s&w

    Votes: 32 9.8%
  • .38 super (or similar)

    Votes: 7 2.2%
  • 9mm

    Votes: 135 41.5%
  • 9mm makarov

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • .380 acp

    Votes: 14 4.3%
  • .32 acp

    Votes: 7 2.2%
  • .25 acp

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • .22 rimfire (any)

    Votes: 47 14.5%
  • Other

    Votes: 11 3.4%

  • Total voters
    325
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Think that was the .45 LC.

Believe the .45 ACP - was designed to stop a 300 lb. machete-wielding, drug-crazed, charging Muslim Moro.




GR

The latter as well, but in the first decade of the last century, cavalry were still very much part and parcel of military strategy and the dictates of cavalry tactics very much formed a part of the RFP that JMB so eloquently answered. That included the requirement that the pistol round be capable of disabling a horse, yet another failing of the 38 LC.
 
I would have voted 357 but on the choices it said semiauto for both the 357 and 44?
Coonan Arms makes a semiauto 1911 derived pistol that shoots 357 mag and 38 special, and Magnum Research makes the Desert Eagle in 357 and 44. There's also the Automag guns.
 
Usually I don’t like compromises. A compromise feels like you are giving up the best aspects of the choices for a middle ground that is not satisfying.

But in this case, .40SW is a compromise that also works out best and fits me best. I shoot it well, surprisingly well. Capacity in a double stack magazine doesn’t make me feel deprived. It hits hard and makes big holes. I think it will neutralize a threat faster and with fewer needed center mass hits than its smaller caliber brethren.

.40SW is the compromise caliber that nobody likes to like, but it works for me.
 
Coonan Arms makes a semiauto 1911 derived pistol that shoots 357 mag and 38 special, and Magnum Research makes the Desert Eagle in 357 and 44. There's also the Automag guns.
I am aware of that but not a fan. I prefer a revolver on those cartridges and those guns are pretty rare.
 
The .380. It's been in my pocket almost every day for the last 25 years. Also, all the cool pistols chambered for it. The PP, the Beretta 70s and 85, the Sig 232 among others.
 
At close range, the M1911 has a great reputation -- in WWI, the Germans were scared of it in the trenches, where it excelled at close-range combat.

That's the problem with relying solely on war stories. Anecdotal evidence only gets you so far. Law enforcement knows that the eye-witness testimony of someone under duress needs to be taken with a grain of salt. If you believe the old war stories, no one has ever been shot twice with the .45. We have enough relevant data collected through testing and through verified after action reporting to know that the .45 isn't any more effective than any other handgun, and certainly doesn't compare to the effectiveness of even a relatively anemic high velocity rifle cartridge. There is nothing you can stick in your .45 that will give it half the wounding capability and terminal effect of even the notoriously inconsistent M855 ball round. When you compare expanding bullets intended for police and civilian self defense, the 5.56 creates a wound easily 4 or 5 times the volume of the most advanced JHPs in the .45.

Something like one in four people shot in the torso with a handgun dies whereas something like one in four people shot in the torso with a rifle lives. Rifles are rifles and handguns are handguns. To suggest that a .45 is on the same level of effectiveness as a high velocity rifle cartridges shows a complete lack of experience and knowledge. An expanding .45 bullet gives you a relatively simple wound of maybe 3/4 of an inch. An expanding 5.56 bullet will blast a hole the size of a baseball through someone--2.5 to 3 inches in diameter and 6 to 8 inches in length,usually complex and nasty with multiple fragments--I've seen it. The 5.56 has enough velocity to do significant cavitation damage and is depositing 3x as much energy 3x as fast as the .45 slug. The 5.56 has just as much momentum or "thump" as the .45 and makes a much bigger hole.
 
I've been shot 5 times with a 5.56 and in each case it took me 2-3 days to find out. While both times I've been shot with a 45 from a 1911 I've died. Once immediately and the other after a bit of squirming.
 
I voted .45acp because I like poking big holes in things.

But I also like 9mm and 10mm and .40SW, all for different reasons. Heck, if it barks and kicks, I like it.
 
1911 ruger lw commander 9mm cheap lots of shooting and the ammo is cheap i don't pick up brass
 
Centerfire, of course, the .45acp. Outside of deer hunting - worked fine for me on small game - it's an "everything" cartridge. It's so very easy to reload, inexpensive to load, accurate and fun to shoot whether auto or revolver. I think of it like a faithful family dog that just loves to please. The .22LR, otherwise.

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Well game wardens in Norway are issued Glock 20s to defend themselves against Polar Bears. If being able to dispatch a horse is good, then being able to dispatch a polar bear is better. Therefore, anything the .45 can do, the 10mm can do better.

Whatever.
 
Well game wardens in Norway are issued Glock 20s to defend themselves against Polar Bears. If being able to dispatch a horse is good, then being able to dispatch a polar bear is better. Therefore, anything the .45 can do, the 10mm can do better.
In a smaller way, that is true. Big bullets make big holes. Smaller bullets make smaller holes.

It is a physics thing.
 
40SW is the compromise caliber that nobody likes to like, but it works for me.

IMO, describing the .40S&W as a compromise is unrelated to its origin.

After the fact, some noticed its size is between the 9mm and the .45ACP and concluded that's why it was created, as a compromise.

I don't believe that had anything to do with why the 10mm/.40S&W was conceived. They work for me as well.
 
So, a .380 is a better stopper than a .338 Lapua? Bigger diameter and all... Or the 90 grain .380 is a better stopper than the .223 since the .223 is only 62 grains. Did you actually ever take physics?
:p
If you are shooting a sheet of paper, I'd say so.
 
I voted 40 S&W. I actually have three calibers I regularly carry, 357 sig, 9mm, and 40 S&W. I think 40 is a great round. Happy medium between 9mm and 45 and recoil is very manageable. My one and only 357 sig is my P229 which was originally 40 and I got the drop in 357 barrel for later on. I would love to have a 1911 commander size set up in 357 sig but, they are hard to find in my price range.
 
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