How many guns to settle on a carry weapon?

[Prof Young]

Shooters:

I went through more than half a dozen carry guns before I settled. I tried guns by Ruger and Walter and Springfield and Bersa etc. And I did a lot of research on each gun before I bought one.

The guns I acquired along the way that I still have are the Kel Tec P3AT (Yeah it's a 380), the Sig P238 (May be best gun in my safe, also a 380.) and the Sig 365, mine has a safety. Yeah, that's three carry guns. I make my choice by occasion and weather. My preference is vest carry in cold weather, but shorts weather leads to pocket or OWB carry.

All that to say, in my case it took a few tries to figure out what really works for me. I had a lot of fun along the way, and got pretty good at selling one gun to buy another.

What's your story?

Life is good.
Prof Young

 

[tlm225]

Pretty much the same. The issue for me was finding one that was a good fit for my hand. I would handle them in the store, try them on the rental range and buy what I thought would work for me. After a few months and a few hundred rounds I would determine that it wasn't quite "right" and send it down the road and buy another one. After several guns I finally had to come to terms that I was trying to make a single stack hand work with double stack guns.

That's where I'm at now. All my carry and range guns are single stack and my hunt is over.

 

[Boarhunter]

I have been trying to settle on a single carry gun the last 45 years and still have not decided.

Best I have been able to do is narrow the selection down to a half-dozen 1911s in varying barrel lengths and calipers.

I am fairly certain that is the best I will ever be able to do.

BOARHUNTER

 

[Nick_C_S]

I guess the short answer is: The first one I bought dedicated for carry duty. That would be a Kahr CW9. It's an excellent gun. Perfectly reliable. And I mean perfect. It has never failed to feed a single round. I've got about 2K rounds through it. Easy to shoot. Comfortable in my hand, etc.

 

[dshack]

I've only been actively carrying for just over three years now, at first I tried a Glock, not a fan. Sold the Glock to fund a Springfield XDS purchase, was only semi-satisfied with the XDS. Came to the conclusion that I'm just not a striker fired kind of guy.

I think I've found my favorite carry gun in the hammer fired Smith & Wesson 3rd Gens, my current favorite is a 3913NL, single stack 9mm, but I'm rotating that with a Smith & Wesson 4516-2, single stack 45acp. I'm liking both of these old school guns.

 

[Bozz10mm]

Just two for me. Started with an XDm 3.8 Compact in 45 ACP. Bought a Shield 9mm and Shield 45 a couple years later and those have become my EDC pistols.

 

[pete2]

2, a 642 and a Ruger LC9. The 642 won, still have the LC9, it's my pickup gun. Shoots straight and has never jammed.

 

[URIT]

Over a dozen semi-autos. I carried a revolver on and off duty for over 30 years which played a major role in my ultimate choice.

The saying goes... Practice make perfect; but in reality, it is practice makes permanent.

I tried the striker-fired guns but they didn't have the heft I was comfortable holding. The S&W Gen3 models in 9mm and .40 caliber felt best and I started working my way through different models and variants. I had to buy them online because none were available locally.

I settled on the double-action-only S&W model 3953 and 4053 as carrying options because the Gen3s are reliable and accurate, fit my hand, concealed IWB well, and I could rely on my past practice skills in a critical life-threatening moment.

 

[Hal]

I'm still in the process of looking for that perfect fit.

What I want is a .44 magnum, Ruger LCP, with a grip exactly like the oversized target grips on my S&W model 19, with a 15 round capacity magazin, that I can comfortably fit in a pocket holster, that weighs just ounces, can stand upto rounds that wull stop either a Casper Milquetoast type home invader armed with a steak knife, or a charging moose, that uses cheap .22lr amunition for practice and of course night sights - all for under $200.

& it has to have a lot of stainless steel so I don't have to clean it.

Did I mention it has to look like a 1911?

 

[GarandTd]

I'm not too far into this journey yet. I started with a duty size 9mm, a Sar K2P. It's a wonderful firearm, but bigger than what I care to conceal carry. I followed that with the Remington Rm380. It's reliable and super easy to carry and conceal, but it's much harder to shoot well. The Rm380 is my current carry piece. I would like to get a subcompact 9mm of a somewhat modular design that can be tiny when I want it and have higher capacity mags with grip inserts for when I want more or less to carry. That shouldn't be a difficult task, but it's not a buyer's market right now, which figures, because I have the means.

 

[jetinteriorguy]

After a 15 year hiatus from shooting I decided to start up again. I’ve never carried but decided maybe it was about time and got a CC permit. Being a revolver guy I picked up a Taurus 85 and tried that for a while. No matter what I did that gun always shot left 3” at 7yds, so I traded it off. I looked at small 9mm pistols and fell in love with the Lc9s so I bought one, the first 9mm semi auto I had owned in over 20 years. Wanting more capacity though I tried several other guns, but for one reason or another just didn’t like them. The PT111G2 came close but I just couldn’t quite get used to the trigger. Long story short, I’m back to the Lc9s and quite happy with it. It’s accurate, reliable, and easy to carry.

 

[tubeshooter]

In a sense you could say 5-6 guns... but in another sense you could say just one.

I have tried various flavors of a small frame .38/.357 revolver. Hammer and without, steel and aluminum, 2 and 3 inch barrels.

Finally settled on a Smith 640. At least for now.



All the same manual of arms. All the same 5 shots. All roughly the same size and same trouble to carry (of course the aluminum is lighter). I am comfortable switching between any of them at any time.

 

[Cowboyfromhell]

Hot summer days--sw bg 380 or j frame airweight
Fall/winter-- usually my HK P2000SK

every once in a while one of my heavy all metal beasts just for fun...

 

[COSteve]

For me it's a matter of carry where?

For the city where the possible threat is 2 legged, I use my Glock 23 and 13+1 rds of 40s&w 180grn Speer Gold Dots (their components but my handloads). It's dead nuts reliable and because I've had it since 2004 and practiced with it continuously, it's become second nature to employ it. A 3.5lb connector and 6lb trigger spring with a bit of light polishing and the trigger is a solid performer. TruGlo TFO sights and it's ready to go day or night. It's lighter and more compact than my .357 Mag pistols and holds more than double the ammo.

However, when I'm 'woods walking' in the Rockies where the threat may be 2 or 4 legged, my carry gun is my custom G20L sans the magwell to save weight. It's loaded with 17+1 rds of 10mm 180grn or 200grn hardcast (my handloads all the way). As I've also had it since 2004, I'm comfortable with it even shooting my heavy loads of 10mm with over 9K through it to date.

The 10mm is a powerful caliber with the right load out of a 6" barreled pistol as is the .357 Mag. In fact, I also have .357 Mag pistols I handload for so I understand the capabilities of both calibers. However, hands down my Glock 10mm is a better choice for carry in the woods.

* 1st, with a 6" slide and barrel and 18 total rds of 180grn ammo (3 times what a revolver will carry) it actually weighs less than a 6" barreled S&W 686. That's right, less.
* 2nd, it's more compact and with the lower bore axis and better grip, the 10mm is faster and much more accurate at followup shooting than any revolver. It's not that they are bad, it's a matter of physics and ergonomics.
* 3rd, and most important, using my hot handloads for both in the platforms above, the larger, heavier weight 10mm bullets (180grn 10mm vs 158grn .357 mag) are actually faster and deliver more muzzle energy.

Now, if I were to discuss carry in the woods with a levergun, my answer would be reversed because my .357 Mag hot handloads for my leverguns benefit significantly more from the longer barrel of say a 20" carbine vs a 6" - 7.5" pistol than does even my hottest 10mm handloads. I'm talking hundreds of fps faster out of a longer barrel than my 10mm. Then my sidearm is only needed as a backup or for rattlesnake shooting.

Here is an example of what I mean. My 158grn full power .357 Mag loads with 18.0grns of Lil'Gun powder and a SR primer (I recently switched from H-110) in my 20" Rossi carbine produces 1,952fps with 1,337ft/lbs ME and the same rd produces a whopping 2,005fps with 1,410ft/lbs ME out of my 24" Rossi rifle!!

BTW, those numbers with Lil'Gun are 10% higher than the same loads using H-110, my choice of powders for 10 years before I switched last year. Using H-110, my carbine produced 1,789fps and my rifle produced 1,822fps with the same bullets, same primers, same chrono, at the same range, at the same temperature conditions.

 

[CDW4ME]

In the last 25 years, I've gone from 38 snub / pocket 380 up to Glock 26/27 up to 1911's to bigger Glocks.
In the last 3 years, I've not carried smaller than a Glock 19/23.
My philosophy: carry a pistol that would be preferred in hand if I had to defend myself, regardless of location.
Glock 23 minimum carry, quick trip to the store, walking dogs, pick up pizza.
Glock 23/22/35 (all 40 S&W) are my most carried pistols.

 

[1911_Hardball]

I tried to count the number. I have no idea.
I ran out of fingers, so I took my shoes off. I ran out of toes.

 

[dmattaponi]

For me, I went through the typical deciding factors...semi auto or revolver, caliber, size, weight, reliability before I found one I was satisfied with. Never did find the “perfect” one, but I settled on a few that I feel are about as good a balance as I’m gonna get. There were probably a little more than half a dozen or so before I started finding some I thought worth keeping.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Blue Duck]

I have tried a bunch of different guns and holsters, and pretty much went full circle, back to a Colt Lightweight Commander for 90% of the time, with a small collection of others, ranging from as big as a Glock 22 down to a NAA mini revolver. But the Commander gets the nod most of the time carried on my person, and the Glock is always in the truck as either primary or back up. And a Smith and Wesson Shield is next up for light carry days when my paranoia is in recession.

That's kind of a joke, but then again maybe not.

 

[Mike38]

I went through 3 guns. Started with a S&W J frame in .38 Spcl. I don't like how heavy it is with it's all steel frame. Switched to a Taurus PT22PLY. Thought I had something there. Went through 500 rounds of CCI Mini Mags flawlessly. Must have gotten a bad box of ammo and had a couple of misfires. Now I have my doubts on trusting rimfire as a carry caliber. Then bought a Kel Tec P32. Light weight and easy to carry. So far 300 rounds of flawless operation, and even more accurate than the pervious two. Now happy.

 

[lee n. field]

Shooters:

I went through more than half a dozen carry guns before I settled. I tried guns by Ruger and Walter and Springfield and Bersa etc. And I did a lot of research on each gun before I bought one.

A half dozen? Sounds about right.

When one starts to actually carry (vs. just talking out your ignorance orifice on the Innernet), you learn things about what works and what doesn't. Yes, it takes a few tries to get down to where you want to be.

Right now I've settled on a couple XDS-s, and a couple different snubs, and I shuffle around between them. Size and bother are all about the same. I have some bigger stuff that I can carry, if it seems warranted.

The idea of moving on at this point strikes me as a lot of trouble. Yet another series of holster purchases, magazine carrier purchases, yet another pile of factory magazines to spend on. Plus necessary doo-dads (ex. if I get another Glock, it will need a Strker Control Device. Don't even try to argue with me on that.)

The guns I acquired along the way that I still have are the Kel Tec P3AT (Yeah it's a 380), the Sig P238 (May be best gun in my safe, also a 380.) and the Sig 365, mine has a safety. Yeah, that's three carry guns. I make my choice by occasion and weather. My preference is vest carry in cold weather, but shorts weather leads to pocket or OWB carry.

All that to say, in my case it took a few tries to figure out what really works for me. I had a lot of fun along the way, and got pretty good at selling one gun to buy another.

What's your story?

Taurus 605. Ruger LCP. Kel Tec PF9. Charter Undercover .38. Sold that, got a S&W 642. Sold the PF9, replaced it with an XDS9. Added an XDS45 to the mix.

The LCP sits unused in my safe. The stuff that broke too much or I didn't like are gone. There're other guns, too, in the timeline, that I never seriously considered carrying outside of some very specialized use.