Which is what I said.
To answer the OP: Shot placement is of paramount importance. Once you get above a certain power level, often set by experts at .380 ACP, the cartridges are all pretty capable performers. A brain shot with a .380 ACP will trump an extremity hit with a .45.
I’m not saying anything that hasn’t already been said, but I got here late.
The largest/fastest round that you’ll regularly practice with is the perfect caliber, imnsho. If you never shoot your .44 it won’t do you nearly as much good as a .380 with which you are comfortable. I’d hesitate to trust anything under .380, but a small person can still be beat up with one of those, and if it hurts to shoot than they probably won’t practice, so a .32 might be enough.
There are seemingly endless debates on this and I’ve never seen a conclusion reached, so I stand by my statement that shot placement is more important than caliber (to a point, as stated previously, there are some minimums that should be observed)
Anecdote - I worked with a South African whose brother shot him in the arm with a .22 - said it felt like a wasp sting and he was easily able to finish beating up his brother.
And my keyboard just freaked out so I am going to stop until I can get punctuation back
As regards the effectiveness of racking a shotgun, this story may be of interest.
Yes, but you can also point it and have it be somewhat more effective than pointing vs. aiming a handgun.
IIRC, the blast pattern is about 3 feet across at 10-12 feet from target- that’s pretty good, I think I can hit a torso like that. Whereas if I am 10-12 feet away and merely “point” a handgun, I’ll probably miss.
Well, right… long guns have longer sight radiuses than handguns, hence they’re inherently more accurate. But sometimes all you have is a handgun.
Here’s the deal: If I *know * I am going to be in a fight, and I have a couple minutes notice, I would ***never ** * choose a handgun. I would choose a long gun. Any long gun (shotgun or rifle) is much more accurate than any handgun. And most long guns are more powerful.
So if long guns are so superior, what good are handguns? A handgun has only one good thing going for it: small size. A handgun is a personal defense tool that you carry on you. It is strictly defensive… it is a tool to be used when you are not expecting a fight. As one famous author said, “A handgun is what you use to fight your way back to your rifle.”
I think that’s way off- I’m not an expert, but I’ve heard figures from the size of a fist to maybe a dinner plate at typical indoor ranges. I’m sure some expert will give us the correct info.
You rang?
Thank you silenus- it would be a plate at 12 feet. I mis-remembered.
Pertaining to “penetration”: I get that it’s the distance it travels through ballistics gel, but how does this translate to, well, “human” penetration power? At what point is it likely from penetration data that the bullet will go straight through a target? How weak before it, say, ricochets off a bone instead of shattering it/piercing it?
(Obviously, much of this is also subject to caliber and type of bullet, but those can be included in the analysis)
It seems calibre might be the wrong term being used in this discussion.
The .22 Long Rifle cartridge and the .223 cartridge are the same caliber but are considerably different cartridges. The former is the typical cartridge used for target shooting, “plinking”, etc whereas the latter is for use in an M-16 and packs a lot more punch. The .223 also has more powder and a more massive bullet than the .22 Long Rifle.
As for rifle vs pistol, I’d always choose the rifle for many reasons (most of which have already been stated.) One reason not yet stated is that if you are going to keep one loaded and ready for use, the probability (IMHO) of somebody ‘screwing around’ are much higher with a pistol than with a rifle. Somehow, some people (aka jerks) are just tempted to pick up a pistol and wave it around, point it and maybe even fire it with the result being “I didn’t know it was a real gun; loaded, etc”
Take another look at that site/cite, thats more like a plate at 12 yards
Thats also for improved cylinder choke which is uncommon outside of trapshooter circles most shotguns you find on the shelves are full or modified choke that are considerable tighter patterns.
Don’t fantasize for a second that a shotgun is some magical “fire in the general direction of the bad guy and watch him go down” gun. For close quarters akin to household intruder ranges they can also be slow and unweildy compared to a handgun.
If you want to think shotgun, think of a shotgun full of 00 buckshot as hitting someone with 7-9 weak pistol bullets at once. Longer ranges mean less penetration and fewer hits.
To the OP:
Ex-EMT checks in
Being hit by a bullet hurts…bad. Even the measly .22 is capable of killing, just nowhere near as quickly as its bigger centerfire friends. Always go with a gun you are comfortable shooting, the nice thing about a .22 handgun is you can fire repeatedly far more accurately than with a larger gun. For inexperienced shooters, thats a big deal, you’re already amped up and freaked out, the last thing you need is a gun with so much recoil and muzzle blast that it leaves you deaf, blind, and neededing a few seconds to recover from recoil.
Funny, I ‘d go the other way. Rifles are far more prone to overpenetration, like kill your neighbor two houses away overpenetration. The benefits of a rifle are most realized over 100+ yard ranges where their longer sight plane and higher velocity allows them to project lethal force more accurately at longer ranges. At <20’ a rifle is more likely to end up used as a club than a firearm.
Nope
Was already in service for 35 years before the US saw any serious action in the Phillipines.
As someone who has been on the giving and receiving end of kicks, knees, elbows, headbutts, and the like, I must respectfully disagree.
No. The reason people stop or fall after being hit by a bullet is due in large part to an absorbtion of a tremendous amount of energy dictated by mass and velocity from the round. This is where the majority of your ‘stopping power’ comes from. This is the reason that although a .22 round fired from a pistol has a small amount of stopping power, the same caliber-sized round fired from a high-powered rifle can stop medium to large game in their tracks. Keep in mind, that the difference between a .22 caliber round and the round fired from an M-16 (.223) is only three thousandths of an inch.
Yet never, never give that a moment’s thought when deciding whether or not to protect yourself. Worry about your survival, and deal with any possible criminal or civil suits if/when they come up.
If you couldn’t hit with a handgun, I doubt you’d be able to hit with a shotgun either. At that short of a range, the shot dispersal isn’t much wider than the diameter of the barrel. If the patterning *was *three feet across, would there even be sufficient kinetic energy to provide any stopping power? (I’m genuinely curious; I really don’t know the answer.)
And considering how even the best shooters can miss their target in a stress situation, I think I’ll take my chances with the 17 rounds my Glock 9mm holds over our single-shot, break-open 12-gauge.
BTW, if you can stomach looking at them, there are pictures of shotgun victims online. The entrance wounds are rarely bigger than a fist. I’ve also seen pictures of people with handgun wounds, including one where the man was still alive, standing beside a car, and conscious. The bullet had penetrated his side, below his ribs.
Added:
Some will say that it can be argued that stopping power is dictated solely by the amount of damage that the round causes, and that mass and velocity energy doesn’t play as well into it, but round cavitation, or the rippling effect of the round when penetrating an object, is very real and has been shown to produce a shocking effect on a living organism.
For instance, in the shootout between eight FBI agents and two bank robbers on April 11, 1986 in Miami, Florida, Special Agent Gordon McNeill was struck in the neck by a high-velocity .223 bullet fired by Michael Platt. While the bullet did not directly contact the spine, and the wound incurred was not ultimately fatal, the temporary cavitation was sufficient to render SA McNeill paralyzed for several hours.
I don’t mean to imply you should just walk in with guns blazin’. Shooting someone is pretty traumatic and if you can avoid it, so much the better.
Well there’s one reason - it HURTS like a bitch!
I’m sorry, but do you have any cites for any of your advice? I’m not an expert or anything, but it seems to me that you shouldn’t have any problems unless:
a) the weapon is illegal
b) you went overboard in your administration of deadly force (like shooting the dude 10 times)
c) the situation was not clearly life threatening
d) some other circumstances would lead the police to believe you are being less than truthfull
cause otherwise I might be like “fuck-it…take my damn TV set. Shooting you would be too much of a hassle!”
Following this thread with great interest. So, in short, it is quite possible and not even improbable that I might shoot an ordinary non-doped-up guy running at me and he’d keep coming?
If he was hit in a non-vital part of the body, why would he stop? Deer hunters commonly aim for the area of the heart and lungs, and use cartridges with considerably more energy than a small pistol cartridge. Even with a solid hit in the heart-lung area, some deer will run a considerable distance before collapsing. With dangerous game, like bears, many hunters will aim for the shoulder, so that even if the animal isn’t dropped by the first shot, the joint is so badly damaged that it will not be able to charge the hunter.