The only issue would be blasting through a wall and hitting someone else on the other side. (Neighbors are not as much of a concern. We live in BFE.) I’m well aware of this, and I must remain absolutely conscientious of this in a fight.
I should have also mentioned that I have a shotgun configured in the same manner. What I grab will depend on what I believe the threat to be. If I believe it’s a lowlife burglar then I’ll grab the shotgun, primarily for its intimidation factor. The FAL is primarily for a JBT raid.
The spread on a shotgun at the kind of ranges you would be dealing with indoors is so small as to be irrelevant accuracy wise, but if you connect, you have little worry of any threat from the now late intruder.
I equate slide racking with threatening someone with a gun without intending to use it, a bad idea. Why on earth do you want to give away your location. In my house, the intruder might be minimally aware of the shot that killed him before he died. No warnings, because you’re not getting one from him.
And in a situation like that, you’re more likely to be simply pulling the trigger until the gun goes “click”, which doesn’t guarantee you’re going to hit anything. And then you’ve got an empty shotgun and not necessarily an incapacitated Bad Guy.
I don’t have a lot of experiences with Semi-Auto shotguns (They’re restricted in Australia and hard to get), but I did use a couple in NZ and personally found them to be less accurate than a pump-action. That may just be my personal shooting style, but I found the fraction of a second I needed to rack the slide did wonders for my accuracy
Yes, I’ve heard them being chambered, and they don’t sound quite as intimidating as a pump-action, IMO.
I know I’m coming from a different culture here, but I can’t think of a non-military situation in which you wouldn’t have time to rack the slide or work the action on a gun. In short, I would NEVER keep a loaded and ready to fire gun in the house, even if it were legal to do so.
Amazingly so. Fire a full-strength Factory Loaded .357 Magnum in the dark (if legal to do so in your area, of course), and you’ll get muzzle flash (flame shooting out of the end of the revolver), and cylinder flash (flame out both sides of the cylinder)- even on a 6" barrel .357 like a Colt Python or a Ruger GP100. It will dazzle for at least a second or two, which is not a good thing in any shooting situation.
One other thought: Instead of buying a Glock UltraTacticalElite SuperBling handgun, why not get something like a Tokarev TT-33 in 7.62x25mm? They have the advantage of being cheap, reliable, and ammunition for them is readily available in the US.
They hold 8 rounds in the magazine, and they “point” very well, don’t kick as much as a 9mm (IMO), and, well, the Soviet Army proved their effectiveness during WWII and many subsequent conflicts.
Classic, Not Plastic, as I keep saying to people who ask why I hunt and shoot with “all those old guns”…
Interesting. I never thought about that. Learn something every day.
I like the .357 when I have to scare bears out of our ‘yard’. I stay pretty far away from them when I fire a round over their head (say 50 feet). And I am real close to a car or the house (bears are incredibly fast) It’s worked good so far though…… Now if I can only get my Wife to get comfortable with the 30-30 model ‘94 or the .356 Marlin on the deck……. ‘course no one is going to be comfortable with that .356. Hurt me for a month after shooting it a dozen times.
I’m sorry about the down home style of my writing at the moment, and it does not look like Marlin makes the .356 anymore. Or I would provide a link. Good gun. It hurts to shoot it, but it sure is fun. It’s a .308 necked up to .356 built for a lever action carbine. Small personal cannon basically. It’s not a .444. But yes it is a small cannon.
My father bought two of these rifles many years ago because “It’s big enough to stop anything on the North American continent”. Yep Dad. I’m sure it would stop most cars and trucks as well. :snerk:
Hmm… Well, I do agree that short barreled pump 12 ga is probably about the best home defense, I disagree completely that someone with a semi-auto is going to just keep pulling the trigger until it goes ‘click’.
Re: the accuracies of semi-auto shotguns and pump shot gun accuracies and home defense.
Its not an issue at 12 feet.
You are more likely to throw your aim off by having to rack the slide.
It’s still not an issue.
I’m not going to start another gun debate. I’m very happy with my .357 or 30-30, .356 or 12 gage. I suspect that if I ever need anything more than my .357 that I will be running as fast as I can.
A few points:
[ul][li]Racking the action strictly as a deturrent measure is both technically and tactically inadvisable. You give away initiative and position, and increase the chance of short-stroking or jamming the gun. It also reduces the number of rounds available to you, which is particuarly important in a gun primarily used for hunting. (In a defensive gun you’d remove the plug and make maximum use of the magazine, of course.)[/li][li]As already noted, the spread on even a cylinder barrel at indoor defensive ranges (<25ft) is insignificant. [/li][li]If you have a “no-time-to-aim” situation, then you also have a “no time to shoot” situation. Rule #3: Finger off the trigger until the sights are on the target.[/li][li]In a combat situation, there is no such thing as “shoot to kill” or “shoot to wound”; there is only “shoot to hit”. To this end, you fire at the center of mass, unless you have the skill and a clean shot at the head. In any case (and I believe this was the poster’s intent), any time you drop the hammer on someone, you have to accept the likely possibility that they may die from your actions, and you are liable for the criminal and civil consequences thereof. [/ul][/li]On the issue of muzzle flash, I’ve been witness to the firing of various firearms at dusk on a firing range. A .357 or .44 Magnum handgun makes a huge fireball of a flash, as will any centerfire rifle caliber. The report in a confined space is also sufficient to cause possibly permanent hearing loss. The stacco bark of a 9mmP or .45ACP is much less intense in comparison. (The .40S&W is somewhat louder and sharper than either but less than the Magnums, and I imagine the same is true for the .357 Sig and the .400 Cor-Bon.) This makes them not ideal for self-defense, though it should be noted that you can fire lower-powered versions (.38 Spl and .44 Spl, respectively) in revolvers chambered for these calibers that are more managable than the Magnum rounds.
I’m late on the discussion, but permit me to reinforce the point that the OP should obtain the requisite training in safe gun handling and have a plan for storage before bringing a gun home and certainly before keeping a loaded gun in access. With children around, one must consider not only the household children, who may be trained and trustworthy around firearms, but also their friends, who well may not be. Secure storage is a must in such a situation, and recommended in all situations. This needn’t be a gun safe, but it should at least be trigger locks and separate stored of ammunition for any firearms not fully secure.
There are, as has also been noted, other weapons that may be a better choice for some individuals who are not comfortable or experienced with firearms, but none are so effective at defending against a larger, more aggressive, multiple, or armed attacker. Such attacks are relatively rare–home intrusions are significantly less likely in the US than in the UK, for instance, possibly due to the difference in firearm availability in those nations–but many do not care to be the oddball statistic at the tail end of the distribution, either, and police response can be highly variable to even the more desperate of situations. To that end, a firearm can be yet another safety measure, but you must know how to store and handle it properly. If you aren’t confident in your ability to do so, obtain the necessary training and experience or select another method for defense.
Well, I agree- until you know how to use it and are willing to use it, don’t buy a gun. But do go get some training.
Now, what to do until you make that decision? Here’s what I recommend- a very large can of bear strength pepper spray. The bear size pepper spray cans are about the size of a soda can or larger. They have a more obvious trigger mechanism.
Of course, they could be illegal in your jusristiction. But if you sprayed an honest-to-goodness intruder, few cops would take you to task. IANAL, YMMV.
And, if you sprayed your neighbor by accident, no real harm done- in 99% of the time, anyways.
In a confined space, pepper or OC (Oleoresin Capsicum) spray is likely to be nearly as noxious to the user as to the recipient. Furthermore, the “burning, blinding, disabling pain” is highly overstated; if you aren’t expecting to get a faceful of spray it might stun you, but if you’ve experienced it before its no guarantee to stop anyone.
I used to train at a dojo which provided self-defense classes to women and battered women’s shelters; one of the demonstrations the owner used to do was have someone defend against a simulated attacker (him) with pepper spray, starting at 21 feet. (This was using a large, 10% grade cannister.) The only time anyone ever stopped him was when a clear-headed defender sprayed at him continually while he was charging, then ducked out of the way and bashed him over the head with the can.
Pepper spray is fine against an animals, which can’t figure out how Pinky suddenly made its eyes burn, and it can be a decent first layer of active defense against an attacker, but it’s hardly a panacea, and I wouldn’t recommend that anyone rely on it exclusively. You’ll note that while most police carry OC spray, they also carry PR-24 batons, flashlights, sidearms, and occasionally other weapons (knives, Tasers, et cetera) in addition.
Personally, I think the most effective, legal-in-all-jurisdictiton weapons is a 4C+ cell flashlight. A modest amount of training can turn it into an effective striking and restraint weapon, and no jury in the country is going to convict anyone for “carrying a concealed flashlight.”
Generally, when you’re facing “an intruder in you home” you don’t need to 'stop"
him as he’s very unlikely to be charging you. In a hallway, the stuff works fine. Although indeed a large flashlight isn’t a bad thing, we here are talking about home defense, which is entirely different than “protection while out and about”. And IANAL but while carrying a flashlight is legal, using it as a club is not. (Here in CA, carrying a club is illegal, and intent is part of what defines a “club”) And, it’s large, bulky and heavy, and you have to get within a foot of the bad guy to use it. This last is something you really want to avoid in home defense. Not to mention, it could be a 4’10 67# female having to weild it- and no matter how small or weak you are, pepper sprayers still do the job. And, if you want a damn club, there’s always a baseball bat, which is better for home defence.
However, rather that the outdated large black flashlight, one of those smallish super-duper bright police flashlights (with a rather short burn time) might be even better- to shine in someones eyes. After being pepper sprayed AND blinded by bight light, there is little doubt you’ll be able to get away from the intruder- which is what a citizen wants to do, not “stop him”.
Have you ever used pepper spray in a confined area? Even the gel makes a fine mist that makes the area uninhabitable until it settles, and the streaming kind is almost as caustic to the wielder as to the attacker.
I agree that a flashlight, being a close-range melee weapon, is less than ideal for home defense, but it provides both the shock effect of illumination (as you indicate) plus a perfectly legally defensible reason for possession. I can’t imagine any DA attempting to pursue a conviction based upon the use of it as a weapon in a situation in which the wielder was otherwise justified in acting in self-defense. The preference, of course, is to used an effective ranged weapon (i.e. a firearm), but it has the attendant hazards and liabilities previously discussed.
As for an intruder in your home not charging you, if said intruder is not being aggressive then you’ve no right (in most states) to fire upon him or otherwise respond with violence. The ideal outcome of an encounter with an intruder is to drive him off without violence, and let the police do the job of pursing him. Disarming, disabling, or wounding an attacker results in some degree of liability and hazard to the defender, and seriously injuring or killing an attacker brings on the spectre of civil liability.
Pepper spray is fine, within its venue, as one measure of a defensive system, but I wouldn’t advice that anyone rely upon it alone.
Don’t let someone tell you to shoot something like a 12 gauge shotgun with a full load, .357 handgun or OG forbid, a .44 magnum when you are still a beginner. You wouldn’t think shooting was much fun when you hear the noise and recoil from those in the beginning although you can build up to shooting more powerful guns like that pretty rapidly. You don’t want to shoot overly powerful guns as the focus of training in the beginning because you can devlelop a flinch problem at the moment of fire and that can be hard to break.
QUOTE]
Okay, maybe I’m just a weirdo or something, but the first time I went out shooting with handguns we had a .357 revolver with a six inch barrel and a .44 revolver, eight inch barrel. We had both standard and Mag rounds for both pistols. I had a much harder time with the .357 because the kick up from the short barrel got me right in the wrists, whereas the kick from the .44 was more of a straight back into the shoulder movement. Hey, I’m a girl, my wrists aren’t much, but I’m a big girl and I have plenty of shoulder/upper body strength. So I shot regular rounds from both pistols, tried the .357 Mag (still too much kick upward, hard to control) but when I tried the .44 with a Mag round in it, whoo Nelly! It was getting on toward twilight, the flash was absofuckinglutely incredible and I put a round lengthwise through the burned out pickup truck we’d been using for a target–no foolin’, saw a spray of plastic from the grill, and lined up the holes all the way through the thing… missed the engine block, of course, but it was pretty cool nonetheless. So my actual point being, when that first Mag round fired off I had what might be best described as a pantysplash and I was laughing like a loon when I finished off the last round.
So, sometimes a big ass hand cannon can be a GREAT first experience with shooting!
For the right person, those things can be hook to loving firearms, However, they are a terrible way to learn to shoot properly (as in almost impossible) and shooting guns that powerful can make some beginning shooters develop flinches and trigger jerking which is really hard to break.
The best way is to learn basic marksmanship with a .22 before moving on. Shooting anything higher than a 9 mm pistol in the beginning is not advised.
My father was a gun dealer, we lived in a very rural area, had tons of land, and had a rifle range, a pistol range, and a skeet range at our house. We also had every gun known to man circulating in and out at all times.
When it was time for me to learn to shoot, I got to use the same single shot .22 that my father and his father learned on. We taught lots of people to shoot over the years and we always started with the single shot .22. I cringe when I here people that just got handed a .357 or 12 gauge and started blasting away. That is more of a dare or stunt rather than proper shooting.
Oh hey, I’d been shooting .22 rifles since I was a kid, but nobody ever introduced me to handguns at an early age–more’s the pity…
As for accuracy, up here it’s considered to be a fun way to waste a day and some money by getting up a shitload of ammo and some friends and heading out to a remote location to shoot stuff. Bottles, cans, milk jugs, watermelons, burned out trucks, whatever–it’s amusement… Nobody’s making any great claims to marksmanship, it’s just all about making a bunch of noise and holes in stuff. Some idiots shoot partially empty five gallon propane tanks, but that’s just stupidy.
What prices have you found? I’m betting they were pretty high, since the Desert Eagle is available new in .44 Magnum and .50 AE. If you want to track down a used one, you can still find one in .357.
While this makes a great deal of practical and logical sense, (Who doesn’t want the maximum number of rounds to let go in case of emergency?) I’d have to advise against making any modifications to your gun or your loads that aren’t legal in the jurisdiction in which you live, and many places do not allow the plug to be pulled on a civilian owned shotgun. There is a reason the plug was installed in the first place.
Never forget, as others have mentioned, that in a worst case scenario, one in which you actually fire the weapon at another person, there is a strong likelihood of your ending up in court. The weapon you use is going to be presented as evidence at the hearing. You do not want to give the prosecuting attorney anything else to throw at you (As you can see, the MURDER WEAPON has been modified to hold more rounds than is legal….etc.) It’s my opinion that the less a gun looks like something you see being confiscated from drug dealers on the news, the better it would appear under the harsh light of a courtroom. I’ll always opt for a nice wooden stocked shotgun for home defense than a matte black, folding stock one. Not that I’m in step with this mentality, but one looks like grandpa’s duck gun to a juror, and the other looks like a prop from an action movie. Keep it simple, keep it safe, and keep it mundane in appearance.
I’m not saying you’re wrong, but I don’t know of any state or municipality where it is illegal to remove the plug for target shooting and home defense purposes. It is often illegal to increase the magazine capacity in a hunting capacity, but that’s a cat of a different meow. Removing or replacing the plug on most pump-action shotguns is about a 30 second task, BTW.
I’d also concur of the inadvisibilty of making obvious modifications to the firearm and particularly using some kind of custom load–the best advice is to use what local law enforcement uses (if legal) and stand on that as justification. While a plastic stock, flash hider, et cetera don’t do anything to increase the lethality of a gun, they can be used to sway a (probably) ignorant jury.
So the Remington 1100 with 16" barrel, magazine extension, pistol grip, top-folding stock, bandolier, SureFire tactical light, and AM/FM cassette player is out?
By having a gun in the house, you increase your chances of dying by gunshot.
I agree that you should go to a shooting range to learn and familiarize yourself with guns, so they aren’t some scary monster kind of thing. But understand that they are dangerous tools, and having one in your home empirically does more harm than good.
