re: "9mm vs 40 sw" The great handgun debate

quote:

---

I just came into this thread just to downvote all the .40 trash...

---

quote:

---

laugh now because I have no idea if I'll end up just like you. Im going with the 40. The reason is that the 9 just doesn't feel right in my hand. No balistic or magazine talk, the 40 just feels right

---

quote:

---

I mean if you'd like to meet me at cabelas I'll gladly show you. Just let me know when

---

quote:

---

I'm not a metallurgist, bullet engineer or physicist. At a certain point, we were already comparing apples to apples, anyway. Recall that hollowpoint ammunition was pretty much just that for decades - a partially jacketed or unjacketed round with a - at times - crude hollowed out shape. Much of such ammunition came out of handloading, and the cartridges themselves were demonized in some state and local laws as "dum dums" and so forth.

So, when the capacity came to make really high quality HP and JHP ammunition, the first one to really grab attention was the Federal 357B - it remains an extremely effective (although obsolete) round with a 95% "one shot stop" record in real world shootings. Now - keep in mind, this is skewed as much of the real world shooting data was police involved shootings from the 1950s through 1980s and a lot of those cops were carrying 4-inch Colt and Smith .357 revolvers with 6 in the cylinder. If you think about it - it makes sense those guys took their time and tried to make every shot count.

Flash forward to the 1980s - 9mm pistols had NEVER been popular in the U.S. Revolvers were still king as late as the late 70s/early 80s. .38 and .357 were huge sellers for law enforcement and self defense options. Larger .357 revolvers were popular for hunting. So, what bullet development existed was for those platforms (first) - now 38 special and .357 are approximately the same diameter as 9mm and share many of the bullet weights, so some of that was transferable. There was also a .45 ACP market, sustained heavily by veterans who had experience with the M1911 from their years in the service.

THEN, several things happened in short order - the U.S. military changed their sidearm from the M1911 and wanted to use the 9mm NATO (Luger/Parabellum - all the same thing) cartridge for standardization with our allies, as we were still in the Cold War.

This started in 1979. The Beretta 92 (M9, ultimately selected) was developed. Sig adapted their P220 to conform with the specs, which yielded the P226 (who ultimately ditched their M9s for this, far superior, albeit pricey, platform) - and by the mid/end of the 1980s, EVERYBODY had a full-sized and compact "Wonder 9" for sale at gun stores all over this great country.

Everyone knew that 9mm was inferior to .45, as it was those little tiny bullets, compared to the "short and fat" .45 ACP. But, these were new, fancy, double action and held a shite ton of bullets. The military bought them and every police force from Maine to Mauna Loa bought them.

Just as the market was, more or less, saturated, the results of the aftermath of the 1986 FBI Miami shootout became available.

If you don't believe in government insanity, you should study that issue. They were SHOCKED that their pistol/revolver armed agents lost a gunfight with perps armed with long guns - and their response (What would you do? Arm your agents with long guns, right?) - was to try to get a more effective pistol round.

Jeff Cooper had one - the 10mm Auto. And it was a high velocity, hard hitting round - but it was made for M1911 platforms and was really hard on smaller guns and agents. So, they ultimately cut it down and created a cartridge that was smaller and faster than .45ACP and bigger and slower than 9mm. America loves choices, so now you had small, medium, and big (still pistol rounds, mind you - still huge compromises, but choices, right?).

So, when the ugly gun/magazine ban went into effect in 1994, the 9 lost it's huge advantage. People picked .40 and .45 more often, because if you were limited to 10 rounds, then the bias was for the larger caliber. No replacement for bullet weight, particularly with 20th century bullet designs.

Well, in 2004, the ugly gun ban expired and there was renewed interest in 9mm, as they have, as pointed out in the thread by the 9mm disciples, typically 2 or more rounds advantage over .40 in the same platform. Plus, the ammo was historically cheaper and easier to obtain, before the late unpleasantness.

9s became hugely popular again. Bullet makers started focusing on what could be fixed - the 9mm terminal performance, penetration, expansion, etc. The reason they're "even" now is that 9mm had more room to grow. The same technology was applied to .40 and .45 ACP, and they're improved as well, but we're at the point of diminishing returns and they've all settled onto about even performance.

So, until a breakthrough occurs that takes advantage of the larger caliber's bullet mass or diameter, the easier to shoot/can carry more rounds cartridge wins current evaluations by default.

---

quote:

---

I was there saturday. I didn't say anything about weight difference.

---