My father wants a gun

SIFU1A said:
if revovers are so great why is every single police dept in the world either switched to autos, wanna switch to autos or wish they could switch to autos? QUOTE]


Because the purpose of police carry is different than the purpose of self/family defense. Police run towards dangers the rest of us flee. They also have a different obligation towards serving the public. But even police only fire an average of 2.6 shots per incident. [ http://www.pointshooting.com/sop9.htm ]

Sure, you might need more than 6 rounds (or 12 or 18 if you carry a speedloader), but you might also need more than 54 rounds. The odds are overwhelmingly against it, though.
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ashtxsniper said:
Glocks are simple. Insert mag, rack slide, and pull trigger.With a double action revolver you have to open the cylinder, remove empties, load cylinder, close cylinder, pull trigger. If you can not understand or figure out how to use a Glock after spending a day at the range with someone who can teach you how to use it then I dont feel that you have any business owning a gun. This is how accidents happen. I own revolvers and autos. I can get a Glock online and fireing faster than my S&W 686 or my Ruger SP101.
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You would be horrified to know know how many people I saw in 2 years or working at an indoor shooting range and 7 further years of working over the counter sporting goods retails forget to clear the chambers in autos after they took the mag out. Not just pistols either. I used to hate hunting season when everyone would start bring in their Remington 7400s for new scopes! :O We had a .30-06 passed back and forth across the counter three or four times before I took it away to check it and sure enough, it was loaded, safety off, and they were aiming at things all around the store adjusting the eye relief on the scope.

We had several holes shot into the floor, walls and ceiling with 'empty' guns. Thankfully nobody ever got hurt, but we had a couple very near misses. I am not saying autos are bad (I carry mix is a S&W 642 and Glocks 19 and 26), but if you have average people that pay the same amount of attention to their guns as they do their cars, revolvers are literally more idiot proof. Now, if idiots should have guns (or cars!) or not, that's another discussion. :D
 
There is no difference between a loaded chamber or a loaded cylinder. Retards dont need guns they do enough damage to society as it is, they need Darwins law to drop down on them like a sack of bricks.
 
Stainless S&W .38 in that price range (shouldn't be too hard to find a good used one). As time goes by it will be easier to clean, load/unload and shoot. A stub nose will be easier to carry, but can be frustrating for some shooters to get a good pattern on paper--let alone in other situations. A 4" barrel might produce better results.

Wipe the weapon down with a silicone treated cloth or something like Marine Tuff cloth and it should be fine for storage or humid environments.
 
Tolly said:
Handgun isn't the best choice for home defense. He would be much better served with a shotgun. An 18-20" barreled Remington 870, Mossberg 500/590 or the like pump in 20ga or 12ga loaded with OO buckshot would be a MUCH better alternative to any handgun. If, however, he is determined to get a handgun I would highly recommend that you set him up with a good revolver. He needs to get some training regardless of what firearm platform he chooses, but putting a semi-auto pistol in the hands of the untrained is foolish. For that matter, putting a firearm of any kind in the hands of someone who has had no instruction whatsoever is also foolish....
Anyway, back to the handgun situation, a good double action revolver, i.e. Smith & Wesson, Ruger, Colt would be a much better option than any semi-auto in this particular situation. If you don't believe me hand your dad a jammed semi-auto and tell him to quickly clear it while you are banging a drum and shooting at him with a paintball gun. Not a wise choice, please trust me. A lot of LE officers even freeze up when their semi autos jam in stressful situations and they carry them every day and train with them. But, like I said originally, the shotgun is a MUCH better option.
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:thumbup::thumbup::thumbup::thumbup:

Get him a good revolver like a model 64 or 65 Smith and Wesson. Stainless steel, ultra reliable, accurite, easy to operate, can be left loaded for decades and still work when trigger is pulled.
 
Tolly said pretty much everything I would have said if I had seen this thread yesterday. I also favor the Ruger GP100 or SP101. When firing .38s they are very manageable. A 357 round in the smaller 101 is a little shocking. :D

Jack
 
Mossberg makes a pump shotgun ( model 500) in stainless steel, I would take that over a hand gun for home defense any day.
 
With proper training and ongoing practice, I'd recommend a ss revolver...357 loaded with 38 Spl.
One consideration I think not mentioned....if your Dad really does not want to use a weapon even to protect himself, he might be better off not having a gun. He might well hesitate long enough that a potential perp. might take the gun from him and that is worse than no gun at all.
Honestly, how about a good dog with a loud bark....or a less lethal weapon..pepper spray or alarm system for the house and loud whistle on a walk, or.... just alternative suggestions.
While I can carry and am skilled at using a handgun, my Dad would never have wanted a gun in his house....he just didn't want to shoot anything, and with that feeling it is quite possible that a gun would have been more of a liability for him than having no gun.
 
So Bamman45, what does the boxotruth have to say regarding penetration in shot smaller than 00... ?
 
I have a Kahr K40 and I LOVE it. Nice accurracy, good handling. An overall nice gun. A tad more than 400.00, but a good buy.

Brett
 
A shotgun 12 gauge makes the most sense - great Zone Defense! Boom - that zone is clear... Boom that zone is clear (etc as necessary)

Also a pump is preferred. Easy to work, if mechanical issues occur easy to clear and that CLACK-CLACK is almost as good as a barking dog to make the bad guys go away.

Of course any police officer will tell you the best thing to have is a Barking DOG! Works really well for keeping the undesired away.

I gave my dad a mossburg 12g - 19in barrel - pump to accent his 3 dogs with the security duties. But he lives at least 1/2 hour from any sort of official response - and he is my dad :)
 
I wouldn't rely on just one gun for home safety. Guns are mechanical, and when they fail it couldn't happen at a worst possible moment than when you are protecting your loved ones. My choice would be to have at least one shotgun and one revolver.

Practice with them, and by doing that you will rotate ammo and keep it fresh. It is a common mistake to have a decent gun but have old unreliable ammo, and old stuff is more likely to cause a jam at the worst moment.

.38 Smith & Wesson 4 or 6 inch barrel
12 gauge full choke semi-auto

Those together with good smoke detectors, and fire extinguishers and you should feel safe.
 
Jeff Clark said:
So Bamman45, what does the boxotruth have to say regarding penetration in shot smaller than 00... ?
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Sorry for my first cryptic post. Here is the link:

http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot3.htm

BB is about .18" and 00 is .33". He is mostly referring to #4 and up which is a lot smaller than either. But he also makes reference to bigger sizes under 0, 00... In plinking around with my shotgun I've noticed that mag bb shot doesn't seem to penetrate deeply into plywood, wallboard etc unless it is very very close range, even with 3.5" mag. His concern in evaluating most ammo is with depth of penetration. So I went ahead and switch from 3.5" mag BB to 2 3/4 low recoil tactical 00. I would be interested to hear your opinion etc as well.
 
In the infamous Cheney accident at least one #7.5 birdshot reached his victim's heart. That was from a 28 gauge shotgun and at some distance. The #7.5 shot is approximately .01 caliber while BB is .18 caliber. The BB shot weighs about 7x as much as the #7.5 shot. For that matter #4 shot is .13 caliber and only weighs about 1/3 as much as BB shot. Within the house BB shot should have plenty of penetration. It is best to use lead shot so that it flattens to reduce penetration through walls.

Back when I took my hunter training course (about 45 years ago) the local police showed off their riot gear. They showed what a classic Thompson .45 and a 12 gauge loaded with 00 buck would do to a car door. They both penetrated clean through the doors (old, heavy, 1950's vintage car doors) and blew up water cans. They picked 00 buck because it did have the penetration to go through car doors. That is the opposite of what I want in my house.
 
bammann45 said:
Sorry for my first cryptic post. Here is the link:

http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot3.htm

BB is about .18" and 00 is .33". He is mostly referring to #4 and up which is a lot smaller than either. But he also makes reference to bigger sizes under 0, 00... In plinking around with my shotgun I've noticed that mag bb shot doesn't seem to penetrate deeply into plywood, wallboard etc unless it is very very close range, even with 3.5" mag. His concern in evaluating most ammo is with depth of penetration. So I went ahead and switch from 3.5" mag BB to 2 3/4 low recoil tactical 00. I would be interested to hear your opinion etc as well.
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Bird shot's for birds.
00 buck is not going through to many wall as the round soft lead balls deform and lose enegy quick.
All bird shot has been proven to be poor at stopping because of lack of penetration.
 
I would seriously look into a titanium d/a revolver. S&W makes one as does Taurus. Look for a .38 special. They are as rust resistant as you can get and I agree with everyone that a revolver is a much safer handgun for beginners. Plus in a revolver you can use shot shells for that caliber. Alternate them with solid rounds.
TEACH HIM HOW TO CLEAN OUT SAND!!! if he is going to have it around a beach environment. Just walking with one on the beach in a slight breeze can be damaging.
 
Jeff Clark said:
In the infamous Cheney accident at least one #7.5 birdshot reached his victim's heart. That was from a 28 gauge shotgun and at some distance. The #7.5 shot is approximately .01 caliber while BB is .18 caliber. The BB shot weighs about 7x as much as the #7.5 shot. For that matter #4 shot is .13 caliber and only weighs about 1/3 as much as BB shot. Within the house BB shot should have plenty of penetration. It is best to use lead shot so that it flattens to reduce penetration through walls.

Back when I took my hunter training course (about 45 years ago) the local police showed off their riot gear. They showed what a classic Thompson .45 and a 12 gauge loaded with 00 buck would do to a car door. They both penetrated clean through the doors (old, heavy, 1950's vintage car doors) and blew up water cans. They picked 00 buck because it did have the penetration to go through car doors. That is the opposite of what I want in my house.
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I think his concern at the Box was whether a given round can penetrate a minimum of about 7" -- I believe that is thought to be the min depth for very lethal hits. It would interesting to see some more experimentation with BB versus Buck in various materials, such as ballistic gelatin, as I thought his article was light on that side of the testing. I don't know how deep BB would penetrate into ballistic gelatin. I will do some googling...

Addtion: Found this article about calibrating ballistic gelatin -- here is a quote

"# To yield reproducible results the gelatin should be calibrated using a standard BB shot (preferably 2 shots) at 590 ± 15f/s which should give a penetration depth of 3.3 ± .6" (8.5 ± 1.5 cm) measured from the front surface of the gelatin block to the leading edge of the BB."

http://www.frfrogspad.com/gelatin.htm

Next up, what is velocity of standard lead BB shot from say a 3" mag shell...

Addition: Winchester lists some high velocity 3" loads for BB shot at ~1500 FPS -- significantly faster than gelatin proofing load listed above. But I also know that mass plays a large part in penetration...

I think I will leave this to others with more ballistic knowledge to comment further on. I am interested in more discussion as over penetration is a concern for me as well. I switched because I was concered about effectiveness...
 
It takes energy to make a projectile penetrate material. Roughly the energy required is proportional to the volume of material broken up by the projectile (plus some waste energy that just causes the target to heat up or vibrate). For a simple cylindrical penetration channel (like a small sphere passing through ballistic gel) it implies that depth is roughly proportional to velocity. I would expect a projectile going 3x as fast to penetrate around 3x as deep. (All these are gross approximations). So I would bet your BB can penetrate 7 inches in the gel.

I don't think that the 7-inch depth is really necessary if the target is getting hit with more than 10 pellets that are closely spaced. There is going to be a lot of shock and blood loss. I know that the British used to use smaller shot in their military shotgun loads than the US.
 
...he knows how to handle, point an shoot a revolver. Nothing more...

...he wants a gun that he can have in the house,
or in the glove compartment of the car,
or even take with him while walking at the beach...
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In my opinion, from what you say about your Dad there is only one reasonable choice,
Have him get a stainless Double Action Revolver in .38 S&W Special. with a 4" barrel.

Double Action Revolver
.38 S&W Special Caliber
4 inch barrel
Stainless

Forget about the .357 Magnum. That's just not a good idea in this situation.


Can you find someone around there who is knowledgeable about handguns?
If so, pay them a few bucks to help your Dad get what's right for him.


Then, take him out often and let him shoot the thing.

Have him start out at close range, like 6 feet to the target, then he can move out further as his skill increases,
but first he has to be able to get the bullets on target.
If he likes to shoot, and it's a pleasant experience, than he'll become a good shot
and the confidence and skill he'll develop is what's really important in this situation...
...The area is very secure and nice, but my father wants a gun for protection, just in case....
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...My father is not careful with his tools, so I'm afraid that when the time comes, the gun will be just a big chunk of rusty metal...
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Find someone that will keep it maintained for him if he's not handy.
 
Alberto Salas said:
My father wants a gun :eek:

Hi guys!
My parents are now retired, and spend almost all their time in a small house they have on the beach :thumbup:

The problem is that they are alone almost all the time, and their neighbours house is hundreds of meters away. The area is very secure and nice, but my father wants a gun for protection, just in case.

Soooooo . . .

He wants something for about $400, small, safe and VERY rust resistant.
I know nothing about guns, but I think a Glock 26 is a good choice.

You guys know a lot about this, what do you think?
Is my recomendation right, is there something cheaper or better?

Thanks for your help!


BETO
====================
Sorry for my english :o
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Mossberg 500 maricote 12ga. Best home defender around. Taurus pt92/pt100stainless steel or even 66 or 617 in .357 mag
 
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