Less than 10 pounds body weight. This centerfire pistol caliber is semi-rimmed and straight walled. I don’t like messing with bullets so I have no personal experience with spoon tips. • Medium Sized Game (CXP2) – Non-dangerous. So again, The Cambridge Dictionary is inaccurate. Think semi-auto handguns, rifles and shotguns. Many people looking to buy their first handguns maybe wanting it for home defense. A good recoil pad can help soften the blow to the shooter's shoulder. It is closely trailed by the .40 S&W, the .45 ACP and the .38 Super. Whereas with semi-auto handgun calibers, the only real contender for varmint is the .22 WMR, that is not the case with revolver calibers. So what’s the kicker? Keep in mind, this is a revolver cartridge. Whether or not these sights are zeroed properly will greatly affect accuracy as well. Required fields are marked *, Best Shooting Vest Of 2020 – Top 8 Reviews & Buying Guide. Again all things considered, I wouldn’t hunt large game with any of the handgun calibers mentioned here, just because of the fact that big bore revolvers and cartridges designed for those are easier to come by. The key is to look at your own needs, and to match them with a choice in our guide. This website is devoted to hunting, with all rifle trajectories sighted … As far as muzzle energy, the .40 Super is the top dog, but availability issues have been hounding this cartridge since the company that manufactured it went out of business. The round is exceptionally controllable, even in small guns. Ok recoil. We included both 22-caliber rimfire rounds again, because as mentioned earlier, there are just a lot of semi-auto handguns and revolvers chambered for those two. Pros: Cheap! This gave a slight increase in recoil. With suppressors becoming more and more common this subsonic handgun round is a dream to suppress. After every handgun caliber has been placed in its respective category, we’ll compare all of them based on their relative strengths and weaknesses in these three key areas: I was initially going to include other metrics like stopping power (for self defense rounds), one-hit-kill potential (for hunting rounds), accuracy, terminal performance and recoil to compare all listed handgun calibers against each other but decided against it because of the following reasons:eval(ez_write_tag([[300,250],'gunnewsdaily_com-medrectangle-4','ezslot_4',130,'0','0'])); Stopping power and one-hit-kill potential in my opinion (and lot of other sensible gun nuts’) cannot be quantified for a lot of reasons. Theoretically, anyone can place well-aimed heart and head shots in their target given ample time and practice. But the thicker revolver frame can withstand more punishment from the most powerful cartridges. This is, S&W 629 Performance Center Stealth Hunter model, Disclaimer Policy And FTC Affiliate Disclosure |. So again, for the purpose of comparing handgun calibers, we will not be using recoil as a metric. The LR in .22LR refers to Long Rifle, while ACP refers to Automatic Colt Pistol. 25 ACP; 32 ACP; 327 Magnum; 380 ACP; 9mm Luger; 357 Magnum; 357 SIG; 38 Special; 38 Super; 40 S&W; 10mm Auto; 41 Magnum; 44 Magnum; 44 Special; 45 ACP; 45 GAP; 45 Colt; 454 Casull; 460 Magnum; 480 Ruger; 50 AE; 500 … While often referred to as the “.44 Magnum of the semi-auto world” it is much more on par with the .357 Magnum. Compare ammunition from all manufacturers on one easy chart, sorted by caliber. The heavier a handgun is, the more recoil energy it will absorb. The ammunition isn’t very expensive, and every .357 Magnum revolver will also shoot .38 special. As with semi-auto plinking calibers, we only want to consider price when shopping around for revolver plinking rounds. Expensive. Still, if money isn’t an issue and you’re considering buying (or if you just happen to own) a Desert Eagle chambered in .50 AE, you’d be pleased to know that its 50-caliber round is the most affordable semi-auto handgun caliber for hunting large game.eval(ez_write_tag([[336,280],'gunnewsdaily_com-leader-2','ezslot_11',126,'0','0'])); All the other calibers on the graph above are close to obsolescence if they’re not already obsolete — except maybe for the .44 AMP (Automag Pistol). Bullet Ballistics & Charts. Yes, I’ve heard people sanding solid copper bullets to give them “spoon tips”. Some revolver enthusiasts have their revolver’s cylinder reamed by competent gunsmiths to allow for moon clips. But it was manageable in the full-size guns that were originally designed for police officers to carry this cartridge with. How a particular caliber performs after the shooter pulls a gun’s trigger, how fast a bullet travels, what kind of trajectory it has, what kind of wound cavities it’s able to create upon impacting tissue, etc., these are the things that come to mind when I hear that word. For example, if you mainly want to hunt varmint, skip to the guns in our guide which mention they are great for hunting varmint. Compounding the fact, it is very difficult to control in a lightweight polymer pistol. It was designed years back for the first blowback pistols that did not have a breech locking mechanism. It doesn’t penetrate as well because of its moderate velocity. Handgun shooting is one of the most addictive types of shooting! Of course, the caliber is a very important consideration, but we have already divided these guns based on caliber. I personally wouldn’t want a revolver in .45 Long Colt though. Tons of guns on the market. It made more sense to downsize the cartridge and make the gun smaller. Felt recoil can be even harder to quantify, because we all have different hand and wrist sizes and varying levels of arm and upper body strength, not to mention we have different pain thresholds. If you’re looking to purchase a handgun in the caliber you’re interested in, go to the range and rent the gun, put it through its paces, see if you like how it handles. Plus the simple fact, the heavy steel frame guns that are common for this caliber are very difficult to conceal. You can purchase a range of weapons to use on the 9mm handgun caliber chart, including small concealed carry and larger firearms. As you can see, many things will effect an accuracy besides just common calibers of guns. This cartridge is already so close to the maximum operating pressure, it is dangerous to try and squeeze an extra few feet per second out of this cartridge. My top 5 calibers for self-defense are 380, 12 gauge, 9mm, 40 cal, and 357 mag. This is still one of the most common self-defense calibers on the market. Some studies attribute falling down or “knock down” to solely psychological re… But let’s not belabor that point. For these two reasons, anyone dead serious about becoming the most bad-ass handgun-toting varmint exterminator should really look into getting a Taurus Tracker M17, a medium-frame revolver similar to the Model 627 and comes in 6- or 8.5-inch heavy barrel. *A note on .40 S&W +P and +P+ ammo: it doesn’t exist. 00 (“double-aught”) is the go-to load. Furthermore, ammunition is expensive for training ammo! And looking at the ballistic performance graph below, the hottest .357 Magnum hunting loads are almost in the same energy category as the .41 Magnum, another magnum round that fills the gap between the .357 and the .44 magnums. However, we are aware of obscure designs that allow for certain revolver cartridges to chamber in some semi-auto handguns (e.g. Also, do your homework on the caliber’s ballistic performance, launching platform and ammo availability. Coonan, LAR Grizzly and Desert Eagle in .357 Magnum and some Wildeys, AutoMags and again the Desert Eagle chambered in .44 Magnum). This round is the absolute best penetrator of all the semiautomatic guns. Both the manufacturer of the firearm and the ammunition. Jan 7, 2013 - Ammo Size Chart Photo - Ammunition Chart. Before I got really into handguns, I remember some of the questions I would often ask myself: To me, the word “caliber” as it pertains to firearms is a label — not just a measurement of a bullet or a bore’s dimensions — but a way to identify the intrinsic qualities of a cartridge that makes it unique. Tons of guns on the market. A 50 caliber 16 inch gun (16 inch diameter shell), has a barrel length (muzzle to breech) of 50 × 16 = 800 in (66 ft 8 in). Not that this is a high-performance cartridge anyway! And lastly, barrel rifling stabilizes a bullet by making it spin as it exits the barrel.eval(ez_write_tag([[300,250],'gunnewsdaily_com-box-4','ezslot_5',113,'0','0'])); Not to complicate this topic, but there are two types of barrel rifling — lands-and-grooves and polygonal, and the number of rifling grooves (in the case of the former) or rifling surfaces (in the case of the latter) affects how fast a bullet would spin, thereby also affecting accuracy. To me it was just another never-ending debate, but it was the number of times both of them said “caliber” that I found amusing — and mildly irritating as well. Especially relevant, these are the most common that you will hear discussed in gun shops and see on store shelves. A semi-auto handgun is great for self defense because it has a thinner profile which makes it easier to be carried concealed. The overall best home defense round is buckshot. Stay away from the small "mouse gun" calibers like .22 Long Rifle, .25 ACP, and .32 ACP. Plus, more people are buying pistols as their first gun than they did in years past. If you don’t mind spending more, consider the S&W 629 Performance Center Stealth Hunter model. It is trailed closely by the 9mm at $0.35, while its bigger rimmed brother the .22 WMR (Winchester Magnum Rimfire — or .22 Magnum) comes in third at double the .22 LR’s price.eval(ez_write_tag([[336,280],'gunnewsdaily_com-leader-1','ezslot_17',124,'0','0'])); Now we get into the meat of our semi-auto handgun caliber discussion. It is better now than it ever has been enjoying the same advancement in technology as other rounds. Pros: Cheap! Good for small game hunting. Cons: Expensive, hard to find, few choices in guns, very few loadings available. It is already quiet, due to its low velocity. While there are a ton of pistol cartridges on the market, this is a few. Fast follow-up shots are possible with this cartridge if you are well practiced. Buck Shot. Combined with, the explosion of CCW and handgun hunting both happening as new technologies push the envelope in the lethality and terminal performance of handgun rounds, new expectations are being held for old classics. But as a camping gun or hunting option, there are very few calibers that are better. The type of sights on a firearm also have a direct influence on accuracy. Guns chambered in this round are exceptionally common. This allowed for heavier bullets pushed at the same velocity as in a 9mm. Much... read more happy to include the.357 Magnum in our list only benefit is that handguns. Carried by most modern militaries and law-enforcement agencies in the coming years will most likely best. 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