Something you might find informative -       http://www.madogre.com/interviews/p3at_review.htm       ; - and why in my less than informed opinion wheel guns are the only way to go if you are only an occasional user.
Autos are great for pistoleros who have the time & knowledge to find the loads their particular specimen likes to digest & know where to find the rough spots that need to be smoothed down.
W/ a wheel gun - fill it up & go. - If you get into reloading it will be for reasons of cost, accuracy & power not reliability

nice pattern FX

As I have mentioned elsewhere, I have several handguns and am a Big supporter of the 2nd Amendment and our rights.

FYI - Taurus makes some decent guns, especially for the price. Also the Bersa "Thunder" .380 makes an excellent CC (it is nearly identical to the Walther PPK for only a few hundred bucks) the biggest problem with the .380 is getting hollow-points now...scarce all over.

As for stopping power - truth is, most people will stop after getting hit with the 1st round - regardless of the location of the shot - mainly from the shock factor of being hit (along with the pain they will experience), a 2nd or 3rd shot will stop most.

That said, I alternate between a .40 Glock and .40 Taurus 24/7 with my PPK as a back-up. I had the opportunity to test fire the new Springfield XDm 3.8 (9mm) 2 days ago....and promptly put my order in for one. They can be had for about $550 - $700 depending on where you go, but there seems to be a backlog in getting those here from Croatia where they are made.

The Taurus and the XDm are polymer and are a bit lighter than the counterpart - nicer for regular carry.

That's my 2cents worth

Guys, not to jack a thread, but this is my passion for many years now. Bulldog i don't mean to throw you under the bus, but I have to state he following. Most people will not stop after one shot unless you hit a major organ. I personally shot a man in my driveway seven times and he made it across the street, about 30 yards, before he collapsed. I shot his partner three times and he was still very much in motion until the third shot severed his spine at the T8 vertebrae. Moments later a guy who monitors police scanners for entertainment shows up and the guy with seven holes in his body gets up and tries to make a getaway by attempting to carjack this guy. He had lost his weapon, so I could not shoot him again and instead had to put him down with a takedown manuever and hold him at gunpoint until police arrived to take control of the scene. Both were on alcohol and had been smoking weed. Another great example of pure willpower is given in a video called Deadly Effects. It's a wound ballistic tutorial featuring Dr. Fackler, the U.S. Army's former Chief Forensic Ballastician. In the video, which dispells many myths such as knockdown power and the relevance of temporary cavitation in flesh by small projectiles, there is an autopsy photo of a man shot 47 times with a 9mm who was still actively engaging FBI Agents after the 47th round until he was finally put down with a 12Ga. His post-mortem toxocology report was negative for any controlled substances. He did this on Adrenalin

Having been shot myself, in a seperate incident than mentioned above, I can tell you that it was virtually painless at the time of impact. It felt more like being hit with a rubber mallet. 30 minutes later was a different story altogether, but at the time of impact I very much was unaware of any sort of incapacitating pain and continued to fight for my life. My website is www.defconccw.com if you would like to read the news article to confirm my story.

A 147gr. 9mm will get you about 9-12 inches of penetration. This is adequate to reach major organs in a 200 lb man wearing a thick undershirt and a Carhart type coat. A 115gr. 9mm target load like you buy at Walmart will get you about 6 inched of penetration if it does not have to penetrate heavy clothing and is not deflected or physically defeated by a bone hit. Barely effective. A .380 is a good backup or concealed carry load when there is low potential for engagement and you want one just in case. I often carry a PPKS in .380 when I'm in a low threat environment myself. But for std. defensive carry I would recommend nothing less than a 147gr. 9mm.

Always carry the largest, heaviest caliber round you can shoot accurately and aim for center of mass of whatever your shooting at. Nature tucks the important stuff deep inside of organisms for protection. If you cannot damage the important stuff, your attacker will almost definitely have the ability to continue the attack.

If anyone would like get a copy of the video, send me a message and I will give you their contact info so you can purchase a copy for yourself. It is a must see for understanding small arms performance for self defense.

Another great self defense video is called Surviving Edged Weapons.  It'll open your eyes as to what is possible with a small blade in a short amount of time. Last time I saw one on E-bay it ran $300.  If you know a law enforcement officer their department probably has at least one copy of this in it's training library.

As Mel Gibson said in "The Patriot", ' . . . aim small . . . ' Another nice revolver for concealment or easy carry is the Ruger P-101, 9mm with five shot capacity and easy drop-in clips, usually found in stainless. Not sure they still are made but can be found easily used or at gun shows. It gives the shooter 9mm power and small profile for easy carry and can be easily handled by someone with small hands, accurately.

I owned a P3AT for a few months.  Great small carry pistol.  Easy to shoot.  But my hands are just too big for it and with the polymer frame being so light it felt like it was gonna fly out of my hand sometimes at the range.  Ended up selling it to a woman who was going through a nasty divorce with a man who beat her.  Glad I did cause she ended up having to pull it on him one night when he tried to enter her home.  She didn't shoot him but scared the hell outta him and he left the house.  Cops picked him up later and he spent the rest of the time in the pokey till the divorce was final a week or so later.

NightDragon, how are you liking your CZ? My carry pistol since '93 is a TZ 75 Custom 90. It's the Italian version of your CZ so much so that most parts are completely interchangeable between the models. TZ's are made by a company in Italy called Tanfoglio. They are imported now by a company called E.A.A as the Witness series. Damn good design for the money, that has saved my life three times now as it was what I used in the shootings I mentioned above. I like the weight of the all steel frame to manage the recoil while driving that front site for rapid fire.

Just purchased an XD subcompact in 9mm for my wife. She has carried the PPKS .380 but doesn't like the way the slide bites her when she's wrapped up on it tight. She has very small hands and her trigger finger is short from having about 3/8" of the tip of it severed in her childhood, so the interchangeble palm swell was nice for her and enabled her to move into 9mm where she really couldn't before. As far as ammunition goes, we haven't found anything off the shelf that it is too finicky about. Eats everything so far with no stoppages.

Be careful of aftermarket magazines in any auto loader, but the CZ/TZ's especially. I have run across several makes that has the mag release cutout too high or too low and kills the feed. This cutout sets the top rounds height in relation to the slide and determines the position the nose of the round when it hits the feed ramp into he chamber. The lips of the mag determine this feed height too and are often damaged by dropping the mag and it hitting top first or by slamming the mag into the well with your other hand (like they do in the movies) which may cause the lips of mag to ram into the bottom of the slide, causing the top round to set too low in the mag and not get stripped off correctly by the bolt/slide.

...maybe that's why I like the .40 as my primary

LOL....Touche' Bulldog.....in the ballistic tests a light .40 will not penetrate as far as a heavy 9mm if velocities are fairly close. Two projectiles the same weight, one having a larger impact surface cross section, the one with a smaller cross section will penetrate farther because the abrasive friction of the smaller projectile is less and thus it travels farther before it's kinetic energy is dissipated by said friction. It's sharper, in a physics sense of performance. Now, the larger projectile will cause a larger permanent cavity that will result in a nominal increase in blood loss that eventually will cause them to stop from excessive blood loss quicker than the smaller projectile, but the time lapse of this kind of incapacitation makes the results irrelevant. The farther the penetration, the more likely you are to reach the major organs.

Shot placement is more important than any other aspect of smallarms. A .40 is roughly two hundreths of an inch larger in diameter than a 9mm. The damage from both in human tissue or an organ is almost indistinguishable from each other and so is irrelevant. You absolutely SHOULD carry a .40 over a 9mm if you can shoot it just as accurately at the same speed as the 9mm because any advantage whatsoever should always be exploited. BUT, you can't miss fast enough to kill them. Don't get too caught up in the hardware until your software is udated and honed as good as you can possibly make it.

I shot a guy seven times with a 9mm and didn't stop him. I kept pulling the trigger and seeing those little puffs of pink spray, but he didn't drop like he was supposed to. After 15 years of research, some other incidents that ended more successfully and continued practice, I'm confident I could take him down in the same scenario with a .22 now that I know the truth of small arms defense in close quarters.

The software side of it trumps all else. Case in point; 1/3 of all police officers killed in the line of duty through 2003 showed no signs of self defense. Didn't even draw their gun, or pepper spray, or tazer, or baton, asp, stun gun, etc. They could have been carrying a .50 caliber and it wouldn't have made any difference. Well equipped, but not well trained for the violence of action that rained down on them in an instant............

OK, you guys got me going, sorry....not meaning to highjack the thread.....just very passionate about enabling people to train correctly so one of these P.O.S's, with their saggy drawers showing their ass cracks, can't takeaway the rest of your life for a few dollars.

good points made - all well taken. I am not as much into the science though it is interesting.

I carry Cor-Bon 135-grain PowRBall in the Taurus .40 (1279 fps) and while it is not the largest I have used in that gun (I had 180 grain for a bit but found it less accurate for me) the Cor-Bon seems to work very well for me - I was trained to do 3 shot rapid succession burst and can run 9 into a 4" circle at 25 ft very quickly from the draw. The Mag on that holds 15 + 1 in the pipe.

I am pleased to say that I have never had to draw mine for need, and honestly hope I never do - but I do go to the range 3-4 times a month anyway and hope that if the time ever came that I needed it it would be 2nd nature. I have fired weapons in battle conditions while in the Marines.

And for the record I am all for training - which I think was a point I was trying to make early on in the thread.
nuff said

Bulldog, if your getting range time in 3-4 times a month, you are well ahead of the game. And, running 9 into 4" @ 25' from a draw is exactly the control you need to stay in center mass and hit something of relevance when your heart is exploding from adrenalin.

Anyone shooting once every 60 days is doing far better than most criminals will ever do. 3-4 times a month and you are definitely engraining some good reflexive training that you will call up in a high duress situation without having to think about it. Now find a buddy to do that kind of range time with and make him find a buddy and spread the habit. If these sons-a-bitches know we all are going to turn it around on them, they'll start crossing to the other side of the street when they see us coming with our families as they should. Of all the shit I have provided armed protection for in my life, my family is the most precious I have ever escorted. That's why I carry just to go out back to the garage and work on the bike. Never know who will walk up that alley and see the light on.

DEFCON and TheBullDog I can't tell you how good it makes me feel that you two have been able to have a reasonable discussion about this subject here. Every other forum I've ever been on and or owned a discussion like this would have escalated into a full blown pissing match with everyone wanting to measure their dicks and calling each other all kinds of bs.

That's just another reason I like this site.

Now for the record in my 9mm I carry the Hornady TAP/FPD 157gr. When I carried my S&W 40 I carried TAP/FPD 155gr and in my Tarrus .45 it was the Speer Gold Dot 185gr.

Years ago when I first started carrying the Hornady TAP/FPD rounds they were the same 9mm rounds carried by the FBI and several other agency's. Whether that is still true today I don't know.

My primary carry is still my Glock 17 9mm. What I like about the 147gr rounds is the ballistics are very similar to the 155gr .40 for penitration, non-pass through, and stopping impact, with a faster bullet and a few more rounds in my mag. Just my personal preference though, YMMV.

Carry on...

The lil pistol I carry in my truck is a Ruger single six in 22 mag. Light gun and the 22 mag is plenty potent. I have plenty to choose from but the lil Ruger always gets the nod in the truck. I've yet to see a wheel gun jam also.

If anyone is interested, there is a great program called the appleseed project. It's about reinstituting the tradition of the American rifleman that made this Nation possible. They have shoots all over the U.S.. You take a .22LR (they allow up to .30 cal if you like) with open sites and they teach you to find your natural point of aim and qualify to 500 yds along with a great history lesson.

It's a two day event. Most have campsites available. I went to one here in Ohio last year and will be taking my wife and two of my kids this year. I met some great people and gained a new friend. It is truly inspiring to see the amount of people the project has trained. Their website is www.appleseedinfo.org

Question for you guns guys... I love guns, but I am not an expert or autority on them.  I came accross the first handgun I ever bought when I was old enough to buy it myself.  Its a Charter Arms .38 Undercover.  I kept it only because it was the first handgun I ever owned, but the gun has not been touched since 1980 (30 years).  It was put away well cleaned, and looks to be in great condition.

Question is, would you feel comfortable firing it? 
Is there anything in particular I should check out before firing it?

Lucky just make sure the cylinder does not have any slack or movement in it. I'm assuming it's a revolver. Probably would hurt to go ahead and have an armorer take a look at it also.

Well since Charter was founded in 1964 your piece is not so old that shear age fatigue should be an issue. If it was in good firing condition when you stored it, and you stored it clean and lubed, there should be no issue with firing it now. They are good simple, functional designs. However, you should have it checked by a qualified gunsmith if you are unsure of it's history before you owned it. If you are the original owner, and stored it correctly, I would not have an issue with shooting it now unless you ran an enormous amount of rounds through it before storage.

Very IMPORTANT!!!

Make sure Laura is not in your sight picture...         

...LOL

BTW...Went and looked at a Taurus Millenium "PRO" P111 9mm, a Kel-Tec P9 9mm, and eyed a couple of Taurus .38 wheel guns. Went ahead and put my application to buy in, but they put a delay on it. Guy called me in said they had to check further. I can't figure why? I bought a new weapon about 4 years ago in Fl. and didn't have any problems even though I had to wait there for 3 days I think, no arrests or haven't been a bad boy? Here in Bama if ya clear on the phone you can buy same day; don't make sense to me unless it's maybe that I moved over here and they just be double checkin...We'll see.

Reminds me of my house!! DEFCON will love this post... We LOVE our guns....picking my new one up as soon as it arrives at the gun shop. Another addition to our 2nd Amendment GOD given right!!!

Would never hurt my Beech.  But that damn bird of hers that makes noise all day while I'm working...that's another story.

GEEZY PETE,...I thought he was hard at work,...guess not,..he is on the fish.....not what he told me in the text he sent me 30 minutes ago,.....hhhmmmmm