Semi vs. Revolver for Carry

[IShouldDoThisAllTheTime]

Historically I'm a 1911 guy, but revolvers definitely have their place. I carry one for backup, and I don't feel undergunned when it's all I have.

The organic shape of a small revolver offers some real advantages for concealment. I find that this especially matters with ankle carry. With revolvers, a brief glimpse of holster can be mistaken for droopy socks, but with a semi-auto it tends to looks like you have a candy bar strapped to your leg, which if nothing else just invites a second look.

Revolver advantages:
- organic shape
- more tolerant of *neglect*
- simple, non-bewildering operation

Semi-auto advantages:
- flat, narrow shape
- more tolerant of *abuse* (dropping)
- speed of reloading
- capacity

Safeties? That's not really a revolver-vs-semi issue, as there are plenty of semis without active safeties. Trigger weight? Short barrel? External hammer or not? Same answers.

The mechanics of revolver operation are pretty straightforward, and that can be a big deal. I agree that snubbies are over-prescribed for newbies, but a 4-inch barreled revolver can be a really viable choice for that reason alone. I've seen too many novices intimidated by semis to not take this issue seriously.

Another place revolvers shine, IMO, is in pocket carry. The small semis just require more maintenance than most people are going to put into them. With a linted-up revolver you can always just crunch through to the next round. Ideal? No. But this is the real world.

[Irving]

The last thing I want in a high stress situation is a long, heavy trigger pull.

I'd be concerned about setting my clothes on fire if I was wearing something with synthetics in it. Doesn't polyester instantly melt to your skin? I know a guy with only one nipple because he pulled a pot of boiling water onto himself as a kid while wearing a polyester sweater. The sweater melted to his skin. Patting out a little flame on cotton is one thing, but having half your jacket melt to your body is quite another.

Finally, it might be just because I have VERY limited experience with a revolver, but I recently shot one and had a hard time hitting anything because the trigger was so foreign to me. I'd need some serious range time to get it down. On the same note, that same day I also shot my sub-compact pocket semi-auto and the trigger was so atrocious, and recoil so painful, that I think I hit ONE target that I aimed at the whole day.

[Great-Kazoo]

Historically I'm a 1911 guy, but revolvers definitely have their place. I carry one for backup, and I don't feel undergunned when it's all I have.

The organic shape of a small revolver offers some real advantages for concealment. I find that this especially matters with ankle carry. With revolvers, a brief glimpse of holster can be mistaken for droopy socks, but with a semi-auto it tends to looks like you have a candy bar strapped to your leg, which if nothing else just invites a second look.

Revolver advantages:
- organic shape
- more tolerant of *neglect*
- simple, non-bewildering operation

Semi-auto advantages:
- flat, narrow shape
- more tolerant of *abuse* (dropping)
- speed of reloading
- capacity

Safeties? That's not really a revolver-vs-semi issue, as there are plenty of semis without active safeties. Trigger weight? Short barrel? External hammer or not? Same answers.

The mechanics of revolver operation are pretty straightforward, and that can be a big deal. I agree that snubbies are over-prescribed for newbies, but a 4-inch barreled revolver can be a really viable choice for that reason alone. I've seen too many novices intimidated by semis to not take this issue seriously.

Another place revolvers shine, IMO, is in pocket carry. The small semis just require more maintenance than most people are going to put into them. With a linted-up revolver you can always just crunch through to the next round. Ideal? No. But this is the real world.

Never heard Organic used to describe a revolver before interesting......

I like pistol's & revolver's, choice for carry, both. Hard trigger pull, unable to hit anything. That all gets resolved with practice.
Now those lcp's. Very uncomfortable to shoot, for me with wrist & hand issues. However a lot of people would select one of them over a revolver, to each their own.

[IShouldDoThisAllTheTime]

Never heard Organic used to describe a revolver before interesting......

Sure. A 638 with boot grips, in a good molded leather ankle holster, with a thin dress sock pulled up to the trigger guard...organic definitely seems like the right word to me.

I tried carrying my Kahr PM40 the same way, gave up after a month. There is just no plausible deniability when you have something that blocky hanging a few inches above your Florsheims.

[spyder]

True, but that is a mechanical failure due to stress and fatigue. And just pure and simple breakage, which happens more than you know. As I also stated, that is just one of the ways in which a revolver can let you down.

Even a good quality automatic in perfect condition can jam if there is a hard primer or the pistol is fired limp wristed... Some designs are more susceptible to limp wristing the gun. For example, my eight year old daughter can shoot my USP without issue, nuff said.

I had one revolver jam due to primers backing out of aluminum cases, and another jam due to a 40 year old mainspring that was dry as a bone. Those are the only two jams I've ever had with a revolver. I've had dozens of jams with pistols, even once with a Glock.... I shoot 45's, and in that arena, Glock sucks with both the 21 and the 30 in which I have owned multiples of... and was happy with none...

Revolver advantages:
- organic shape < I like the description
- more tolerant of *neglect* This depends on the semi auto pistol the revolver is up against....
- simple, non-bewildering operation Have you opened most revolvers out there?

Semi-auto advantages:
- flat, narrow shape
- more tolerant of *abuse* (dropping) Depends on the revolver.
- speed of reloading Depends on the person.
- capacity

Safeties? That's not really a revolver-vs-semi issue, as there are plenty of semis without active safeties. Don't forget revolvers with passive safeties! Trigger weight? < Can be changed with either platform. Short barrel? External hammer or not? Same answers.

The mechanics of revolver operation are pretty straightforward, and that can be a big deal... I think there are lots of revolvers out there that you have not taken apart...

Another place revolvers shine, IMO, is in pocket carry. The small semis just require more maintenance than most people are going to put into them. With a linted-up revolver you can always just crunch through to the next round. Ideal? No. But this is the real world. If lint is going to stop your carry gun from working, you need a different carry gun...

This can be argued many different ways... Lots of different points can be brought up for both sides. For triggers, one trigger that is growing on me is the light LEM for Hk's. It's a 4 lb trigger pull on a DAO set up that is very crisp and easy to shoot with. The next thing, is most of the revolvers out there, are not straight forward in how they work, at least not any easier to explain than the normal semi auto. You can note, there are 52 parts to my USP...

...and 70 parts to the S&W J frame...

...and the same ammount of parts on an 1877 Colt, as there is on my USP...

...and this old revolver with 42 parts that is a single action, with no safety...

There are more revolvers with even bigger parts lists than these... Can you tell me exactly what happens when you pull the trigger on your revolver? What parts do what, at which specific time? I guess it depends on what you mean by straight forward...


The only arguement that I will take that the revolver has over the semi auto, is if you have a dud round, you can just keep pulling the trigger till one goes bang, where on the semi, you have to rack the slide, but that's the only arguement I will say is a win for the revolver. The arguements about all of the other faults of semi's... as I said, buy the best one you can if you are serious about carry (this includes ammo). In this, I compare the revolver to my Hk's, and in reliability and durability, the revolver isn't any better, and in a really dirty environment (mud), you won't like that revolver.

[Sawin]

^ I will build upon this...

A revolver is no better with reliability than a well built semi auto. That is one thing I have learned so far with my time at this gunsmithing school and from talking to the instructors (who worked at the factories or had their own shop).

I will use Hk for my example...

I see no reason to carry a revolver (using the hammer down on an empty chamber notion) as I can rack the slide on my Hk, and then use the decocker to let the hammer down safely. At that point, my Hk is exactly like a revolver using the double action trigger pull to fire off the first round, and (unlike a revolver) I have twelve more rounds of 45 acp to follow if needed (or 8 in my wife's gun). Some semi autos are better than others. As others have said and I say, if you're gona carry (using the gun for self protection), you should carry the best, and to me, nothing I have owned has beaten the USP.

Exactly.

[IShouldDoThisAllTheTime]

When I say "simple operation" I'm not talking about from an armorer's perspective, rather from a naive/newbie operator perspective. Parts counts aren't really relevant to this kind of user.

Me: "So as you pull the trigger, there's a clockwork mechanism that advances the cylinder and cocks the hammer. See? Then at a certain point everything is lined up and the hammer falls."
Newbie: "Oh, yeah, I see that. 'Clockwork' makes sense."

Me: "Some of the recoil energy is stolen by this mechanism that unlocks the action and lets the slide move rearward. There's this hook on the slide that pulls the empty case out of the chamber and flings it across the room. A spring takes over and pushes the slide back closed, and on the way the slide strips a fresh round out of the magazine and pushes it in to the chamber. While all this was happening the hammer(/striker/whatever) got cocked(/pre-cocked), and now when you pull the trigger again all it has to do is release the hammer and let it fall."
Newbie: "Huh?"

I've had conversations like those many, many times. If I'm bad at explaining machines, I'm not alone in it; NRA Basic Pistol classes spend fifteen minutes explaining semi-auto operation, and people still walk away looking bewildered. In my experience newbies have a basic, comfortable understanding of revolvers (again, not at an armorer level) within 30 seconds.

This speaks to an important point: it's really hard for advanced/expert/authoritative users to remember what it was like to be a novice. I submit that those of us who were field-stripping 1911s before we'd had our first kiss will have a remarkably hard time relating to or understanding the needs of someone who has only seen a gun while they were being mugged. A basic understanding how something works is extremely important to confident handling, and if someone can get that more quickly with a revolver than with a semi-auto, that's worth consideration.

/treatise

[IShouldDoThisAllTheTime]

If lint is going to stop your carry gun from working, you need a different carry gun...

A statement which might be taken to support my point!

[spyder]

When I say "simple operation" I'm not talking about from an armorer's perspective, rather from a naive/newbie operator perspective...

Me: "So as you pull the trigger, there's a clockwork mechanism that advances the cylinder and cocks the hammer. See? Then at a certain point everything is lined up and the hammer falls."
Newbie: "Oh, yeah, I see that. 'Clockwork' makes sense."

Me: "Some of the recoil energy is stolen by this mechanism that unlocks the action and lets the slide move rearward. There's this hook on the slide that pulls the empty case out of the chamber and flings it across the room. A spring takes over and pushes the slide back closed, and on the way the slide strips a fresh round out of the magazine and pushes it in to the chamber. While all this was happening the hammer(/striker/whatever) got cocked(/pre-cocked), and now when you pull the trigger again all it has to do is release the hammer and let it fall."
Newbie: "Huh?"

You went into detail a lot more in the semi auto. I've explained this a lot also, both to people who have never held a gun, and to my friends that were in the military, that wanted to know more.

Basic: I will go straight to the trigger pull part

Revolver - When you pull the trigger, it operates this arm (I point to the arm that spins the cylinder) and that turns the cylinder to align a cartridge up with the barrel to be shot. At the same time it makes the hammer pivot back, till the hammer slips off the edge of the trigger and falls onto the back of the cartridge, and boom. Your first shot fires, and you do it over again.

That is all that I get into it for the very first part. I explain what they can see working. I don't explain the cylinder stop, the different parts inside the revolver that are also helping, or even the sears at this point, just what I said above (unless there is a hammer stop that needs to move out of the way).

Semi auto - When you pull the trigger, it makes the hammer pivot back, till the hammer slips off the edge of the trigger and falls onto the back of the cartridge, and boom. When the cartridge goes off, the slide comes back and throws out the empty case, and shoves a new cartridge from the magazine back into the chamber. Now you're ready to do it over again.

At this point, we're just splitting hairs...

A statement which might be taken to support my point!

Have you ever seen what mud does to the timing on a revolver? I personally have. I've also taken one of my USP's, thrown it in the mud with the slide open, picked it up, chambered a round, and shot the muddy round, and every other one after. I've freaked out a few people doing that actually. I might have to do a video of that......

[IShouldDoThisAllTheTime]

You went into detail a lot more in the semi auto.

Right, that's exactly my point. From a perspective of gross overall mechanical comprehension, there is more going on and more to understand.

Not all newbies get paralyzed with confusion, but enough do to convince me that this is a real issue. Especially if they are also still trying to cope with recoil, noise, any emotional baggage that comes along for the ride, etc. I believe those shooters are probably better served with a 4" J-Frame than with the best most reliable most amazing semi, at least for a little while until they've processed the pile of new information already in front of them.

At this point, we're just splitting hairs...

I definitely think we're getting away from the OP's question. Which is about new shooters, not about ideal carry guns.

So to try to bring my rambling back to the question at hand: Semi or revolver for the OP's wife?

Have a conversation with *her*. Work with her on her needs and wants. That applies not just to action type, but to caliber, weight, capacity, sight radius, everything. Listen to her concerns and try to sort out what's going to work best for her, and her give plenty of freedom to change her mind along the way. Don't overload her with options or information.

Let her have her own journey of exploration. She is the only one who can make and be comfortable with her choice. Don't steer her toward or away from anything for religious reasons. If she likes the way something feels in her hands, is confident operating it, and can hit her target, what else is there to worry about?

Unless she picks something way off-the-wall crazy like a Nagant M1895, of course.