IMHO, one of the sweetest concealed carry handguns on earth is the
S&W 442, be it carried in a pocket holster, IWB holster, OWB holster, or a shoulder holster. It is ever so light and easy.
IMHO, the 442 loses all of its sweetness once the trigger is squeezed and a cartridge fires. Recoil is stout even when using mild loads. Using the +P (
SAAMI Plus P Loads) in this light alloy-frame revolver becomes very challenging. Further, the sights on this short barreled J frame S&W are rudimentary; distance multiplies errors in aiming.
For this venture, using +P 158 grain semi-wadcutter hollow-points, I decided to shoot the equivalent of what Illinois requires for obtaining a concealed carry license (15-feet, 21-feet, 30-feet, 10-rounds each distance; 21-rounds of the 30-rounds fired have to land inside the scoring zone).
Since the pseudo-qualification turned out okay, I decided to have some fun and I switched over to 130-grain standard pressure FMJ loads and then rolled a fresh target out to 70-feet.
Wow, that kinda sucked. At 70-feet my first shot was "on paper, in the pink," but just barely (it was not inside the scoring zone, so it counts as a miss). I decided to roll the target back out to 70-feet and try it again.
Double suck; same thing, I scored another miss. No doubt about it, 70-feet is far beyond my level of competence with this revolver. Don't get me wrong, in a quality machine-rest the S&W 442 is probably capable of putting all shots inside the 10-ring of the target at this distance, but my handgun skills are not anywhere near up to that task.
Sooooooo I ran the target to 50-feet and finished off the remaining ammo as fast as I could load and fire. Heh, a quarter century ago a target 10-feet downrange with holes sprayed all over like that was as good as I could score with the airweight. With practice, maybe by the time I am 200-years-old ...
Thank you
5 Star Firearms for having Monday as Senior Citizen Rangetime Discount Day! Your team is always polite, friendly, and professional; your facility is just downright outstanding. You are a treasure to Lake County, Illinois.
Zowie! Fifteen rounds of standard pressure .38s through a 442 and my hand will be aching.
ReplyDeleteHey there Comrade. Thanks for stopping in!
ReplyDeleteYeah, I really over did it; three fingers on my right hand are still numb all the way to my aching wrist. I was going to try for some practice with the 638 airweight bodyguard next week but I think I am through practicing with alloy revolvers until after the beginning of the new year.
nice shooting there, partner! Nice gun too!
ReplyDeleteEl Fisho my friend! My gosh it is good to hear from you. You were getting fires near your area when the hurricane was flooding everything south.
ReplyDeleteBe well!
Zack
In my experience, 130 gn standard 38's hit much differently than combat rounds. They are very useful for sight alignment and trigger control. Try a group at 35' then correct for 70. If you had bigger paper your 70' target might have looked good.
ReplyDeleteThanks for that insight, Punzdeleon. I appreciate you stopping by!
ReplyDeleteFYI - getting "adult content" warning when I link to your page today. Never happened before. I guess Google is really clamping down on folks who like the 2nd Amendment.
ReplyDeleteThanks Zendo Deb. I set that flag, Google is innocent for a change. If people think this is a porn site maybe it will generate more traffic ;)
ReplyDelete