Taurus Public Defender

[BigFoot]

I was thinking about getting one. Since we moved to Dallas and live in an apartment I have a bigger concern of a personnel defense round penetrating a wall. With the PD it is small enough you could carry it if you wanted to and load it with 410 in the apartment. So who has one and what do you think of it.

 

[LittleLebowski]

I have shot one. I couldn't recommend it for....anything. If my choice was between this and a good Ruger .22 semiauto pistol, I would not hesitate to take the River.

 

[Goober]

I have the Judge and love shooting it. 410 buckshot or 6 shot are both fun. Great for shooting snakes too. I shot the home defense round at a cabellas catalog about 1" thick. Two of the disks went through and stuck in the wood behind. The last one stayed in the catalog. I would say a good apartment round. The 45 Long Colt was a different story. Good luck.

 

[RondeB]

A friend of mine just got a judge and loves it. With shot it pretty much covers a doorway at close range.

 

[Crixus]

that just ain't so.. a 2.5" 410 will have 3 or 4 #00 or 8 #4 pellets. here's a link to 410 pattering user the Taurus and it's not going to 'cover' a doorway at close range.

http://www.410handguns.com/taurus_spd_text.html

Although I'm in no way defending the Public Defender for self-defense, your numbers are off on both counts here. I have used a .410 pump as a bedroom gun, and the short shells hold four 000 buck pellets and the 3" shells hold five 000 buck pellets. That's about .36 caliber if I recall.

With #4 birdshot, the short shells hold nearly sixty pellets. With smaller shot, better than a hundred pellets. I would never try and defend myself with the birdshot, particularly with the spread they are likely to give soon after leaving a short handgun barrel.

The buckshot will definitely penetrate a couple of sheetrock walls in an apartment. Any projectile/projectiles that would be somewhat reliable against a home intruder will also go through a wall or two. You can't cheat physics.

 

[Kabong30]

I'm just not a fan of those things for anything but range toys. It's personal preference for sure, but for your money I think you could do a ton better in a handgun and for less you could get a proper shotgun in whatever gauge you prefer. Just my two cents.

 

[cb91710]

Don't be fooled.

If a round has sufficient penetration to kill and attacker, it has sufficient penetration to get through a wall and cause injury or death on the other side.
Indoor shooting is never good... you just need to know your backstop and what is behind it. In my condo, I have only a few "safe" directions to shoot. Fortunately, one of them is shooting down the fatal funnel that an intruder would have to negotiate to get to the bedroom.

And I always chuckle at the idea of using a 410 for home defense.
The 410 pistols are great snake guns, but a 410 is a 410.
Don't even consider birdshot... it won't penetrate leather, denim, or even a heavy down jacket (and retain lethal energy).
You need buckshot from a 20ga or larger shotgun, or in a handgun something in the .38/9mm class, or larger.

I would tend to shy away from an AR pattern, unless you can easily go through the NFA procedures to get a short barreled model. The minimum 16" barrel in the AR pattern results in a 30" long rifle at the bare minimum, and typically 32" with the flash hider installed, and that's a pretty big gun to swing around in a home defense situation.
Shotgun minimum barrel length is 18", but there is no buffer tube and no minimum OAL requirement, so you can run a pistol-grip-only pump action shotgun and it's only about 24" or so... much more manageable, but you do need to be prepared for the recoil.

 

[Kabong30]

^
Lost of good insight here. Thanks for sharing!

 

[Jim]

I have always thought the Judge was a bit of a gimmick, but to be fair, I have never shot one.

Just to add to the debate I will submit the Glaser slug into the mix as an in home round.

http://www.shopcorbon.com/glaser-safety-slug/500/500/dept

 

[Crixus]

Just to add to the debate I will submit the Glaser slug into the mix as an in home round.

http://www.shopcorbon.com/glaser-safety-slug/500/500/dept

Jim, anything designed to not penetrate a wall cannot be even remotely counted on to physically stop an attacker. There is way too much myth and misinformation out there that suggests you can have it both ways. Products like the Glaser Safety Slug feed on that. It eases the layman's "fear" of overpenetration, but never touts its own terminal ballistics because they are almost laughable.

 

[malocchio]

This debate is somewhat irrelevant to me,unfortunatly I live in California ,where any pistol capable of shooting any shotgun round is classified as a "sawed off shotgun" by law,and carries stiff penalties just for possesion of such...

 

[Graybeard57]

get a dog and the bad guy will move on to the next apartment.

+1

 

[cb91710]

A number of years ago the RCMP took all of their S&W model 64 M&P stainless in 38 special out of service in favor of automatics. These were special ordered from Smith with a 3" barrel that were never available to the general public. I picked up a number of them and they are scattered all around the house. Most looked like they had been shot less than a half dozen times (annual qualifications is all). A standard load 38 special hollow point is all you should ever need as a first line home defense firearm.

Likewise in the US. I don't think any agencies still allow revolvers except perhaps as a "boot gun" backup.
This was triggered by the deaths of two CHP officers in Santa Clarita, who were killed while reloading their revolvers.
Even with speedloaders, 5, 6, or 7 rounds and a more complex reload procedure doesn't cut it.
The semi-automatics (is RCMP running automatic now?), even if limited to 7 or 8 rounds like the 1911, are still much quicker to reload... and most police agencies moved into semi-auto with the Beretta 92FS, which has a 15rd capacity (with a non-neutered magazine). Current issue 9mm and .40 have comparable capacities.

 

[cb91710]

This debate is somewhat irrelevant to me,unfortunatly I live in California ,where any pistol capable of shooting any shotgun round is classified as a "sawed off shotgun" by law,and carries stiff penalties just for possesion of such...

This is very important and bears repeating.

Even for a non-resident, it is a felony to be in possession of a Taurus Judge within California.
If you have one and are planning a trip that will take you through California, leave it at home.

10 years, lifetime firearms prohibition.

 

[MrMurphy]

The CA shooting happened years before the auto switch, it didn't trigger it. It was a training issue, they had empty brass in their pockets instead of live ammo in their guns since they trained that way on the range.

A 16" AR is no longer than a pistol in a standard shooting stance. I've fit places you wouldn't believe with an M4 carbine, and with modern ammo (softpoints/JHPs) the 5.56 penetrates less than both pistol AND shotgun indoors. All will still penetrate.

FBI proved this twenty years ago, it's just gotten to be more so.

The .410 is fairly useless as a HD round, especially in the solution-looking-for-a-problem Judge.

A good 9mm with a pair of mags full of JHPs would be your best option, then a 5.56mm rifle with good ammo or a shotgun WITH a stock holed up behind cover loaded with buckshot.

Even 00 Buck isn't a guaranteed stopper with a center mass hit, but it's a high likelihood.

 

[Jim]

Jim, anything designed to not penetrate a wall cannot be even remotely counted on to physically stop an attacker. There is way too much myth and misinformation out there that suggests you can have it both ways. Products like the Glaser Safety Slug feed on that. It eases the layman's "fear" of overpenetration, but never touts its own terminal ballistics because they are almost laughable.

No debate from me, just throwing it into the mix for conversation.

 

[BigFoot]

Good debate guys. This is what I was looking for. I am not a fan of semi autos. Dont really know why. I have several. 357 mags I carry depending on dress. They are always loaded with. 38 special. The velocity of the magnum round scares me for personnel defense.

 

[cb91710]

No debate from me, just throwing it into the mix for conversation.

Excellent point.

We have grown up with Hollywood telling us that a single bullet will lift a man off of his feet and hurl him through a saloon window or wall.
Obviously not the case... but reality is even more sobering.

With anything smaller than a high powered rifle round, "knock down power" and "stopping power" are myths.
Whether a "large and slow .45" or a 9mm, .38, or a .32, reality is going to be closer to the final scene in The Matrix when the agent "killed" Neo.

You are going to stop an attacker through only one of several means:

Psychologically - "OMG, this person is not afraid to kill me and I don't want to die." This is an area where we have an advantage with a human attacker over animal attacker.
CNS hit - Paralysis or death due to damage to the central nervous system... hit them in the brain or spine.
Bleed-out - Even if the heart is damaged to the point that it stops, the attack may continue for a short time, and death may not occur for as long as 4 minutes.

In police situations, officers average about a 20-30% hit rate. Out of a 15 round magazine, only 3-5 rounds will find their mark.
A real live shooting situation is not remotely close to shooting paper, or even "stress" training at moving targets.
When something goes bump in the night, you are going to be amped on adrenalin, but not fully awake. Your heart is going to be pounding out of your chest. Your hands are going to be shaking. You will have NO fine motor skills.
If your revolver is not loaded, it's not going to become loaded... at least not by you. The simple act of slingshotting the slide on a 1911 to chamber the first round is going to be a monumental effort. Just taking the safety off will be confusing.

 

[BigFoot]

Good point.......an officer I know in KC when I lived there told me no matter how much you train for those situations pulling your service weapon gives you so much adrenaline you almost forget how to use the weapon.

So if an officer gets affected that way the common man will have a hell of a time. That is why I keep things simple at my house. My wife can point and shoot. The beauty of a revolver in this case.

I have not heard much positive on the Taurus. Anybody like it?

 

[cb91710]

I have not heard much positive on the Taurus. Anybody like it?

I'd like to have one, simply because California says that I can't.
But it would be nothing more than a novelty and a range toy.
I might carry it loaded with snakeshot for hiking, but nothing more.

There are better personal defense rounds than the .45LC.
There are better home defense shells than the .410
There are smaller, more concealable handguns than the Judge.

As with the early Kyocera PDA/Smartphone, every aspect of the design is a compromise and the result is that it is far from the "best" at everything it was designed to do.
In the case of the smartphone, we had to start somewhere and the Kyocera was obsoleted within 2 years.
In the case of the Judge, it should have stopped there, but instead there are now a couple more similar designs

Interestingly enough, the Taurus Circuit Judge is NOT considered a SBS in California.
The pistol is an SBS because it is a pistol capable of chambering a shotgun shell.
The rifle is not an SBS because under BATFE specification, a shotgun does not have a rifled barrel, therefore the 16" minimum barrel length applies, rather than the 18".

Also, it actually IS possible to bring a Judge into California, by installing a forward vertical grip and importing it to the state as an AOW. This still requires an NFA trust and the proper paperwork.
Once registered, it is always an AOW and the grip can be removed.