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What Do You Use For Home Defense?

I sleep with a 327 beside me loaded with 115gr gold dot hollowpoints. Nearby is a Ruger P90 45 with 230gr FMJ. To get to me you have to come down a hallway... I wouldn't suggest it.
 
I'd love to "like" turtle's post with the Winchester Model 1910 and ammunition. I'd love to have a Winchester Model 1910 .401.

You may think you want to have one but I doubt you would want to shoot one on a regular basis. They are a true shoulder cannon.

That 1910 was a score from a small gun shop in New Hampshire. SWMB and I had a short conversation when she came across it on the racks of hunting rifles. She thought it was modern, not an older model. I can say she was floored when she looked up the S/N and found out it was 1915 manufacture as it appeared to be new/un-fired.

After we purchased it the shop owner said "I've got a box of ammo for it if in the back you are interested". We thought GOOD.... a box of 401 ammo. Finding obsolete ammo is sometimes harder than finding what shoots it.

We were once again floored when the "box of ammo" turned into a cardboard box full of boxes of ammo.

We were once again floored to see the early orange box Winchester ammo.

Another flooring happened when we found 2 spent cartridges out of the entire lot of ammo.

That 1910 had been fired two times when it was new then put away for over 80 years.

We did not have that one very long. It was sold to a New Jersey State Police Captain. He did not want to buy it but he could not take it out of his hands. He said he had never paid over 100% condition price for ANY firearm in his life but he could not let the Winchester go. He too could not believe it was made in 1915 and asked to see the Winchester S/N date page in the book several times.

After a little time to let him "bond" with the 1910 he paid our asking price. I was surprised that he did not want any of the ammo but he said he had no intention of shooting it and if he had ammo for it, he probability would fire it. If he did not have any ammo he more than likely would not locate any as only 1 rifle chambered that round and that rifle was only made between 1910 and 1936. I've not come across another box of 401 SL Winchester since that first score.

He called us a few weeks later and said he believed that he was the first person to take it apart as it had the original dried out Winchester grease in it. He was finally convinced that it truly had only been fired two times and thanked us again for being able to purchase it.

It is amazing when something that old can "tell you its life story without saying a word" I could tell the history of the rifle from the boxes of ammo. It was obvious that the rifle and the 7 original orange boxes of ammo were purchased at the same time. It was shot in the back yard. First round through it must have hurt something fierce but the second shot fired put it away in the closet. The other 3 boxes of Winchester ammo were bought sometime in the 1930's (I got dad's shoulder cannon). The Peters were purchased in the 1950's (wow gramps had one of those). It got consigned at the shop when it finally ended up with someone who dd not appreciate it and just wanted that old thing out of the house.

We just happened to go into the little gun shop a couple days after it was "consigned" for almost nothing to get rid of it. SWMBO could always locate a jewel everywhere we went. The hardest part was having enough $$$ to be out buying for longer than a week.

I've got hundreds of stories like this from the "way back years before the interweb" which made everything become common and easily obtainable.

Few more pics of the 1910 for your enjoyment.

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Oh ... just Wow!!!

Love the gun! Love the story! I have some old Winchesters of various kinds but really came along too late to gather all the ones I like. I'd love to have one of each of the "self-loading" line beginning with the Model 1903.

The Model 1907 I keep around here was acquired from the original owner. He also had his dad's Model 1905 .32 S. L. serial number 44 and an early Winchester Model 11 shotgun.

Rather than clutter this thread with more topic drift I'll just stick up this link that includes my '07's story.
http://www.defensivecarry.com/forum...ridge-discussion-351-wsl-lawmen-villians.html

I can see how one would think the Model 1910 was a newer gun. Yours appears new. Besides, the lines of the self-loading line of rifles are somewhat timeless.

I'm sitting mere feet from this '07 which really does serve for home defense.*

*See how that last sentence brought the thread back on topic?
 
My victory model shoots VERY well.

Those Victory Models are pretty amazing. Produced during World War II they look rough as a cob but that was deliberate. Inside, I'm not sure but that they are smoother and finer shooting than any K-Frame Smith & Wesson made before or since. I've had K-Frame .38s from all decades of the 20th century and still have most of them. The Victory Model is the slickest. My brother-in-law has one as well. It 's the same way ... fantastic action. Saw one in a pawn shop late last month. It also had the characteristically smooth double-action.

Here's the garden-variety Victory Model kept around here with its old Army buddy the Colt Commando, also produced under contract during World War II (Victory Model on bottom).
 
Break apart (fragmentation) and shot rounds should be your first choice for home defense. FMJ is military and not right for home defense (IMHO anyway).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glaser_Safety_Slug

If you live in a solid pour cement block house (like we do) it is not critical unless you are unlucky and a round goes through a window.

Yet we use pistol rounds, many of which are designed with law enforcement in mind, i.e., designed to penetrate various sorts of barriers while still expanding when they hit soft tissue. (HST, Gold Dot, etc.) That was my point. Do you use fragmenting rounds in your HD pistols as well? If not, why not?

I do not load FMJ in the defensive rifle, preferring hollow points or soft points such as Winchester PDX or Federal Fusion, for better terminal performance at SD ranges. They'll go through walls, too; that's what bullets do. Hard to get around that. I won't use the Glasers, as test after test have shown them to under-penetrate.
 
Ive got a few weapons that ill keep "ready". I EDC a Glock 43 so that is usually near me, but I also keep a Sig P226 in by bedside table and an AR-15 variant that I "built" in my bedroom closet.
 
I use a sig sauer m-400 with two magpul coupled 30 Rd mags with a noveske kx3, 1300 lumen lightand a sight mark holo sight, a tricked out mossy 500 12 ga with a m16 style stock and foregrip on the pump, a sig sauer p226 tacops 40 cal with 15 Rd mags and a nice streamlight light attached, or my trusty 30-06 with pentax 6-24x50 scope dialed in at 500 yards. It just depends on where the threat is. Outside of the home I use a s&w shield for carry and my sig 226 tacops in the truck. People tend not to mess with the truck with the gun stickers and the house with gun signs outside. The lock on the door is for their protection, not mine. If all else fails, my trusty mutt will screw them up pretty good.
 
Bebe,
Looks like a mighty fine security system. I had a pit/great pyrenees cross at one time for security. Looked like a 150 lb pit. Now I have a coon hound lab cross that is very protective and lighthing fast.$IMG_21668900305096.jpg
 

OkieStubble

Dirty Donuts are so Good.
Lol'd. I've never seen a more alert pair of ears! :) Very nice Taurus. Can't beat that lifetime warranty Taurus has. The Kimber grips look great on it!
 
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I normally stash a 12 gauge with 00 buck by the bed, after seeing many positive results for HD use I may switch to bird shot. At HD distances it still makes a heck of a hole because of the tight pattern but you don't have as much of the over penetration to contend with.
 
Springfield XD40, Marlin 30-30 lever, and a Winchester 1300 12 gauge...may change when we move out to the new home we built in the country.
 
I normally stash a 12 gauge with 00 buck by the bed, after seeing many positive results for HD use I may switch to bird shot. At HD distances it still makes a heck of a hole because of the tight pattern but you don't have as much of the over penetration to contend with.

Birdshot at 7 yards will still penetrate walls and keep going. I use 12 guage slugs with 3 00 buck on top of the slug. I also have many other options for times that firearms simply cannot be used. Pepper blasters, pepper balls, stun devices and dogs can be useful for an intruder.
 
If I have time, for bug in's. I do keep a couple of trip flares that can be affixed to the front and back doors. Will buy enough time to get into the saferoom.
 
A German Shepherd. I'm her back-up unit...with my 1911 as mine. One of these days I will get around to finally buying a home defense shotgun, but for now I'm comfortable with what I've got.

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Check out OATH ammunition for a load to use in whatever firearm you incorporate as a home defense weapon. Their soon-to-be-released 12 gauge slug is looking to be the definitive answer to effective ammunition with minimal risk of over-penetration
 
I had a GSD for about a year. We got her when she was around 2 months old as part of my defense strategy and also planned for her to grow up with my daughter (got dog when kid was 2). She went through training and seemed to be learning well. She was a puppy so quite a handful; lots of nipping, a little chewing, not too many accidents, but ate a lot of poop :001_huh:. Even at such a young age she was very protective and even though she played hard like a puppy she never once did anything to my daughter out of anger. My daughter sometimes yanked her ears or pulled on her until she yelped but she never defended herself out of reflex to this toddler. She just endured it like she instinctively knew it was just a baby.

Well, my wife and I both have very non-traditional work schedules and it was very hard to make time for the dog. I felt bad for not giving her a ton of affection because of the eating poop thing. We tried EVERYTHING for this but nothing worked. More importantly we just didn't have the time to give her the proper level of activity a GSD needs. We had to give her away to a close friend's family member.

We gave her away right around her 1 year birthday. A couple months later the new owner updated us and told us she weighed 104 lbs. and got to run all day at his rural property and play with a Rottweiler regularly. She just turned 2 and we heard from him recently. He said she is trained perfectly and that I actually did a wonderful job with her. He never mentioned or asked about the poop thing. I guess even at 6 months the training sunk in and a year or so later, she just does everything like one would expect the breed to do. I think she's better off in the country with this guy but I miss her a lot and hate that I had to give her up.

My daughter gets sad too and has been asking about her a lot recently. Daughter is 4 now and she even said, "I wish Nema could still be here and watch me grow up". /cry

I miss the dog a lot and feel like I'm missing out but a dog just doesn't work for us at this time. I hope I can get another GSD in the future, before my daughter gets too much older. I won't again though until we have more time to devote. I'm just glad we found her a good home (I wasn't going to just Craigslist her or anything).
 

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