Maximum "combat" range of a Snub Nose .38 Special?

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My Agency issue for many years was a SW 640 as a backup. I still carry it and the 642 often, even though the Glock 27 is the new backup issue. I am an accomplished shot on most any weapon system and qualify expert without much effort. The furthest shot on the qual course for the 640 is 25 yards.

Taking my sweet time to work good sight alignment and a smooth DAO trigger pull, I can hit pretty well out to 50 yards in the kill zone for target plinking. However, when you are talking combat shooting or stress shooting, putting rounds anyplace on a lifesize target even at 25 yards is an accomplishment.

In a combat/self defense situation you are not just standing and shooting. You are using cover and know that each time you expose yourself for a shot the risk of being hit escalates. The stress is further escalated when you know you are looking at a reload after 5 shots and begin thinking about where you will be when that occurs (assuming you have a speed loader or strip). Your shots are quick and intended to limit your exposure as a target.

Having trained regularly as a professional under combat conditions with the 640 as a backup, I know my personal comfort zone is inside of 25 yards for a fire fight. Certainly I would not choose the 640 as my first choice if I knew I was going into a gunfight, but sometimes you have to work with what you got at the time. Its a great and effective gun for a fast defensive response at short range.

I would encourage anyone contemplating carrying one to learn how to reload quickly and to have a speed strip or speed loader with them. I love a speed loader, but sometimes it is a bit bulky in a pocket. The speed strips lie flat in a pocket. Training with a dedicated pocket to the ammo for the reload is also an important TTP. Would suck to try to load a handful of change or a set of keys while groping for your bullets.
 
You know, it makes me wonder... I mean, revolvers, at least as a primary duty weapon have been obsolete for DECADES now!

Did it not occur to PD's that they could be issuing something like 1911 to their officers? Would cost really have been a deal breaker? How much would it have costed for a S&W Model 10, compared to a decent "GI" style 1911? The only thing I can come up with, would be that there aren't nearly as many options as there are now, but I'm sure someone was making a decent quality/decent priced 1911... Right?

I mean apparently, a Model 10 is $719 MSRP. Proportionately, it would have seemed like a better investment... Just my .02 :confused:
 
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Re; Dahermits question about splatter plates. These were pretty common for trick shots and merely were steel plates placed to allow the bullet fragments to spray around and do their work. I admired Jordan's expertise greatly, and what he did with the fast draw and hitting in the general vicinity of an aspirin is a major feat, but there was not direct contact between the bullets and aspirins. A fairly hard mix of wax bullet will splatter upon hitting the metal plate the aspirin was sitting on, but you have to be pretty close and hit between you and the aspirin for it it work....which was a feat.
Obviously hitting steel plates with velocity out of a firearm will cause the fragments to splatter and break baloons in the vicinity. Still some amazing skill involved in the exhibition shooting though.
 
Splatter Plates, Bill Jordan

The following is an artical about Bill Jordan that appeared in the Novermber 1969 issue of Shooting Times Magazine:

http://www.darkcanyon.net/BillJordan_TopGun.htm


"Bill emphasizes that no chicanery is involved in his shooting. Shot cartridges for aerial work and breaking candy wafers against a vibrant steel plate while blindfolded are not part of his repertoire."

For exhibition work, Bill’s bullets are of paraffin. For many years he performed all the same feats that are now enjoyed by his audiences, using 38 Special wadcutter ammunition. The transition to wax loads came as he worked more frequently before indoor groups."

"More startling than his quickness is the fantastic accuracy that attends Bill’s hipshooting sessions. After a bit of kidding around with 12” balloons and aluminum baking tins, he settles down to the real meat of his routine. Two-inch wafers, sliced from a cedar pole, are zapped calmly with quick hipshots. The range is 10 feet – good shooting, but nothing you would stomp your feet and whistle about. Next comes a line of Necco candy wafers, which are smaller and shatter in pleasing fashion. Bill’s guests nudge their drowsy neighbors awake as he blasts Lifesaver mints with quick hipshots, and everyone is muttering in awe when he reaches the finale, unerringly obliterating aspirin tablets with his Magnum held at waist level. Worried that the folks were getting blasé, Willie has added a new target to the series. He now finishes by centering a saccharin tablet with a wax bullet."
 
Is Bill Jordan not the former Border Patrolman who shot a fellow LEO during a raid?

Maybe I am thinking of the wrong guy.

My point is that sometimes speed is its own worst enemy.

(Edit: Just looked it up; not a raid, Jordan was practicing fast draw with an "unloaded" gun, fired through a wall, and struck BP agent John Rector in the head; 1956, Rector died.)
 
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I think for all handguns, the extreme effective combat distance is spitting distance.

Yes, at the range, with no pressure, no moving target, you can hit things way out there. But it is an artificial environment.

I recall reading about an attempt to make a Civil War Combat course "realistic". Re enactors would come up in squads and have to hit all targets before going on to the next stage. Of course, fastest time wins.

I read that one event, the match directors had set up a tennis ball “cannon”. Squads had to shoot while under attack from compressed air artillery fire. Apparently even the threat of being beaned with a tennis ball was enough to dramatically increase the time it took to clear all targets.
 
For a long time I carried a 3" square butt Model 36; it has a hammer spur but I fired it only in DA since I found I could shoot it as well that way as SA. I could hit a silhouette target at 100 yards almost every shot, firing off hand, though the holdover was considerable. With a rest, every shot was a hit. I don't know if I could have done that under stress (meaning the target was shooting back!) but those who say folks with 2-3 inch barrel revolvers can't hit anything beyond ten feet are wrong.

Jim
 
No one would take on an armed opponent at 100 yards with a short barrel revolver IF he had a choice, and Slamfire is correct that the range is an artificial environment (but so is anything except actual combat, and no one want to practice under fire from live ammo).

But to quote an old Army saying, "you go with what you got" and if that revolver is all you got, that is what you use if the alternative is taking punishment without even trying to return fire. My point was that even at relatively long range, a short barrel revolver was better than "spitting". And if I were being fired on, I would probably not be standing up in some fancy stance; I would be diving for any cover I could find.

Jim
 
Jordan

Re; Dahermits question about splatter plates. These were pretty common for trick shots and merely were steel plates placed to allow the bullet fragments to spray around and do their work. I admired Jordan's expertise greatly, and what he did with the fast draw and hitting in the general vicinity of an aspirin is a major feat, but there was not direct contact between the bullets and aspirins.
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I saw Jordan perform his "tricks" in person when I was 15 years old. There was no splatter plate. The only backstop was a heavy, folded blanket. The aspirin tablets were lined up on a table, about 6 inches apart. The exhibition was indoors, and he used paraffin wax bullets propelled by primers only...as was his standard practice whenever performing in public.

Jordan was so fast, that if you blinked at the wrong instant, you'd never see him move.

And he was gettin' on in years at the time.

And he never missed.
 
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I would say about 300 yards. As long as the bullet is going about 600 feet per second...it still has enough foot pounds to penetrate the lungs.
 
Is Bill Jordan not the former Border Patrolman who shot a fellow LEO during a raid?
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No, he shot his partner during practice. Killed him to.

Sad but true and he had to live that down for the rest of his life.

But Jordan was a gifted shooter. Top competitor to. He also used a flamethrower on Iwo Jima in WW2 as part of the U.S. Marines.

And during prohibition he was in many a gun fight (as was Askins.)

Deaf
 
I like to PRACTICE with my SP101 DAO ringing steel at 50 yards. I'm not 100 percent with it, but, I do okay. After walking back over to the 7 yard line, I feel a lot better with it haha.
 
The snub nose revolver has an unlimited range. I once saw, in an episode of Hawaii Five-O, Steve McGarrett shoot a bad guy off the roof of a Honolulu hotel with his .38 snubby.
 
When you watch Bill Jordans aspirin shooting, note a metal plate they sit on. You hit the plate basically anywhere between you and the aspirin and the aspirin will disapear. Try it yourself....you won't match the speed or expertise of Jordan, but you can do it in slow time.
Terrible about his AD where the fellow officer got killed. That would have been very tough to live with
 
Jordan

When you watch Bill Jordans aspirin shooting, note a metal plate they sit on.
Click to expand...

When I saw his exhibition all those years ago, there was no metal plate. There was a table with the aspirins lined up near the edge of a flat plywood board about 6 inches apart. Seems that if there was sufficient splatter with a wax bullet to clean one aspiring off, it would have hit the one beside it...but he picked off one at a time.

And even if we assume that the bullets struck in front of the tablets and skidded in...we're looking at maybe...what...a half-inch low? That's close enough for government work in my book.
 
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