Thinking about Buying Your First Gun Part 4

Now that I have brought up the issue of size you might be wondering what is a good size?
Like a lot of things there is not just one answer, just about every model of handgun is at least a little different in size.

Often pistols are categorized into size classes like Large, Full Size, Mid Sized, Compact and Subcompact, but these terms are used not really standardize like they are with cars. I tend to steer new shooters towards the middle sizes.

In the picture above you can see 3 pistols, the top one is a Smith and Wesson 4506 (45acp)which is on the larger side of standard handguns.
The middle pistol is a Ruger P95 (9mm)which is pretty typical of your average current production 9mm or 40cal.
The Bottoms pistol is a Glock model 27 (40sw)which is consider a compact or subcompact pistol.

New shooters are often concerned about the weight and these days most pistols have frames made out of polymer which has cut down on the heft and the cost. Pistols in general do seem to be a bit on the heavy side to people in the beginning, but it is what it is. If you do choose a 22lr like the Ruger SR22 or the Walther P22 the weight is only 15-17 ounces. Most of your 9mm and 40SW handguns will be 24-30 ounces. There are plenty of compact pistols that start around 17 ounces but as I stated before a compact pistol is probably not the place to start for a new shooter. It seems as though once a new shooter starts practicing and spends some time shooting they don’t really seem to think about the weight much anymore.

This picture is of a Ruger SR22

The other concern some new shooters have is the grip size, people with small hands or short fingers are often wondering if they will have a hard time pulling the trigger. In my experience this tends to not be that much of a problem. For the most part many of the handguns on the market today are well sized for just about all full grown adults. More and more handguns are coming with grips that have changeable parts to make the fit more customizable. If you start out with a 22LR pistol you will find that they tend to have smaller grips then the 9mm/40SW weapons as well.

Here is a little explanation of Calibers or sizes of the bullets. 22LR is the common name for a type of round or bullet formally know as 22 Long Rifle. In spite of its name it is a small round commonly used in handguns as well as rifles. It belongs to a category or bullets known as Rim Fire. The projectile is usually made of lead and measure about 0.22 inches across.

1. .22 LR shot
2. .22 Winchester Magnum Rimmed
3. .25 Automatic Colt Pistol
4. .38 Smith & Wesson
5. .357 Magnum - budprop
6. .357 Maximum - budprop
7. 9mm Luger
8. 9mm Japanese Revolver
9. .40 Smith & Wesson
10. .45 Automatic Colt Pistol - budprop
11. .44 Special - cycle61
12. .44 Magnum
13. .45 Long Colt - budprop
14. .454 Casull - budprop
15. 5.7x33 Johnson Spitfire
16. .25-20 Winchester - budprop
17. 4.6x36mm Hk
18. .223 Remington
19. 5.56x45 NATO
20. .300 Blackout
21. 7.62x39 - budprop
22. 6.5 Grendel
23. .338 Spectre
24. .30-30 Winchester
25. .308 Winchester Accelerator
26. .270 Winchester
27. .416 Barrett
28. .410
29. 20ga
30. 12ga

New Pistol for a New Shooter Part 3

One thing I noticed while standing at a retail counter showing and selling firearms was that people are often drawn to the very small pistols. This has come up in many conversations as well, people talk about derringers and ‘gamblers guns’, ‘belly guns’, ‘pocket pistols’ and so on. I understand the attraction to the small pistols myself but I try to steer new shooters away from firearms like these. In short my reason is that the smaller the pistol the harder it is to shoot. I think most new shooters and perhaps experienced shooters will find small pistols very frustrating and far from ideal for self defense. This diminutive class of weapon does have the advantage of being easier to conceal, lighter weight to carry and are often less expensive but again there isn’t much point in having a gun if you can’t hit your target and hitting a target with a really small pistol can be very difficult. I suppose if you thought you were never going to shoot at something more than five feet away it might work, but I would not want to stake my life on that sort of limitation. I also don’t think it would be much fun recreationally to try hitting targets that close nor would it be an effective way to become a good shooter.

You will notice in the picture above that the sights are so small you can't even see them in this profile shot.

You may notice that small pistols often have very small sights on them. I always say I can shoot any pistol as long as is reliable and it has decent sights, so I put a lot of weight on the sights when it comes to evaluating a pistol. The grip or handle of the small pistols is also rather small and this adds to the challenge of being proficient. Another feature of small handguns that is less obvious at the onset is that they often have very heavy trigger pulls. Since very small firearms are often carried in a pocket rather than a holster they often come with a trigger that is hard to accidentally pull, the easiest way to safeguard against pulling a trigger is to simply make it very hard to pull back. By the way I don’t recommend that anyone carry a pistol in their pocket, I don’t recommend they carry it in anything but a well fitted holster, it is just not safe no matter how experienced you are.

Often times the less expensive to manufacture firearms are not quite as durable.


Not so much now but in past years there were a lot of inexpensive ultra compact pistols on the market. I suppose if that was all you could afford it is better than nothing but I would not recommend them. For one they were not all that reliable and I would not expect them to last very long, if you can’t practice with them then there is a good chance they won't do you much good if you really needed. You are also not going to have much fun at the range target practicing if the weapon is constantly jamming or just plain hard to shoot.

One interesting tidbit that may also encourage you to buy a regular size pistol is this, most people who draw or brandish a pistol in self defense do have to actually fire the weapon to scare off or discourage their assailant. So if you have a really small pistol that someone may not even see or recognize, you may have lost your chance to successfully defend yourself without a fire fight and let us not forget that you are just less likely to hit your target with a small pistol.

Well I hope to have plenty of photos and new links in my post soon.