Better than ever, in every respect, for CCW - Handguns

Guns Magazine, Sept, 2003 by Massad Ayoob

Better Concealed Carry Leather

Elmer MacEvoy of Leather Arsenal is back going full-bore building great concealment leather. I've always liked the Leather Arsenal stuff. I was drawing a Government Model Colt .45 from one of his Bruce Nelson-inspired Summer Surprise holsters the year I did my personal best out of six times at the National Tactical Invitational. The rough-out, inside the waistband (TWB) scabbard had given me excellent concealment of the big autoloader coupled with the speed of a quick-draw match holster.

At the moment I'm wearing his latest, a brilliant design enhancement of the "tuckable" rig developed by Dave Workman that goes inside the waistband, behind the hip, and under a tucked in shirt. A thin slab of leather allows the shirt-tails to go between the IWB holster and the trousers. The loop that attaches to the belt remains visible, however, but Elmer has ingeniously camouflaged this as a functional key-ring.

I'm sitting here with a Kahr PM9 under a tucked in Arrow dress shirt and tie. The pistol is simply invisible, and two movements -- a tug on the shirt, followed by a conventional draw stroke -- from being up and on target. For info contact Leather Arsenal, 27549 Middleton Rd., Middleton, Idaho 83644.

When I was young, holster options were far fewer than today. Bruce Nelson had not yet conceptualized the defining IWB that he and Milt Sparks would make famous as the Summer Special. Most IWB holsters were crappy things that appeared to be tangible proof that one could skin a chicken, tan its hide, and sew it into a pouch with quick-rotting cotton thread. It would then be "secured" inside the belt with a crappy snap on a flap of cheap leather, or perhaps a tenuously-grasping metal clip like the one that came on a 29-cent eyeglass case from Woolworth's.

Better Concealed Carry Guns

That PM9 is Kahr's latest polymer-framed subcompact carry gun. At 15 ounces unloaded it's the same heft as an Airweight five-shot .38 Special, but carries seven rounds of 9mm Parabellum and is much easier to shoot, even with the extremely effective 115-grain JHP hot-loads at 1,300 feet per second nominal velocity. Not so many rounds as a Kel-Tec or Glock 26, but shorter than the Glock and thinner than either, and very easy to shoot fast and straight.

This one recently put five rounds of Black Hills' economical "blue box" remanufactured 115-grain JHPs into about two and a quarter inches from the 25 yard bench rest. That "shootability" is tough to duplicate with an aluminum frame .38 revolver loaded with P.

On the same day I signed the 4473 form for the PM9 at Jim McLoud's Manchester Indoor Firing Line range and gunshop in Manchester, N.H., I took delivery of the new Springfield Armory XD40 Tactical, that firm's answer to the splendid Glock 35 Tactical/Practical.

The owner's son, Jim Jr., was eager to shoot it, and he took it straight from the box to the range with 50 rounds of CCI Lawman in .40 S&W. Firing as fast as he could, he put every shot into the ten-ring of a B27 target at seven yards. A Glock man like his dad, he had never fired an XD before, but he and the gun bonded instantly and turned in a superb performance.

Dammit, we didn't used to have defense guns that were this "shootable." In the mid-'50s, your choices in serious defensive autos were the S&W Model 39 and the Browning Hi-Power in 9mm, and the Colt Government or Commander in .45. The first was horribly inaccurate, in that early generation and didn't always work. The latter two had mediocre triggers, tended to bite the web of the hand with hammer spur or grip tang pr both, and like the Gen One Smith Parabellum would feed only round nose full metal jacket amino. Speaking of which...

Better Defensive Handgun Ammo

Yesteryear's hollow point ammo didn't always mushroom, especially when launched at reduced velocity from short-barrel concealed carry guns. That's over now. Today's hi-tech "premium" hollow points from all the big makers are expressly engineered to expand when fired from shorter barrel guns.

These include Tom Burczynski's StarFire (PMC) and Hydra-Shok (Federal) designs, the Gold Dot produced by Allen Jones' design team (CCI Speer), Alan Corzine's SXT that evolved from the Black Talon (Winchester), and Dave Schluckebier's Golden Saber (Remington). The new Taurus ammo with the Barnes X-bullet promises the same high performance even at lower velocity.

Better Concealed Carry Laws

We have more states with "shall issue" concealed carry licensing now than at any time in the last century. These dominoes continue to fall, with Ohio, Minn. and Miss. about to join the ranks of the "free states."

For those law-abiding citizens who choose to discreetly and competently carry concealed, loaded handguns in public to defend themselves, things have never been better. The old Madison Avenue jingle comes to mind. You've come a long way, baby!