And don’t depend on a land line phone, even an amateur can trace a phone line coming into your house and snip the line – keep a cell phone by the bed.

(A widow lady friend of ours always had a dog the entire time she was married and raised her children. She is now alone and within a month of her dog’s death someone busted her sliding door and burgled her place while she was there. Fortunately she did not wake up. When she did she grabbed her phone but the kitchen phone was off the hook and her cell was elsewhere. Lucky lady. New alarm system and cellphone beside bed.)

And of course a shotgun wont be stolen to be sold on the black market so some 15 year old in the bronx can hide it in his baggy jeans.

Seriously, comments like ‘3 shots to the killzone and dont damage the artwork’. Ever been in a life and death situation before? Had someone point a gun at you with intent to kill? I havent, but i also dont pretend to be a hard ass killer either.

All in the bedroom. I’ve got a .38 S&W snubby in the home office loaded with +Ps.

I have 4 automatic pistols – 3 of them premium types and the only one I would really trust to work like a revolver is my Makarov. They stay in the safe.

My rifles tend to be 7.62 and I don’t really want to shoot thru a hundred houses and hit the High School a mile away. The Colt is bad enough. The SKS is in the safe with a charged stripper clip inserted but not loaded. That will get replaced by an AR when I get done building it.

Living as I do in Joisey, no matter what I do or who I save – I’m in trouble. It’s not like I can depend on our new gov for sympathy. I still burn up hundreds of rounds a month anyway…if anyone is going to be lyin’ on the witness stand – it’s gonna be me.

Oh, and the wife can handle the Colt…If there’s anything left after the dog finishes up.

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What do you do when you’re not home? I keep everything in the safe, except what I’m carrying, and I can’t remember the last time I walked into the house not wearing a gun.
I’d suggest some simple tell-tales that let you know immediately if you’ve had, or still have, company.

RE: shotgun pattern spread. Some testing I was involved in years ago showed that out of a cylinder bore barrel pattern spread is approximately 1″ in diameter for every yard from the muzzle for OO, 1 and 4 buck, out to 20 yards (we didn’t test farther than that). Buffered shot spread a bit less. No appreciable difference noted for 18″ or 20″ barrels. The judgement from all of this was that #1 was the best balance between shot size and pellet count, which seems to be some sort of secret; #1 buck shot loads are pretty hard to come by, 00 and 4 are everywhere.

The carbine keeps coming up in this thread, and not without reason. A 16″ carbine barrel is shorter than the minimum scattergun barrel, round count will be much higher, substantial gains in accuracy can be had. Years back Tim LeGrande (sp?) had a 30 carbine-to-45 Winmag conversion that, due to chamber size, metalurgy, etc. didn’t quite work, but the basic concept had, and I think, still has, merit.

The .30 carbine gets advertised as having 357 magnum punch at 100 yards, and on paper it does; military hardball doesn’t win many points, but softpoint ammo makes it a worthwhile choice. As Tam and Uncle have mentioned, there’s increasing interest in 9MM ARs. So, pistol-power carbines are somewhat popular and becoming more so.

I’ve probably become obsessive about this, but I see a purpose, if not a need, for a short barrel, major pistol caliber carbine with a folding stock, direct blowback action to keep it simple. Something along the lines of a paratrooper .30 carbine, but in a better caliber. 45ACP doesn’t make the grade because bullet drop at 100 yards is too great. 9MM is too small. 40-43 caliber seems about right, with a power level in the 41-44 magnum range, say 200-250 grain bullet at 1700-1900 FPS, and a 15-20 round double stack magazine, and a barrel comp like the one Springfield puts on the SOCOM. A rimless 41-44 mag cartridge seems pretty close to center here, which we have in the long defunct 44 Automag case, unless someone could pull a Ruger and build a reliable folding stock autoloader around the 44 mag, but with greater magazine capacity.

Keep it short, light, add an under rail for a tac light, ghost ring sights (or a simple mount for a dot sight or laser), 12-15 rounds of 43 caliber, seems like a winner to me. I’d buy one, maybe two, and retire the 870 from its home defense role.

I did not see anyone mention the fact that they can’t be home at all times and what does the wife/family do then? I cannot picture my small wife handling my 20 inch Mossberg 500. Likewise I cannot see her with the AR. I know she can hit whatever she p…

With the carbine I’ve got a light, 29 rounds, and it’s easy enough to negotiate through my house if I have to. Pistols are notoriously poor man stoppers; at house distances you do indeed have to “aim” a shotgun and you’ve only got 8-9 rounds; and since I live in Texas, I feel very confident that any home invasion type of shooting will be ruled in my favor by the grand jury, regardless of what my rifle looks like.

This doesn’t mean that pistols or shotguns haven’t found their way by my bed; or that they won’t be found there in the future. As said above, they all have their place and something is surely better than nothing.

#4 buck in the Benelli by the bed, some reverse-loaded hollow-base wadcutters in the .38.

A handgun leaves a hand free; answering the door with your hand behind your leg isn’t anywhere near as upsetting to neighbors who drop in as propping the 870’s stock on your hip.

I’m with Uncle on the warning: None will be given. If you’ve made it past the perimeter protection it’s not a social visit. The winner will be the one who shoots – and hits – first. That would be me.

Racking the slide on the 870 sends an alert, squeezing the 45 through produces a bang. I’ll take a chance on the bad guy figuring out that bang is the first of two or three. Or all 12 , if necessary.

I also keep my Pro Ears on the bottom shelf of the nightstand. Not only are they protection against gunfire – the first shot from anything I fire inside will render my hearing useless as a defensive tool – with the volume turned all the way up I can hear small sounds better than I can with bare ears. I suspect, though, that it might be advisable to put them in a drawer before the cleanup crew in blue arrives.

As for “willingness” versus “eagerness,” I don’t think any rational person is eager to take a life. I also think no rational person is willing to sacrifice his own. I’ve made the decision that my life, and the lives of my family, are worth substantially more than the life of anyone who would threaten us with harm.

As for a light source, flashlights are like tracers; they work both ways. I use aquariums. The light from even a 10gal fish tank will light up a 12×12 room quite well. Since I actually live in my house, not only do I have the advantage of knowing the floorplan, but I have also had time to set up the tanks to where I can leave myself cetain areas that are still unlit to move in. They also provide me a way of seeing movement (when the goblin/s move across the light, I get to see where and which way).

As for the kuh-chunk warning, wait until you have a teenager in the house. Their comings and goings will quite possibly make you rethink the no warning theory. Of course, one racking of the slide in the dark will remind them that their nocturnal coming and going patterns should be rethought (it did for me, anyway).

I figure that, should worst come to worst, a couple of rounds of #6 ought to dissuade just about anybody from continuing hostilities…and that the nice wood stock and deer-slug barrel ought to be proof against the “evil black gun” argument. Although the one time I had to actually “use” my gun for defense, I never actually had to fire it thanks to the “ka-CHINK” factor.

I had a drunken neighbor try to break down my front door about a year ago; he was upset that I’d called the cops on him during a violent domestic dispute he’d previously had with his girlfriend, and he was threatening to kill me for doing so. When he started pounding on the door, I promptly grabbed both my cordless phone and the shotgun. Fearing that he was about to come through the door, I forgot about dialing 911 and chambered a round (I leave the chamber empty for storage).

Obviously he heard me, for there suddenly was a moment of dead silence from the other side of the door, followed quite clearly by an exclamation of “Oh, SHIT.” Then footsteps, receding rapidly down the balcony giving access to my apartment, toward the stairs to the parking lot.

I stayed up for about a half-hour or so, then when he didn’t come back I went back to bed without, unfortunately, calling the cops; that was probably a mistake on my part. Nonetheless, the next morning as I was leaving for work, the neighbor, now sober, stopped me in the parking lot and apologized profusely for disturbing me the night before. He never bothered me again…and moved out about a week later.

So no, I’m not going to rely on the “ka-CHINK!” factor to defend myself, but I speak from experience when I say there’s something to that argument…

We had one where the bad guy scaled a ladder to the second floor, broke in to a second story window, and attacked the homeowner. You could not get a more clear cut case of self-defense. Yet the AG sent the case to the Grand Jury (although he did say he did so “without comment”).

Maybe putting the Attorney General’s head on a pole is a bit harsh in this case, but he ought to be run out-of-office, and tarred-and-feathered, or some other equally demeaning public punishment.

I’m even shopping for a wood stock to go on my 870, although there is, happily, the letters “HD” (home defense) right behind the “870”.

I suppose I can explain, when they hold up that “evil black shotgun”, what the “HD” stands for, and why I chose the thingy that goes “kachink” instead of something like a evil black house gun.

I think your inference of SayUncle’s “eagerness to do it” is evident of him having thought it out and has determined he WILL shoot someone that needs shooting–that is someone who has broken into and entered his dwelling

When someone breaks in your house isn’t the time to begin the philosophical thought process of whether or not you will use deadly force. As I understand the law in Tennessee from my gun carry permit class, anyone who breaks into someone’s house has legally put the occupants into danger of serious bodily injury or death and that is a lawful reason to use deadly force and have the “peace officers” to declare it a “justificable homicide” if his aim was good.

Honestly sounds like a big mess even before the dolts in blue arrive. I wouldn’t be eager to do it.

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/37418

Reading that makes me think that maybe, just maybe, you’ve masturbated to one too many Tom Clancy novels…

If you are better with a black tatical carbine than a handgun (maybe because of miltary training or some such), it might make sense to use carbine until you can get some training time on another weapon.