Having owned several Mercedes, and being a mechanic, I know from personal experience that quality products still need TLC to be at their best. And having wrenched on custom fire apparatus for almost 20 years, I also know that 'Custom' doesn't always equate to quality or reliability. Also, while I'm really good with most mechanical gizmos & I work on my own range/competition guns, my defensive guns go to the pros for work.
My approach is to start out with a high quality gun. Entry level and even mid-grade guns need not apply for defensive use IMHO. For me, that means one of three types of guns:
- A military-grade DA/SA service pistol (Sig P-Classic, Beretta 92F, H&K). You might put others on the list, but that's my list because I've got no use for an SAO or striker-action gun in the middle of the night when the brain is half asleep.
- A small high quality gun with a long but smooth trigger - again no short/fast triggers
- A high quality 1911
My preferred home defense gun is the Sig P226 in 40S&W. I've had two of them and both were sent to the Sig Custom Shop for their Action Enhancement and reliability package. I also use them in IDPA competition because even though the DA/SA P226 isn't competitive, competition wrings out the guns and hones my skills on using them.
My preferred carry gun is a Kahr because they are very high quality and extremely efficient in terms of size and weight for the power they pack. And yes, I also use my Kahr K9 in IDPA a few times a year for the reasons I use my Sigs. My favorite CCW is my Kahr PM40 because of its amazing power/weight ratio - incredibly comfortable to wear, yet without compromise in power.
But, it NEEDED help to be reliable, so it made the requisite visit to Kahr and is reliable now with all of my favorite CCW ammo. The other ones are the Sig P238 for those occasions when I need to carry a pocket gun and my wife's Sig P238.
While I like 1911's in general and love the finer ones, I'm not one of those that thinks the1911 is the cat's meow for CCW. My main issue is that wonderfully fast and smooth trigger makes it too easy to make a mistake I don't want to make. The other issue is reliability. It seems that 1911's aren't inherently reliable and even the best ones that are out of the box still need TLC to stay that way - just like my Benz.
None the less, I finally bought a 1911 for CCW last month. After months and months of research and hand wringing, I popped for a Dan Wesson CCO. While I have had some issues with the gun and the purchase (more shall be revealed later) none of the problems have been related to reliability. So, while there have been some issues, it has proven to be totally reliable with everything I have fed it. None the less, it would have gone back to DW or to my local 1911 gunsmith/builder for a thorough exam and tune-up if it wasn't being replaced with a new one tomorrow. I've got my fingers crossed that the new CCO will be perfect, but I won't know until it's been broken in and thoroughly checked out.
You may have noticed that there is only one polymer gun on my list of defensive guns. Hmmm.