Picking A Load

Life would be simpler if I wasn't a gun collector accumulator.

Life would be simpler if The Lovely Harvey wasn't a gun owner.

Not only do I have to find a round that works for me in the gun that I carry, it has to work for Harvey as well so we don't have to segregate the ammo by gun.

I love her, but she routinely misremembers that .357 Magnum and .357 SIG aren't the same round and is stymied when she gets to the range.  She knows they're different and not interchangeable, but she grabs the wrong box.

So if we're both carrying 9mm, I have to make sure there's just the one kind in the can.  9x18 Makarov is kept separate and we don't buy .380 that's marked 9x17 or 9mm Kurz.

Working with her aversion to heavy recoil and my dislike of +P we're sticking with 115gr.  I don't care for the (theoretical?) extra wear and tear from the hotter ammo and it also means we don't need to worry about the ancient guns not rated for the extra pressure.

Hornady's Critical Defense has worked for us.

So far everything we'd consider toting in 9x19 likes it.  Actually, everything we own in 9x19 likes it well enough, even the couple that aren't in consideration for carry.

Sticking with 115gr also means that we can find the right weight for practice without any effort at all because every manufacturer makes a 115gr load. 

Does this make everyone else doing something different wrong?

Of course.

This is the internet and if you're not doing it exactly like the person who's publishing on the web, you MUST be wrong.

Actually... (or should I say ackchyually).

Our solution is our personal solution and just because it works for us, doesn't mean it works for you.

Your gun might hate Hornady's 115gr Critical Defense and love 124gr +P JHP from another vendor.

You might not have a significant other to keep happy.

You might only have one pistol to feed.