I bought an iPhone (again)

As the title states, I did, indeed, buy another iPhone.  Blackberry has lost the plot in a major way, the Passport being the last good one, and all the Android phones I've had have been flaky and slow.  If the spirit moves you, you can leave your complaints about that statement in the comments.  I'm just reporting my experience with the things.

So, since the smartphone is no longer a novelty and is approaching the status of an appliance, I simply decided to buy the most reliable appliance out there.  After a short survey, that turned out to be the iPhone.

So, mobile email is much better than last time I used an iPhone.  Still not up to Blackberry standard, but that's really not an option anymore.  The iPhone has a far less annoying notification system than Android, something I am reminded of every time I pick up my Android tablet and do anything with it.

The iPhone I have is the 6s plus.  It is fast, reliable, and hasn't needed any real fiddling.  Apple does not understand cloud at all, so I've been constantly forced to fix iCloud issues, but that's another story entirely.

We'll see how long I stay happy with it.  Since my last iPhone, I've had two Blackberries running classic, two running OS 10, one Blackberry running Android and the Galaxy Note 3.  I seem to replace my phone mostly annually now.

What bothers me the most is that Blackberry was still the only manufacturer making something intriguing.  They produced devices such as the Passport, which was a stunningly useful formfactor, and the Priv, which was an almost-usable Android phone.  Prior to the iPhone, those were the two phones I bought before the iPhone.

Since I have decided we are in a post-innovation era in the smartphone market, I may keep this thing for a couple of years, which will be a disappointment to my kids, as they've been getting my castoffs.

Back To Revolvers

I'm swinging back to revolvers.  It's not a new thing; I seem to swing back and forth between revolvers and semi-automatics for my main self-defense and carry guns.  I'm going to provide my reasons in this essay.

Define a purpose

This is sort of an engineering approach.  The engineering method is to define a purpose then find a solution that matches that purpose.  To that end, we need to define the purpose of the weapon.

There are actually three major categories of handguns, with subcategories for each.  I'll list them out below as I see them.

1. Defensive handguns
1. Carry guns
2. Non-carry guns
3. Pack/trail guns
2. Combat handguns
1. Gunfighter guns
2. Military combat guns
3. Duty guns
3. Recreational handguns
1. Target guns
2. Competition guns
3. Plinking guns

I'm going to discuss two of the subtypes of defensive guns, the carry gun and the non-carry gun.  I'll be giving my reasons for switching back to a revolver on both.

Carry guns

Actually, when I got my license, I went out and bought a revolver.  I bought a Taurus M85 .38 Special snub-nosed revolver.  At the time, the reason was simple, in that I wanted an uncomplicated weapon to carry, one that I didn't need to worry about state and would not easily accidentally trigger.

The primary requirements, for me, for a carry gun are:

1. Reliability: absolutely must work no matter what
2. Concealability: must disappear when carried
3. Adequate performance: needs to hit at 35 yards and hit hard enough to be effective

The M85 I bought hit all the points except reliability, as it currently has its second broken firing pin.  That's why I went out and bought a Ruger LCR in .327 Federal, which is a better carry gun.

A revolver is easier to conceal.  Sure, semi-autos are slimmer, but the revolver looks less like a gun, thanks to years of Hollywood teaching everyone what a handgun looks like, which is a blocky semi-auto.  The profile of a semi-auto through clothing is much more obvious to the average person than the profile of a revolver.  The Ruger LCR, in particular, is easy to conceal due to a fully-shrouded hammer.  It can be put in a pocket.

When carried in a pocket, the positive action of a revolver is going to be more reliable in the face of pocket lint and whatever else might get into the action than the balance action of a semi-auto.  In general, of course, revolvers are more reliable than semi-autos.  A revolver will have less of a chance of jamming, of course, but, almost more importantly, a dud round does not require working the slide.  The next trigger pull advances the next round into place.

There are plenty of semi-auto carry pistols with adequate performance.  However, given the fact that the round does not have to fit into the grip of a small pistol, a revolver can have much higher performance than a semi-auto.  Since it doesn't have to worry about balancing a small, light slide against a heavy recoil, it can also have a much more powerful round, and the round can be tuned to provide high velocity in a short barrel.  In this, the .327 Federal excels.  It has nearly the same ballistics as .357 magnum but has much lower energy, which means it is not difficult to shoot out of a snub-nosed revolver.  Its delivered energy is excellent and its velocity is high enough to cause hydrostatic shock.

For me, the revolver is easier to shoot accurately, which I'll cover in greater detail when I talk about non-carry guns below.  This isn't true for everyone, but it is true for me.

Non-carry guns

This type of gun is one that you wouldn't carry concealed because it is too big.  It is a weapon designed for defense in a situation where the size of the weapon doesn't matter because you are keeping it in a house or car where there is adequate room to store it.  This means that the power factor can be lots higher, as can accuracy, and we can select a weapon that is somewhat more fiddly than a carry gun.  For me, the primary requirements are:

1. Accuracy: has to hit at at least 35 yards, preferably 100 yards
2. Power: has to hit very hard
3. Reliability: has to work even when stored for a long time

For a long time, I've been using an EAA Witness 10mm as my primary non-carry gun.  This weapon meets every requirement except reliability.  It requires too much maintenance to keep in top working condition, but, knowing that, I just cleaned and oiled it rather often, which wasn't hard since I've been shooting it regularly.  It also has issues due to full-power 10mm ammunition that have required replacing the recoil spring for a heavier one and replacing the magazine catch due to damage from recoil.

The Witness is 35 yard accurate, and the gun itself has the potential for 100 yard shots but I can't do it with the gun.  I've always had this sort of problem with a semi-auto, only really achieving good 100 yard accuracy with a Beretta 96FS I used to own that I practiced with nearly weekly for six months or so to acquire that ability.

Recently, I saw a simply beautiful Smith & Wesson N28 Highway Patrolman 6" .357 magnum in a pawn shop and bought it.  It has been worked on and has a brilliant single-action trigger pull as well as silky-smooth action all around.

Anyway, I took it to the range and was hitting bullseye at 35 yards by the end of the day in single-action, so I'm back to a revolver for this particular gun use.  I still have the 10mm and probably won't sell it, but this N28 is a revelation.

The main disadvantage, of course, is that the 10mm has no less than 15 rounds available when fully loaded while the N28 only has six.  Since 10mm and .357 have very similar power, that means that the 10mm is worth 2.5 revolvers.  However, statistically, you'll only ever need three rounds for defense anyway.  If you need much more than three rounds, you need a rifle, not a pistol.

As promised, I'm going to discuss why I hit more accurately with a revolver than with a semi-automatic.  If you hold a semi-auto in one hand the way you'd hold it to shoot it, with a fully-loaded magazine, you'll find that the axis of vibration is quite vertical.  This means that if your hand trembles, as mine tends to these days, the muzzle will flop around quite a bit.  It is quite difficult to keep the thing on target one-handed.  With two hands, it's easier, but still not as easy with a revolver.

If you hold a revolver in one hand, you will notice that the weight of the cylinder drags the axis of vibration more to the front of the gun, which means that vibration in your hands waggles the muzzle less.  

A major factor in shooting accuracy is the interaction between the trigger finger and the trigger.  This is particularly true of long-pull double-action triggers, but it is true of all triggers.  I haven't yet found a semi-automatic with a large enough grip that I can position my trigger finger optimally while providing the choke hold a semi-automatic requires.  Almost all revolvers allow me to slide my hand down the grip to the point where my trigger finger is optimally positioned to reduce bucking the shot by errant trigger control.

With a good revolver, you do not have to hold the gun tightly.  A semi-automatic might not cycle properly if you do not hold it tightly.  When you hold a gun tightly, your muscle vibrations increase and this makes you less accurate.  With a revolver, you can pull the hammer back to single-action and let the thing sit loosely in your hand which means much greater accuracy.

Another advantage a revolver has is that its sights are fixed to the barrel and the frame and the barrel is also fixed to the frame.  Semi-autos, generally, have a camming barrel arrangement to make loading more reliable, but it also makes the whole gun less precise and therefore less accurate.

In the end, I could probably spend the hours and ammunition necessary to overcome my issues with the Witness, and spend the time necessary to retain that skill, but the fact that I picked up a new gun, and, by the end of the day, was more accurate with it than with the Witness, convinces me I need to go back to using a revolver.  The decision is heavily influenced, of course, by the fact that I just like revolvers.