i have packmar grips on my rossi plus i have a lifetime of hard work using my hand with gardening,wood cook stove wood cutting and a whole lot of farm work .living and growing in that will make strong wrists
My wife won't be coming on the site to comment, but I can share what she prefers. She does not carry, so weight and size is not an issue. But her preferred gun for home defense is a Ruger SP-101, 3" barrel, shooting .38's. She likes the weight, which gives her better recoil control and she shoots it well, which is what really matters. We're just beginning to look at smaller carry guns for her as she'd like to transition to carrying and the SP-101 is a bit much for her to tote around all day.
Take her down to the local HanGun Eporium, and let her heft all the different models, in 9mm and .380... Which will be equivelent to the weapon she is using Now... Then when she picks the best two or three that fit her hand, "Like a well Worn Glove" find a Range, that has those weapons for rent, and let her shoot a box of 25, each, and see which one she prefers.... Then, and only then, worry about the Price, color, etc... She will thank you for the attention, and advice, Down the Road....
They also make some nice snubbies in .22's. I think the smith and Wessons 38's have come down into the 500 region as well. Good time to buy.
We've done some of that already, but have an even better option available - a retired woman on another forum that owns a nice variety of small guns in various calibers - she has offered to meet us at my range and let her try them all
@Withak, FWIW may I suggest checking out the LCR line. I have an LCR in .357 mag. It barely weighs more than the .38 Spc.+P model but it has a steel frame. It makes shooting hot .38's a piece of cake and is surprisingly easy to shoot even 158gr. 357 Magnums.
That is the best option IMO. The lady that is allowing your to try out her guns can also give you her opinion and thoughts on each one. I find that going and testing different guns at a gun shop gets real pricey. Rent the gun, buy the ammo, lane fees. You are fortunate to have that option.
My wife actually chose a Taurus Judge(3in chamber/3in barrel) over the smaller semi auto .45ACP I bought her. She is very comfortable with it and usually bags at least one rattlesnake per summer with the .410 load.
At this point, while she does like revolvers, she is more interested in a semi-auto. She's shot them before, just not the smaller ones. I know she can operate them, I just want to be sure she's comfortable with it. That said, if she can't find one she likes, an LCR is certainly a good option to consider.
you may be flabbergasted to learn that a woman can't make up her mind on something. I'm sure you have never experienced this phenomenon but the choices here may bring about this disaster. Of course they want the cutest little pink thing to carry, but they want the L-frame to shoot. It's a compromise. Just don't let her get anything she "likes" to shoot like a .22. She's just going to have to put a bunch of rounds down range and suck it up so she can shoot an effective caliber, rather than accepting a substandard gun. As I've grown accustomed to saying in this situation: You really have to do the homework and make an informed choice for yourself. Then buy the Glock you're going to decide on.
My wife has a loves all the same firearms that I have.. Her 30-06 bolt action rifle is slightly lighter than my Thompson center Icon. Hers is a Tika Light Hunter . It is a powerful rifle and she is very good with it. She shoots the same AR-15 platform I shoot just adjusts the stock different. Same 870 shotguns and same pistols.
Mine stole my K98 for a truck gun...and my .357, then my 1911, until I've got ownership of whatever I have on my belt. I know a bunch of ladies who'll pull a S&W 10 with 6" barrel or an old 1917 .45acp with a 4" out of a purse or from under a seat.
Adding in here, My Wife has taken her new citizens rights super serious and this includes her right to keep and bear arms. We did a lot of shopping and a lot of rentals before she chose her own on her own. She fell in love with the Taurus 24/7 in .45 and that had served her needs well until she tried out one of my double stack 1911 series pistols! She really liked the Kimber Ultra Carry II in .45 but wanted something in a double stack so I built her a double stack compact from an STI frame! It was a really fun adventure for both of us, she was able to choose all the fixin's she wanted, and finish, and now has a firearm she is proud to own and carry every day! Like us menfolk, You have to carry it every day and you have to make adjustments to your dress style to allow this! She also fell in love with my super sweet pre 64 Winchester mod 70 in .30/06 and she shoots it very well, so I couldn't say no when she asked if I would give it to her! So it's hers now, and she takes as good care of it as any one! For a kick around rifle, she went out on her ownsom and picked out a nice Tikka T-3 stainless in .243 win for all round service work, and I gotta say, she is really good with that little Tikka!
My wife won't carry, but she is concerned about defending herself at home if I am not there. She used to have an old Taurus 85 revolver because she always had trouble working the slide and levers on a semi-auto. Earlier this year she came out to a USPSA match I was shooting and got to talking guns with some of my shooting girlfriends. She was amazed at how easy it was to jack the slide and work the levers on their guns. I explained (as I had a million times before) that not every semi-auto was as tight as my XD or 1911 and that all we had to do was find the right gun that fit her hand and I could modify it to be just as easy to operate as my "girlfriend's" guns. I took her to a couple of gun shows where she could pick up and handle a wide variety of semi-auto pistols. The one she liked the best was a Taurus PT-111 Millennium G2. It fit her hand nicely and she was able the jack the slide...but the mag release and slide levers were still a little hard for her. She's practicing loading, unloading, chambering a round in multiple scenarios (fresh mag, slide forward, fresh mag slide locked, malfunction drills, etc) and dry firing using dummy rounds a couple of nights a week...and actually doing some shooting on the weekends. She's getting more comfortable with the gun and I am not going to do any modifications until she puts a good 500 rounds through it..then I'll see what I can do to make things a little easier for her. Just the fact that she is practicing on her own is MAJOR progress. She also likes to shoot my .22 rifles and even my AK occasionally...but has no love for my 30-06 or shotguns.
Does a girls gun shoot differently than any other gun ? Obviously no. So coloring it like a toy does that make it less lethal ? Obviously no. but may be less intimidating .
I've been trying to understand what firearms women like almost as long as I've been trying to understand women. I've had about the same luck with both. I thought my Kahr PM9 would be the perfect carry piece for a woman with small hands, who is a competitive pistol shooter. Same caliber as her race gun, a Glock 17 with the grips ground down, 9mm, same loads, smaller grips, sounds perfect. ... And she hates it. My wife, who was never a pistol shooter before the kids were old enough to start shooting handguns, shoots a 1911 and a .38 spl S&W snubby, and prefers them over a .22 pistol. Women and recoil is also a puzzle. Some probably had a bad experience with some idiot giving them a shotgun to shoot with no training, but not all are recoil sensitive. I met a woman from out West somewhere who was a long range silhouette shooter. She would sit on the bench and shoot 80 rounds of 7mm Rem Mag in a long afternoon. Her rifle was too long as it had been built with a recoil pad, so she removed the pad and installed a thinner hard plastic butt plate. She said the recoil was actually more manageable like that since the rifle didn't "get a running start." Maybe if the gun is pink? I'd get hurt if I tried that reasoning. I'll just stick with what has worked for me. Let each of the women in my life try a bunch of firearms and see what they like. No pressure, no mention of a "woman's gun", and absolutely no clue what she may finally prefer. I just hope it isn't one of my favorites.
