NPE J-Frame Size Revolvers - Let's Talk Quality Options

[Ed L]

While I cannot comment specifically on the choice between S&W and Ruger for this specific application, I will completely agree with others who pointed out that small and light are of primary importance. Keep in mind that the same people will be seen every day, 50+ hours per week. If anything is off, it will be noticed, particularly by the women in the office.

Selection of pants will be a big help. Relaxed fit and/or pleated go a long way towards good concealment.

Have a plan for securing the gun if the job requires going anyplace where the gun is not permitted, and to be able to quickly and easily transfer the gun between the secure location and however it is being carried.

The pocket holster selection goes a long way towards good concealment, and I will add an endorsement of the Aholster, with the caveat that the hook near the rear sight should be rounded, and some Moleskin wrapped around this hook, to protect the pocket.

Also consider whether a revolver is the optimal choice. Some will claim that the shape of a revolver creates less of a gun-like bulge in a pocket than a semiauto, and in some cases this may be correct, but I have not personally experienced it. Consider whether a semiauto such as a Sig P365, Glock 43, S&W Shield, Ruger LCP, or Kel-Tec P3AT might be a good choice.

In this situation I would have to agree with BillSWPA. I usually prefer a hammerless J frame for pocket carry because it is snag free and easy to get your hand on the grip when it is in the pocket. But in an NPE situation where the same people see you every day, where you are having to wear dress slacks or suit pants, the most important attribute is non-spotability.

I think a shield of a Glock 43 or a Sig P365 would be too big to carry in this manner in an NPE environment. I carry a Kahr PM-9 for this situation. It is a single column 9mm with an overall length of 5.3". It has the easiest DA-only trigger that I have encountered on a semiauto. I have two of them with over 2000 rounds fired. They sometimes need a bit of a breaking in, but I have never seen this to take more than a few magazines.

Another secret is to have a tailor deepen your pants pockets a few inches, because most pants pockets are way too small and tight to begin with. I can hear people complaining, but it costs between $30-$40 to get both front pockets deepened in a pair of pants. So for the price of a firearm you could have this done on 10 pairs of pants.

[Caballoflaco]

Not exactly revolver related, but in regards to an npe: I’m no fashion expert, but anybody these days who buys and wears pleated pants will raise an eyebrow unless they haven’t updated their wardrobe since the early nineties and wore them previously.

I’ll go unarmed before I put on pants with pleats, but that’s just me.

[SAWBONES]

Not exactly revolver related, but in regards to an npe: I’m no fashion expert, but anybody these days who buys and wears pleated pants will raise an eyebrow unless they haven’t updated their wardrobe since the early nineties and wore them previously.

I’ll go unarmed before I put on pants with pleats, but that’s just me.

Then there are those of us who are altogether "clothes unconscious", and who would never imagine associating the presence or absence of pleats on pants with the condition of CCW, or give a damn about what does or doesn't conform to current "fashion" in men's pants.

[blues]

Then there are those of us who are altogether "clothes unconscious", and who would never imagine associating the presence or absence of pleats on pants with the condition of CCW, or give a damn about what does or doesn't conform to current "fashion" in men's pants.

You've very concisely typed the reply I had mentally composed but not bothered to post.


ETA:

I can imagine the following domestic scene playing out in the residence of one or more of our forum brethren:

Her: Have a nice day at the office.

Him: Do these pleats make my gun look fat?

[Bucky]

Another secret is to have a tailor deepen your pants pockets a few inches, because most pants pockets are way too small and tight to begin with. I can hear people complaining, but it costs between $30-$40 to get both front pockets deepened in a pair of pants. So for the price of a firearm you could have this done on 10 pairs of pants.

If your office is business casual, there are a few offerings that already come with deep pockets. Also, consider buying a size up, keeping the pockets looser.

[Rex G]

Another secret is to have a tailor deepen your pants pockets a few inches, because most pants pockets are way too small and tight to begin with. I can hear people complaining, but it costs between $30-$40 to get both front pockets deepened in a pair of pants. So for the price of a firearm you could have this done on 10 pairs of pants.

Pockets, in recent men’s trousers, do seem to have become shallower and smaller. Most men’s trousers now seem to have less-useful pockets, as the 21st Century has progressed. Even my favored-for-a-while VertX britches have been blessed with shrinking pockets, though more of them. My newest VertX’ front pockets cannot adequately hide a G42! I used to be able to pocket-carry an SP101, inside the front pockets of some of my Nineties and turn-of-the-century trousers.

I am thinking that many, if not most men’s trousers now seem to have lower-set waistlines, which probably contributes to the lesser volume in the pockets.

Being retired, and, thankfully, not (yet) in need of a post-retirement job, to supplement our income, I am not compelled to work in an NPE, and can wear VertX cargo trousers just about everywhere, taking advantage of the larger cargo pockets, if I need to pocket-carry, unlike some cargo trousers, VertX are built to minimize the swinging-pendulum effect, if one has much weight in the cargo pockets. (I would rather not carry “primary” in a trousers’ pocket, for tactical reasons, anyway, but understand that NPEs can require compromises in weapon accessibility.)

[Rex G]

Keep in mind that the same people will be seen every day, 50+ hours per week. If anything is off, it will be noticed, particularly by the women in the office.

Selection of pants will be a big help. Relaxed fit and/or pleated go a long way towards good concealment.

Have a plan for securing the gun if the job requires going anyplace where the gun is not permitted, and to be able to quickly and easily transfer the gun between the secure location and however it is being carried.

The pocket holster selection goes a long way towards good concealment...

Agreed.

I miss my Nineties-era Wrangler Riata pleated slacks, which seem to have been tossed-out during our battle against mold and mildew after Hurricane Harvey. (Most of them were starting to look a bit frayed, at some of the seams and edges, anyway.) I could conceal a pocketed SP101, with room to spare!

[camsdaddy]

With phones becoming larger I find it odd that pockets are getting smaller.

[Duelist]

Not exactly revolver related, but in regards to an npe: I’m no fashion expert, but anybody these days who buys and wears pleated pants will raise an eyebrow unless they haven’t updated their wardrobe since the early nineties and wore them previously.

I’ll go unarmed before I put on pants with pleats, but that’s just me.

Flat-front modern dress pants only have the potential to look good on skinny, stick-legged, no squat/dead-lift butt people. Legs are cut too short, waists are set too low, cut is too tight, and pockets are too small. These pants are for very young people more interested in how they look to other young potential hookups, not for people in a more settled social bracket.

For those that lift, or those who have grown a dad-bod, especially those who awkwardly cope with both a lifter’s butt and a dad/beer gut, they almost always look horrible, and should be consigned to a flaming pit of fashion hell, forever to be remembered, at most, with a shudder reminiscent of the one I make whenever I look at my high school mullet pics.

I’ll buy dress slacks without pleats and adequate room for my butt so I can sit without the front seam smashing my jewels sometime in the never.

[Gun Mutt]

I currently have the good fortune to manage an office far from corporate and an untucked polo is a completely acceptable mode of dress. If/when I take over an office and tucked becomes the order of the day, I'll go back to a snubbie in a Galco belly band, the leather on the body side really is a nice touch. Wearing a belly band 45+hrs a week really kinda sucks, but not as much as being unarmed.

It was the previously mentioned thread by RJ that got me to check out the LCR and I find I vastly prefer it to the j-frame. If your friend can get to a range to rent and try both, they might very well choose the LCR as br'er RJ did. The big, cushy grips don't have to stay all that big, either. I learned here on P-F that with a little patience, one can easily dremel Hogue Tamer grips to their preference. If I do have to start tucking in my shirt at work, I'll probably use the Hogue boot grip full time.