I rarely carry a spare mag on my person, but when I do I use this one. It’s amazing how adjustable it is. I almost always shoot from concealment and its easy to go fast with.
https://darkstargear.com/product/koala/
I rarely carry a spare mag on my person, but when I do I use this one. It’s amazing how adjustable it is. I almost always shoot from concealment and its easy to go fast with.
https://darkstargear.com/product/koala/
The other thing I like about the sidecar setup is that the magazine is always in the same place on my belt.
When I use single clip magazine holders, they sometimes tilt, they sometimes migrate and they're not always in the same place.
With a sidecar arrangement, it helps the profile and stability of the holster (the clip is offset and it's a dual clip) and with my body shape I don't find it much of a barrier to conceal and be comfortable but I will only use it for smaller guns and I like them higher riding.
Yes, I do. Life is too short to beta test crappy kydex. The clip looks like shit. Anybody can bend kydex, but the really good holster makers put a lot of time into their designs, and incorporate feedback from users. Take a look at JM ad DSG and the attachment options you get from them.
https://www.jmcustomkydex.com/p/AIWB-SPMP.html
My list of decent holster makers is shorter than my list of good firearms trainers. That's not because I'm an elitist asshole, it's because I'm a cheap asshole. Buying crappy gear and paying for crappy training are a waste of money.
"Gunfighting is a thinking man's game. So we might want to bring thinking back into it."-MDFA
Beware of my temper, and the dog that I've found...
The Foxx product linked above was my first AIWB mag carrier. Hard. Pass. The clip is garbage, and the thing may be thin in one direction but it’s wide in another and has sharp edges. At one point I had almost the whole thing wrapped in foam to try to make it comfortable.
I strongly recommend looking at something from JMCK or Dark Star instead. JMCK’s high ride AIWB is what I’ve settled on and I like it a lot (evidenced by the five or so examples I own, owned, or have on order).
I recall Active Self Protection saying at one point he had never reviewed a scenario in which a spare mag would’ve made a difference. Does anyone else recall this?
Personally, I don’t carry a spare mag and probably never will. I’m willing to take the chance. It’s a risk assessment and one I’m comfortable with as a civilian.
This article gives some good reasoning. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.luc...led-carry/amp/
"Shooting is 90% mental. The rest is in your head." -Nils
Even when I carry my "Five for sure" J-Frame, I carry spare ammunition.
These days, because 'leaving the house' involves walking the dog down the block or going to pick up some takeout the wife ordered from the Chinese place a few blocks away, I stick my LCP in my pocket. I'm way low risk and long before I get out my pistol, I have other tools available to dissuade a criminal assault, including a 60-pound dog on a lead and/or OC spray and/or my words and/or my feet.
And yet...I stick a spare mag in my pocket, next to my wallet. Why? Because why not?
Ultimately, each person much make their own decision, but for me personally, I cannot find a compelling reason not to carry one.
___
Regarding risk 'calculus' and probability and odds etc. Here's the thing: most folks suck at probability calculations. And most probability calculations are based on an understanding of a given distribution. For most folks, they've never bothered to establish what the distribution is for a given event/time/place/etc. they just have assumptions with an intuition. Don't get me wrong, intuition or 'gut instinct' is an extremely important tool, but it isn't a 'probability' equation.
Regardless, let's talk basic probability - Probability (P) of event A (A) is equal to the Number of Favorable Outcomes divided by the Total Number of Favorable Outcomes. Please note favorable in this context means the event in question occurring vs. not occurring.
So let's look at this in a context using a very skewed approach (that would not pass peer review). Let's assume the that the event in question (A) is a criminal assault that occurs in the United States
So P(A) = Probability of a Criminal Assault in the USA.
We'll take the FBI's crime numbers. In this case, I'll say the total number of favorable outcomes would be equal to the total number of criminal 'opportunities' that actually occurred in a given year. I.e., I'm combining violent crimes and property crimes - I'm using the 2019 FBI numbers.
1,203,808 violent crimes were reported in 2019
6,925,677 property crimes were reported in 2019
So our total is = 8,129,485 (denominator)
Our realized number of favorable outcomes (numerator) is equal to the number of violent crimes reported
So P(A) = 1,203,808/8,129,485 = 0.148. Or 14.8% - we'll round that up to 15%
In effect, 15% of crimes that occurred in 2019 were violent crimes. Think about crimes occurring around you, or to you, and recognize that 1 in 15 of those is likely to be an actual violent crime.
And these are reported numbers. Based on interviews with career criminals, they commit hundreds of crimes before being caught. Who knows how many of those crimes are reported. I'm not sure what the rate of unreported crime is, but it wouldn't surprise me if crime numbers went up by 100% if all crimes were reported in the US.
you're leaving out personal demographics.
Go look at those "crimes" and the demographics of the "victims" and the perpetrators and the likelihood of the member of this forum being the "victim" of a violent crime drops to nearly nil.
factor in the most valuable lesson learned in "survival training" (situational awareness) and it becomes even less than that.
Then start to think about the number of these scenarios where someone would have dropped their guard enough to be a "victim" but still be presented with enough time to react in a way so as to make the gun in their crotch the deciding factor in the live/die... I mean, damn.
I'm not saying "don't carry a gun", which is how many on this forum tend to react when I point these things out. What I *am* saying is that the "odds" discussion is pretty much ludicrous. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that the "odds" damn near negate the "stakes" so often cited.
Does the above offend? If you have paid to be here, you can click here to put it in context.
Carrying a spare magazine is a simple, unobtrusive and low-weight proactive precautionary measure-as others have mentioned, more for staying in the fight if you encounter a malfunction more so than needing the additional ammunition per se.
Quite simply, the immediate action drill for most malfunctions is to eject the current magazine, work the slide several times to clear out the problem, and reload a fresh magazine.
Just carry a spare magazine. Seriously. Don't be "that guy"....
Best, Jon
Sorta around sometimes for some of your shitty mod needs.