When it comes to a FAMILY actually using weapons, it's a little more involved than just standardizing to "outfit a platoon."

Most of our families don't train as much as they need to or should. Most of US aren't training as much as we should.

If it's just a couple hundred rounds a year cause we are cheapskates and then that is scattered between 3-5 pistol types, how much SKILL AT ARMS do you really think you will develop with little practice on many different systems?

What about your family? Fantasies aside, can you wife and children operate EVERY firearm in your stable without a quick tutorial on how it operates? OK how about under stress?

I've always shot AKs, I do own an AR that I bought specifically for using UTM on force on force classes, outside of that, not a huge fan. Learned it back in the day and try to put at least 1K rounds down range with one yearly to try to keep some modest proficiency. First time my wife shot one she liked it. A guy at a shoot that knew I liked AKs let her shoot his and then smiled when he said she liked it. I said "have him teach you the 4-5 involved  malfunction drills so when it jams you don't die." Is your wife or kids going to be able to do those under stress?

If we are serious about survival and not just firearms for fun, RELIABILITY has to be the key issue we look at.

Personally, I have a "lot of the same" types of weapons in my inventory. There is a little variance, but not a helluva lot and not anything I wouldn't depend my life on. Only weapons I have used extensively without failure are first line weapons. *For me* in the pistol category that would principally be 9mm Glocks. My first 26 I purposely didn't clean or lubricate the first 7,500 rounds just to see how it would do- not a single issue.

Narrowing down to at least weapons that operate the same way helps and then they are taught on JUST that weapon until they start truly developing skill at arms. Then you practice 5-10K rounds a year cause it's just like being in good shape- it's easy to lose it and it takes work to maintain it.

Definitely.

But we really should be stocking enough ammo in TWO phases-

1. To have a realistic supply always on hand for SHTF.

2. To budget for at least a year or more of training and practice. This one is as important or more important than #1. Why, cause people don't "budget" ammo for that and then comes an ammo shortage and people go all cheapskate and get into the "dry firing will do all I need" BS mindset that talks them out of shooting more than a few hundred rounds a year. Almost possible to maintain skill at arms with little input like that.

So that begs the "how much is enough" question.

First the SHTF supply. This is general should be where you are storing more of your HP type ammo and more "effective" defense rounds. BE SURE to shoot a fair quantity of this in each of your weapons to make sure a picky eater will accept it.  Some guys will say "A thousand rounds is enough, you'll never shoot that much without getting clipped" blah blah blah. A thousand rounds is enough for what? One rifle? Perhaps, if you are heavily budgeting for training ammo as well, but a thousand rounds for both- no way in hell!  Five thousand rounds gets a little more into the realistic scale.

Further- don't forget to divide your ammo by TOTAL number of weapons in that caliber. 10,000 rounds of .223 sounds like a ton, but divided by maybe 8 rifles, it's not a lot.

Second the training ammo. This can in many cases be lesser cost ammo provided it meets your needs. The dreaded steel case cheap Russian .223 may run fine in your AR and if your truly diligent with your maintenance it may never be a problem. Or you might have issues right off the bat. FIND OUT if you don't know. Then if you find out it's a picky eater, put that ammo in your training stocks and it stays there. Make sure it gets shot up. Bonus points for training ammo that causes a few jams and makes you work on your malfunction drills. I'm not suggesting you buy shit ammo, but if you find ammo that you have doesn't run great in your super special black rifle, then USE IT UP, don't hope for a miracle when SHTF.

Ammo that had issues in storage should be put through the training rotation as well. Years and years ago I bought a ton of East German 7.62x39 before I moved (20+ years ago now). It was packed away in the original cardboard cases and largely forgotten about. Cleaning and re-doing some storage areas about 10 years later I found them. Cardboard had been damaged, moisture was evident and many cartridges had light rust. I sorted through each case pouring what looked best into ammo cans and only had to ditch a few rounds per case. This was at the time $79. a case ammo and comparable costs upon rotation was $250.'ish so erring on the side of caution and pitching a few rounds wasn't a bad idea. Still I posted some pics online at the time of some of the casings and they were pretty ugly. Even some rust around the primer/primer pocket. But this was military grade ammo and sealed well. I rotated about 10,000 rounds of that in the year or two that followed and had a very failure rate- probably not much higher than normal failure rate on Wolf X39 now (1 or 2 per thousand).

Long story short- if we follow a good plan of ammo purchasing (buy cheap stack deep type deal) with an eye towards maintaining a TRAINING AMMO supply that is at least 2X more than our SHTF supply, we will usually survive any major ammo shortages AND maintain skill at arms. And maintaining SKILL AT ARMS is the real important issue, not having an "ammo fort" to post about on the net.

How many times have you heard people cry baby in survival circles about "wanting" to  take a training class but "the ammo requirement is a thousand rounds" blah blah blah whine whine whine. If you've prepared properly and have a good TRAINING AMMO stash, this isn't a problem and OPPORTUNITIES won't be missed due to being an ammo miser.

From purely a survival aspect, short answer "no".

Not even talking some EOTWAWKI scenario, availability of ammunition by caliber has been an issues many times in my life.

This all goes back to the issue we've talked about many times on this board which in guns is how many can you and yours carry? Mags same thing.  Figure out you load outs, ie combat, hunting, conceal, etc. and you will answer your own question.

Other truisms, a mouse gun in your pocket when you need it beats any hand cannon at home in a safe and "Wait while I go get my gun" a terrible survival strategy.

Commonality has its place but once you reach a point, its a hindrance on many levels.   Once you get past you and yours immediate need then its the whole equipping an army thing.  Unless you are some camp of survival militia type thing, diversity leads to better enjoyment rather than just collecting.  You'll shoot diversity and same thing, you'll just collect it.  Nothing wrong with collecting however even then collect different then at least you'll look at it from time to time.

Last count I now have 19 calibers which I reload all and don't even own a .40 or 10mm................I should say yet.

The problem with calibers is if one caliber did it all, we'd only be talking about one caliber.  The truth is we have different calibers and different guns because they fit different applications.  If you spend time shooting reactive targets, you find its not good to think absolutes.   This caliber will penetrate where that one won't, this one will reach out there where that one won't, this one you can carry more, on and on.

Yes, its a great thing to have you and your families combat load out the same.   Beyond that, its no.  The possible scenarios are too broad.

You stay in the gun culture long enough, if we were pre-Civil war when people equipped units, we all become colonels.  Once you get past your need however, you get a lot more trigger time with diversity.  Go off the deep end, you end up you'd need two WWIIIs to use what you have when average 400 rounds most of won't survive anyway.

Do I have favorites?  Oh yeah, I'm very partial in handguns to in order of impact, .380 acp, .38,  9mm, .357 magnum, .45 acp, and .44 magnum.  I carry probably 9mm most.  The new subcompact 9s are pretty easily carried even in summer.  Would prefer .45 acp but that's mostly winter.  Outdoor activity its mostly .380 acp because of size.  You get my point here?  Nobody ever said after a gunfight, "Damn I wish I had smaller or less bullets." and the ultimate goal isn't filling that need but having a gun when you need it.

Now one last point from someone who's had to use his firearm more than once for real, unless you are an LEO or in the military charged by society with apprehension, by definition the bad guy gets the first move and unlike the movies, bad guys don't project their intent from a block away.  Most of us in the gun culture do not hang around with criminals so its more often than not simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time.  We can limit that by planning but I have a saying bad guys commute because truly there are no safe zones.  That said most of us have guns we'll probably never use for real.  Hell this site is named after the most popular one.  What I'm saying here is don't neglect the ones you probably will for the ones you probably won't.  Plan for the most likely scenario first and least likely last.

A couple years back I close friend, an LEO, sold me a bullet proof vest on the cheap.  Its a nice vest and probably one of the most practical things a person charged with apprehension in society can have.  For me though, it decorates my wall.  Coming up with scenarios that I know I'm going in harms way is difficult to say the least.  I'm not a cop neither am I a big time drug dealer.

This entire topic is just like that.  Get what you may need before you go off the deep end of over thinking it.

Tj