I!!! Hello everyone. My name is Knute and I've been hunting with handguns since I was a teenager. I started using handguns for big game exclusively about 15 years ago. I started out in my early teens when my father taught me how to shoot his S&W .357. At that time I hunted small game with a Colt New Frontier Buntline (7-1/2 inch barrel) 22. Great little gun. Bagged alot of squirrel and even a few pheasant on the ground as they came into the cedars to roost in the evening. Lots of neat memories but I'll try not to go on and bore everyone. 15 years ago I started hunting deer with a TC Contender in 30 herret and also a 10 inch barrel in 7/30 Waters with a Burris 1.5x4. After hunting groundhogs with it all summer it started malfunctioning just 3 days before buck season. It wouldn't lock up. Sent it back to the factory and used my Dad's old .357 to take a 4 point at just over 50 yards (hit in the lungs and went 20 yds before dropping). Don't flame me but I found I was more comfortable going back to the N frame Smith than the bulkier scoped gun. Besides, the type of woods I hunt in I rarely have a shot over 75 yds so I traded the Contender in on a (1991) S&W 629-3 and thats what I've been using ever since. I use Federal 180 grain hollow points as they group extremely well. I do want to go to a heavier bullet because I think they expand a little too quick IMO for a quartering away shot on deer. Fortunately my shots have been broadside so far. I really enjoy this forum and ya'll seem like a great bunch of handgunners.