desert eagle .50 (AE) opinions

[n.c.outlaw2024]

fad or flawless? (discuss)

 

[RustyInBend]

Fad ... definitely fad ... Fun for the first 20 rounds, but then the impracticality of the size, recoil, cost, etc. sinks in, and it sits in the gun safe and only comes out to show it off for friends ... until you sell it on GunBroker for $300 less than you bought it for, and the cycle starts over with a new owner.

 

[joshb]

If you fire one, you’ll know. I did. Ouch! I have a 44 Magnum revolver. I bought it when I was 28-29. Even being younger and stronger, I only fired 3-4 boxes of full magnum rounds thru it. Then I discovered the pleasure of shooting 44 Special rounds.

 

[STORM2]

Buying a hand cannon without first hand knowledge of the ride is frequently a mistake. It would seem practical to work your way up in the big bore handgun food chain before buying the AE.

 

[SVT_Tactical]

They are a novelty. Occasional range toy. Reacher series season 1 caused a hike in popularity and price, settling back now but still high.

 

[CJ6]

I bought mine for deer hunting back in the mid 90s. At the time we pushed a lot of standing corn fields and lugging a shotgun through them was a real pain. It works well for that purpose, it's lighter and much easier to carry, but with all the knockdown of a slug gun.

 

[Straightshooter1]

fad or flawless? (discuss)

Mostly fad.

 

[davidjoe]

This is the gun that you’ll sorely want when they are no longer made.

It’s a plausible weapon in hand to hand combat even without bullets.

In a house fire, you’ll need to replace its grips.

Big and dumb? If tasked to select and reproduce a handgun in your machine shop at work, it will be the last one on your list.

You think your .357 has a rigid barrel?

TSA wishes all hand guns were Desert Eagles.

Your other gun goes straight to Netflix if it’s lucky, but a Desert Eagle sells the large Popcorn and the 3-D glasses.

 

[n.c.outlaw2024]

at one time highlight of the party b/c you could put .50 size in a phonebook
now not so much imho.

 

[Coyotefurharvester]

I like shooting my brothers 44 DE and BIL 357 DE. Both accurate handguns. I keep the brother supplied with 100 240 gr sp ammo loadings. They tell me to buy a 50, for a full comparison run.

 

[CJ6]

I like shooting my brothers 44 DE and BIL 357 DE. Both accurate handguns. I keep the brother supplied with 100 240 gr sp ammo loadings. They tell me to buy a 50, for a full comparison run.

Just a barrel and a mag change is all it takes to go from 44 to 50.

 

[reed1911]

If you have to have on, the .50 is the best for shooting. The .44 Mag best for re-sale.
I've owned several. The really have little practical use.

 

[bpd459]

Good day,
I know a former crack dealer that took a 300gr .50 AE round through both ass cheeks and survived…

 

[john 800]

I thought it was useless and pointless… until I shot one. I have shot a 44 desert eagle more than a 50, never owned either. I will say they are very fun to shoot and I was surprised how easy it was to shoot accurately for someone like me that doesn’t shoot handguns alot and am certainly not very good at it. Flawless? No cause they are heavy. Fad? Maybe but still fun

 

[K22]

One man's desert is another man's poison. If they made a 458 Win Mag in a handgun someone would buy one and espouse its virtues.

Nothing mechanical is flawless.

I don't think it's a fad either. I have only ever seen one, once at the range and I don't see much, if any interest in it. However, in the day of Clint Eastwood's movie, Dirty Harry, the 44 Magnum was the most sought-after handgun in America among handgun aficionados. Now that was mother and father of all firearms fads. However, the 44 Magnum has a real practical use for the handgun hunters. But most didn't buy it for that, they wanted to be Dirty Harry. Soon, they discovered they couldn't shoot it (hit anything) with magnum loads and it either end up back on the dealer's shelf in their closet.

 

[DirtySteve]

Too large of a frame....

 

[LonewolfMcquade]

Perfect pistol for shooting an intruder, who is hiding behind the fridge, of your neighbor's house , 3 blocks away.

Fun guns, but traded mine for an RPR .308 & S&W Carry

 

[CJ6]

Perfect pistol for shooting an intruder, who is hiding behind the fridge, of your neighbor's house , 3 blocks away.

Fun guns, but traded mine for an RPR .308 & S&W Carry

View attachment 1574596

See...This is what you need to hunt deer with. It will have the same effect as your headlights at night..They would just freeze in their tracks until you hit them. But too GUCCI for me.

 

[Capt. Oblivious]

My concealed EDC pistol...

 

[rmr]

I had one of the original IMI DE50's when they first came out. at the time, no load data was available and i bought Quickload (also new at the time) to help me figure out what to load. H110 is the go-to.

Fun cartridge but the gun was so damn heavy it was simply a range toy. ejecting cases had a nasty habit of hitting you in the forehead if you didn't have a solid grip on the pistol. the gun itself was well made, accurate and reliable.

Fast forward to the introduction of the 500SW. the pistols are just as useless as they were in the beginning, but the 50AE morphed into the 500SW. when used in a carbine, (18" barrel) the 500SW (or the 50AE for that matter) are some of my favorite cartridges. an absolute powerhouse with enough energy to take any game that walks on planet earth, all in a handy package that is actually useful.