Looking at the poll, we see that NO ONE (thus far) uses a WML for carry purposes, though several use it on their home defense gun. (I'm one of those.)
Like many people, for CCW I find that having a WML on my carry gun just makes it too bulky for carry. I know some people who can get away with it, but I can't seem to. Maybe I just haven't found the right holster yet... (It is true that I only tried a couple of holsters for it. I do have a belt holster for one, but I can't carry concealed with it.)
The "don't use WML, you have to point your gun at anything you are looking at!" argument doesn't actually seem logical to me. It IS certainly true that whatever you are pointing the WML at is what you are pointing the gun at---however, you don't
have to point the light at something to see it.
In my case, the WML makes perfect sense for home defense. We don't have kids, the layout of my house is such that my wife will always be behind me in terms of ever needing to check anything in the house starting from our bedroom, and I'm pretty sure I can tell the silhouette difference between a human attacker and my cat while under stress. In my case, for home defense, I'm perfectly good with pointing a gun at what I'm trying to look at, at least initially.
And there is nothing that says I can't use a hand-held initially, and carry a WML for aggressive social purposes when I check my house, too.
For actually shooting---given a choice for illumination, I'd
much rather use a WML than a hand-held. I've done enough practice with both than I'm really clear on my relative speed and accuracy when comparing them---and shooting two handed using a WML in dim light or no light FAR outstrips shooting one-handed with a hand-held.
At the Rogers Shooting School, one of the days (after you've spent an entire day shooting already) you come back in the evening and do a dim light then no-light shoot. Rogers targets are both appearing/disappearing AND reactive steel---they show up, stay for brief amounts of time (often less than a second) and drop back down, and you only have that one chance to hit them.
I scored pretty well on the regular tests though the days---but shooting one-handed using a hand-held light, my scores were comparatively dismal. With the WML, I got MUCH better.
I happen to have a weapon mounted light/laser combination with me at the class. Prior to that, I had a standard WML on my gun, but recently had thought about the light/laser combo. Hadn't had a chance to use it at all, but had it with me. One of the instructors noticed it, and asked why I wasn't using the laser along with the light. No one else had, so I just hadn't bothered. He laughed and said USE IT! So, I turned the setting to "light AND laser"...
After doing so, I could see why. With normal WML, you still have difficulty seeing your sights with great clarity. (Same for using a hand-held---either you hold the light back so you can see your sights whereupon you get glare off the back of your pistol plus you light yourself up for the attacker, or you hold the light forward to keep it off you but now you can't see your gun so you have to attempt to silhouette the sights on the lit-up target. Neither is great. And you are still shooting one-handed.) However, with the light/laser combo, hitting those steel targets became cake. Seriously.
The light gave me a perfectly good picture of the targets, I could use the rough silhouette of my sights to get my gun on target, and the laser made it simple to precisely put hits exactly where I wanted to----such that I pretty much didn't miss after that. I completed one of their "random blast" evolutions (all the targets come up repeatedly for brief moments in time in a random order, and you just try to shoot down as many as you can, reloading when you think you either want to or have to in the middle when you hope a target doesn't show up, and they just KEEP COMING sometimes multiples at a time)
without a single miss. In complete darkness. On a night where it was cold so there was a LOT of fog from every shot. (After four shots or so, you were standing in a cloud.)
I'm now a fan of WML/L combos.
If I could comfortably fit a WML on my carry gun, it would be a combo, too. I may even get a WML version of some of the holsters I already use, just to see if I can make it work---because it REALLY made a difference in dim/low light. And hey, having that weight on the front end of the gun helps recoil, too, so daylight shooting would be easier also.
Don't know if I can make it work, but it is at least worth a try.
I note that trying the same thing with just the laser really sucked. Using a hand-held plus the laser (so, shooting one-handed) was better than without the laser, but still was NOT remotely comparable to the WML/L combo.
When I think about a police officer telling me that WML are not a good idea, knowing that many LEOs use them, it makes me shake my head a little. His point was a good one---what you point the WML at, you point the gun at----but that doesn't mean that no one should use WML. It means you need to be careful in how you use the WML.
I've got some more comments about using lasers for SD weapons, but I'll hold off on those for a bit. (Plus some things I want to ask about hand-held lights that you use.)
Comments about WML or WML/L combos? I note that these days, perfectly good WML/L are available for decent prices. (Especially for people like me, who use handguns for home defense for the most part. For me personally, there are too many people around my house for safe use of rifle, and I think shotguns are unwieldy for use other than for defense while barricaded in a safe room. That's myself and my home, though---your choices may vary based on your circumstances.)
