Sig Sauer P226 vs. Beretta 92L: Which Is the Better Gun?

Agree that both are great firearms and there is now a metal tab that prevents the rear half from exiting the frame on the Beretta. There were actually 14 slide related incidents in all with the Beretta "M9" platform with 3 being Navy related and under "operational" conditions. The other 11 were Army M9's and occurred during laboratory testing (thanks to Navy Seals eating Italian steel) . There was as well an issue with the frames cracking on the M9's as well. See attacked for more on the cracking issue.

I think the big part of the story that is often left out is the fact that for a least one of the Navy failures over 10,000 rounds had been fired from an M9 and although a safety message had been sent out saying that the slides needed to be replaced after 3000 rounds Navy officials stated that the slide was never replaced due to being in an operational deployment. So it seems that a least one failure happened in the field - not a great place to have your sidearm blow up in your face.

In testing it was determined there was indeed a more serious problem with the slides - the attached report has more on this for each failure and round count. The part of the report I found most troubling is in testing, one weapon was examined after 6000 round with no fatigue detected yet at 6007 rounds the gun blew up. Seems like it was a hard problem to detect with the naked eye as such not sure any armorer would be able to spot a problem.

https://www.gao.gov/assets/110/102286.pdf

The better gun?
Colt M1911A1.

Sir, great start to an ongoing discussion and debate. The only other comparison discussed more is the 9mm, .40 S&W and .45 ACP debate. I’ve carried the Sig Sauer P226 and P220 for over 30 years as well as the Beretta and other similar weapons operationally around the world. In short, Sigs are great but for conventional units would require a lot of practice to develop the skill needed to be proficient. Berettas are good, so are Glocks (Combat Tupperware), Kimbers and other handguns it’s all just a matter of training and skill development. Kimber TLE Custom and the Glock 19 are my personal faves and always go BANG when needed.