At athe range for CCW instructor got on me for having hardball ammo for self defense

[Travis McGee]

He's full of crap. .45 hardball is "pre-expanded," 100% reliable, and will penetrate through all the vitals, front to rear.

Ask loads of dead Germans, Japs, Chinese, Koreans, VC, etc. what they think about .45 hardball!

 

[Model520Fan]

I don't understand all the worry about feeding. Of course, HB feeds better, but if you have the charge holes in your cylinder chamfered, you shouldn't have any problem reloading, even with HP. And that's after six shots.

 

[G1FAL]

A 9mm HP "MAY" expand, but a 45 FMJ will never get any smaller!!

Ya know, I never thought of it that way. That is a good point.

Since the politicos in this 'wunnerful' state have yet to realize that people should be able to defend themselves from criminals, I dont carry on a day-to-day basis. But I have run HP's thru my Sig P220 quite a bit, and it worked just fine. The only problems I have ever had with the Sig were when using Wolf ammo. I wont use Wolf in my pistols any more, but it still gets fed to the rifles.

If one .45 FMJ wont stop him, I got at least 6 more. One of them is bound to stop the sumbich.

This is, IMO, another one of those 'whatever works for you' things. If your weapon will work just fine with HPs and you want to use HP, by all means go for it. If you dont feel comfortable using HP in your weapon, use FMJ.

I wonder, though, how effective that Glaser Safety Slug is? The one that has a bunch of shot pellets in it? I dont know if its the same as the Glaser ammo I had read about somewhere else, that was saying that a large % of people shot with FMJ live, but the vast majority shot with Glaser ammo die, as they induce a LOT of shock right friggin NOW! It wasnt in a gun rag that was trying to sell Glaser ammo. I dont remember where it was. I do remember thinking that I'd like to have some of that stuff, though. Anyone used it? What did you think about it? Hype, or good stuff?

 

[artherd]

I sure don't want to get hit with an FMJ in 9mm or .45 for that matter. Either will stop when using FTS technique (ie, shoot, and keep shooting untill he stops. It can be 1 shot, or 40. Depends on the guy and your aim.)

I however will carry HP because of it's resistance to overpenetration. I am not in combat, and I must consider MY responsability to innocent bystandars that I do not intend to kill.

That said, I would not feel undergunned with WWB plinking FMJ for gosh's sake, if that's all I had.


If I had a gun where I questioned the reliability of HP ammo, I would get a new gun RIGHT NOW. There ain't much more useless than a gun that dosen't go 'bang'

 

[c_yeager]

What i find odd is that your instructor expected you to attend a mandatory qualifier with expensive hollowpoint ammo. I generally carry hydrashoks (they feed just fine in my wheel gun ) but im not going to go out and spend that kind of money on shooting 200 rounds so some guy can say im OK to shoot. Thats what they make CCI and comercial reloads for.

 

[Sven]

Chuck Taylor told me he had five one stop shots with .45 ACP ball - one was through a car window.

 

[moa]

What Brownie said about hollow points getting clogged up apparently is quite true. In cold weather states, during the winter, people wear heavy clothing that can plug the HP. Then there is the possibility the BG is wearing ballistic body armor, and HB would probably be better in that situation.

 

[Bobarino]

for those that carry hardball:

how much of a concern is overpenetration for you? i'm just curious, i have nothing against carrying hardball. not trying to start anything. i carry JHP's for many reasons, and one of them is that it has less chance of passing through the bad guy and into someone or something else. is this something that needs to be heeded or is it over hyped?

Bobby

 

[ARperson]

There is no answer to this age-old dicussion. Many of the conclusions are based on certain suppositions about chambering, size of the bad guy, what you have to shoot through, how many times you have to shoot him, etc., etc., etc., and so forth. And since there is no standard "shoot to defend" situation, there can't be a right answer.

And if you really want to get down to reality and practical, it probaby won't matter what you feed down the pipe since most of the instances of using a firearm to thwart a crime did not require a shot to be fired. Simply making a show of defending oneself was enough to send the bad guy bugging out in most of the cases.

So there!

 

[Brad Johnson]

Instead of anecdotes and hearsay, how about we break it down to the basics...


BALL AMMUNITION

>>Pros<<
- It's cheap
- It's reliable in almost any firearm

>>Cons<<
- It's prone to overpenetration
- It's relatively low-powered compared to self-defense loads
- Causes little tissue trauma other than the actual bullet path (little hole in, little hole out)

HOLLOW POINT AMMUNITION

>>Pros<<
- More prone to expend all available energy on the target
- Less likely to overpenetrate
- More energy compared to most FMJ loads
- Reliable in firearms designed to handle HP projectiles
- More effective at reliably causing extensive tissue trauma outside the actual bullet path (hydraulic effect)

>>Cons<<
- Usually slightly more expensive
- Can cause problems in guns not designed for it

Screw heresay and myth that I can quickly disprove with some basic scientific scrutiny. When it comes to my life I am going to carry the most terminally effective ammo I can get my hands on, and the hands-down winner in that category is HP ammo with the highest possible velocity for the given projectile weight.

Brad

 

[Double Maduro]

I found this site. Scroll down to the index and check out the differance in the 2 .45 acp rounds shown.

http://www.firearmstactical.com/wound.htm

DM

 

[G1FAL]

On a side note:

Is overpenetration really a problem with .45 ACP? Its not going that fast when it leaves the muzzle, seems going thru a few inches of tissue, blood, and maybe bone would slow it down quite a bit.

So how likely is a .45 to overpenetrate at the ranges that most self-defense takes place?

 

[TonyB]

I don't want ot be shot with hard ball or hollow points.......just me???