What is the most Lethal 380 ACP ammo on the market

Steve C said:

As far as it goes this is likely true however death of the assailant isn't a requirement for successful self defense. Most handgun shootings are not lethal and certainly not immediately lethal. The purpose of using JHP is that it makes a larger hole and if you have to rely on circulatory system depletion to stop the assailants agression then a larger hole brings that on faster.

At best a JHP will expand and produce a large wound cavity, at worst its hollow gets plugged or closed off and fails to expand so it acts as a solid nose bullet. Solids never expand and have no opportunity to produce a larger wound cavity.

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But the fmj will always penetrate deeper and in the case of 380 that might be more important than a slightly larger hole.

There is also the probability that the the fmj will go through and through leaving two holes in an organ, an entry and an exit hole.

"old grandpa" does use wet packs, but he has used them on all of the .380 hollow points.

Seeing how I have never seen a single person do the same on ballistic gel I think he has a lot to provide for helping people.

Defiantly better testing than someone who says a brand of bullet for no reason.

All things being equal


an accurate 32 cal wont do as much damage as a 380

An accurate shot with 380 isnt going to do as much damage as a 38+

A 38+p is similar but isnt going to do as much damage as a 9mm +p

A 9mm +p. < 40

A 40 < 45

And so on.....

I think many people on the board believe that if they need to use their ccw they will
Put all thier shots in a one inch group.......just like their quarterly trip to the range with 50 rounds shooting at stationary paper at 5 yards.


I practice, with moving around and shooting. I shoot with many different ccw holders
I rarely see anyone, while moving, stay in a one inch group.


If you are the guy that can hit a one inch circle with a 22, under stress, consistently,
Than you are probably set.

I am not that guy

If you add stress to a situation, will you become more accurate or less?

I may be different, but i believe my groups will open up some.

With this in mind, i believe I need a caliber that puts the biggest holes possible, which for me is a 45, though i do trust my 9mm as enough when i cant carry the 45.

Especially with the awesome corbon dpx or hst rounds. (i did my own backyard test with wetpack and denim which was eye opening)

A near miss for a 45 is Much better than a near miss with a 380
IMHO

Accuracy IS king, but there is difference in performance between bullet calibers and manufacturers

What if you only get one shot? (before the BG sends a few back?)

If we were honest, and we knew a threat was coming to your house and you had a choice between a 45 and a 380 to pick up...... Which would you really pick up?

I would pick up my Remington 870 LOL

Motownfire said:

I would pick up my Remington 870 LOL

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Too bad it won't fit in your pocket-LOL

Motownfire said:

I would pick up my Remington 870 LOL

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Me too......

It's whatever you have in your gun at the time.

I know that the macho side of all of us wants to say that we want a round that will drop a person in their tracks with a single shot, but what about the aftermath of this action? I saw the CNN video of the Sr. Citizen that thwarted an armed robbery by two thugs with his little .380. While his actions seemed a bit reckless, he "stopped" the attackers. I also think about this Travon Martin case in FL. I bet Zimmernan wished he could have just "stopped" Travon instead of killing him. Was he right? Was he wrong - sadly, I fear the truth will be suppressed by political correctness.

In truth, none of us know what we're going to do until we're in that situation. I'm a prior military guy and have been trained on everything up to a 40mm M203 grenade launcher. While overseas, I was an M60 gunner running perimeter security for the post in an armored track. I've always said that I have no compunction over shooting to kill, if the situation warranted it - and while I'm pondering it here, given my training and my resolve to protect my family, I will do what is necessary when/if that time comes.

I just wanted to throw this out there because it seems that this post has become a bit of a frenzy of shoot to kill. In the uneasy time we're all in right now - I'd hate for our words to be mistaken or misused. Food for thought.

Mt P3AT has been 100% dependable with every jhp i have tried. They have all been basically equal in accuracy and penetration as far as I can tell.

Exactly right, dfsixstring. The truly perfect SD round would instantly knock an assailant unconscious 100% of the time and do no other damage. Since that hasn't yet been invented, those wishing to defend themselves are stuck trying to find a projectile that will do enough damage to cause immediate incapacitation. That's the legitimate goal... not "lethality," although many of the things that lead to incapacitation also lead to a likelihood of death or permanent injury.

I just read a forensics book about gunshot wounds and while in theory hollow points are more effective... in reality the author hasn't seen a single instance where the factor of hp vs fmj determined in wheather the person shot lived or died... the only issue was shot placement...

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I'd like to suggest that the goal isn't to make more dead people, but to stop more people. It could possibly be measuring the same factor, or at least have a strong correlation, but they are at least theoretically different factors.

I use FMJ ammo in all small caliber handguns. Most attackers will assume a blade stance. Meaning you don't get a straight shot into the chest. Another thing is we all tend to shoot where we are looking. If the attacker has a weapon you are focused on the weapon. Given that your focus is on the weapon there is a good chance you will shoot the attacker in the hand. A FMJ will penetrate the attackers hand/arm into the body cavity. The FBI didn't just snatch a random number from the air when they set 16" of penetration into ballistic gel as their standard. Not many handgun rounds will penetrate 16" of ballistic gelatin with hollow points.

A lot of guys use golden sabre, or corbon powerball, my 380 shot a heavier bullet than my 9mm

Take a close look at the Lehigh or Underwood 380 ammo. It's 65g and runs well over 1000 fps. It also tests well in gel blocks with 15" penetration and wound cavity of 2.5 inches. Punches right through 4 layers of denim with incredible speed and damage.

Fortunately not having to actually shoot anyone I can't really say which round would be the best, but for me the gold standard of testing the 380 round would be the tests done by "Shooting The Bull" at

http://shootingthebull.net/blog/final-results-of-the-380-acp-ammo-quest/#comment-34965

The Lehigh round was not included in these tests, but he did test them later and they are interesting, but I'm not convinced yet they will do what is claimed.

Sure, everyone has an opinion. I accept the use of gelatin blocks for testing, it gives a good apples to apples form of testing. So looking at the performance of the Lehigh/Underwood 65g extreme defense ammo that creates a large wound cavity for more than 10 inches long, that's enough for me. The high velocity and lightweight round should easily penetrate winter clothing while the flute design causes serious damage along the bullet path. It's what I'll carry every day....

IMO and according to all the ballistics data I've seen, hollow points and self defense rounds in the. 380 aren't effective enough and didn't pass the FBI's ballistics tests because they all fell short on penetration. when I had my Bersa Thunder Plus it was my daily carry for a while, I decided to take Tim's advice from the Military Arms channel and carry PMC fmj ball ammo rds in it & they turned out to be really good reliable rounds

Well unfortunately there is no tactical nuclear round for the .380 ACP.

Not to sound like a parrot......my first consideration is mechanical reliability as in will it shoot accurately and will it load the next round to do the same. Is brand X Super Duper Hollow Point more effective than say the afore mentioned Winchester White Box FNFMJ? How do we know? Gel is not real people. M&S numbers are suspect. Very few of us have shot a significant number of humans under combat conditions. Very few of us have been involved in very many autopsies of .380 victims.

Yes. EVERYTHING in this thread is opinion.

In the bad old days when there were few hollow points that actually worked in that they expanded in flesh anyway the biggest issue was that many would not reliably function the weapon they were being used in.

To day we have a lot of bullets that launched at the velocities they are designed for expand well in Dr. Marty Fackler's favorite brand of jello. Do they expand when shot through a t-shirt, sweater, leather jacket nylon wind breaker or starched sunday shirt? Do they expand after punching through a rib, wrist, or arm bone?

Not definatly knowing these things what is the best bullet?

Again the one that work to reliably function your pistols for you, that you can afford to practice with, that you can hit with.

I will confess that back when the old Super Vel 88 grain was considered the ne plus ultra of .380 rounds that I favoried it. I also had one gun that simply would not feed it. I confess that I would load on Super Vel up the spout and follow it with a magazine of FMJ in the hopes of getting that one good bullet into the target but being able have reliable follow up shots.

I would rather get a second shot with the RN FMJ than be freaking out over a pistol that stopped working when I need a second, third , forth or eighth shot.

I would rather have a bullet that can go completely through a target at whatever angle than one that might stop short of where I need it to be inside that target.

If you want a Hollow point, find one that you like the looks of, and that makes holes in Gel the way you like and see if it works every time to cycle the action and goes where you want it and buy them, practice with them a lot and carry them.

May haps I should copy this post for future posting.........

-kBob

Michael Nelson said:

Take a close look at the Lehigh or Underwood 380 ammo. It's 65g and runs well over 1000 fps. It also tests well in gel blocks with 15" penetration and wound cavity of 2.5 inches. Punches right through 4 layers of denim with incredible speed and damage.

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Welcome to the forum, nice of you to bump a 4+ year old thread.




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My personal experience with solid bullets (.357 hard cast swc) vs flesh and blood (deer) was not impressive. I used the swc bullets because I had hand loaded them and they were very accurate. However, a small diameter clean wound channel takes a while to anchor a 150 lb deer....even if the wound is mortal. I can only assume it would be similar with a bad guy.
I also carry an lcp daily. The ammo varies because I practice often and don't always buy the same thing.....but always hollow points.

Holy necropost!

I thought this was a different thread that had been bumped. I'll cut to the chase. The best JHP is a round that shoots the XTP bullet, there are several. Gold Dots are not far behind. About half the JHP rounds are worse than shooting ball. To attain penetration approaching a foot, expansion needs to be limited to around .42 because .380 lacks the energy to push anything larger any deeper. Expansion from .38 to .42 is not a lot. Ball on the other hand is reliable, inexpensive and will penetrate, it will also overpenetrate. If that bit of expansion or over penetration is important to you then buy a good JHP but do your research. But ball is a very viable alternative.

Acera said:

Welcome to the forum, nice of you to bump a 4+ year old thread.




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I found this thread and this site by doing a google search for best 380 ammo... sorry, didn't realize how old it was.

What's amazing is that 4 years later some people are still putting out incorrect information about the 380 ACP.

As others have said, there are a few cartridges that meet the FBI standards, here is just one of the few, Precision One's loading of the Hornady 90gr XTP:

Have you got any new videos with newer ammo testing? These are all 2 or 3 years old. Pretty much all hollow points perform the same in a 380 but the newer extreme defense 65g round by Underwood/Lehigh appear to bring fresh technology to the mix, even with FBI spec gel.