Is 9mm FMJ really that ineffective against bad guys?

481 said:

Given that .45 ACP 230-grain FMJs routinely penetrate to 30+ inches-

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-and the .380 ACP makes about half that distance with 14-15 inches of penetration-

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-how can you say that the .380 over-penetrates when it only makes half the distance that the .45ACP FMJ does?

If anything, the .45ACP 230-grain FMJ grossly overpenetrates by nearly double that of the .380ACP.

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Referencing a couple of paul harrell videos where he shot one meat target with white box 45acp fmj and none of those round penetrated into his back stop:



vs 380 fmj penetrating 2 meat targets:



Not exactly apples to apples but I'm not sold on ballistics gel being a good simulation, its just cheap.

bnolsen said:

Referencing a couple of paul harrell videos where he shot one meat target with white box 45acp fmj and none of those round penetrated into his back stop:



vs 380 fmj penetrating 2 meat targets:



Not exactly apples to apples but I'm not sold on ballistics gel being a good simulation, its just cheap.

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Ah, I think that you are just having fun with me. But, if you are not, and you are being completely serious...

If you wish to discard ballistics gelatin out-of-hand, a soft tissue simulant that has been correlated (through research at both the US Army BRL and the FBI) to both porcine and human tissue, then there is little that I can, or wish to, do about that.

The process of testing with calibrated 10% concentration ordnance gelatin is anything but cheap and if that is the criterion by which you judge terminal ballistic test mediums, ''bags full of groceries'' don't make a very good choice for a representative test medium either. I had to chuckle as this guy (Paul Harrell) explained with a straight face that his 'meat target', which includes, according to Mr. Harrell, "this bag of oranges to simulate lung tissue", that serves as his test medium. I don't think that I could have done what he did without laughing out loud and I certainly don't believe that anyone will find much in the way of research supporting it as being a valid test medium. If it was, I suppose that we would find the military, law-enforcement agencies and the ammunition manufacturers eschewing calibrated 10% concentration ordnance gelatin in favor of these 'meat targets'.

There are two physical test mediums that calibrate to human soft tissue: "Bags full of groceries" are not one of them.

Most speculations made against the 9mm are by those who want you to buy their products.

Id say 9mm P is the standard by which they judge. Some are weaker, some stronger, smaller, bigger, but 9mmP is the median they measure from. Its the Median round because it is effective.

Most Military's test and decide, then issue.

9mm speaks for itself, and theres no Army out there trying to sell you on its products, so they dont debate or convince, they kill you with the product.

All I can say is; In my 30+ years of combined military and law enforcement, I have seen the results of 9mm FMJ (non +P) both incapacitate and kill. It sometimes takes more than one round but that's why most 9mm have a larger capacity than any other Military/LEO calibers (.45/.40).
Under Military vs well protected Jihadi, I know of no handgun caliber that I would rely on but I don't believe either the .40 or .45 hold significant advantage in a military application.
All I'm saying is I've seen more people shot/killed by 9mm FMJ than any other handgun round.
How do I know they were FMJ you may ask?
The answer is because I knew the R&R of these same units and departments.
As a LEO I carried the Mark III with 4 mags and one was loaded exclusively with FMJ if I needed to shoot at a vehicle. My HP in the other 3 mags wasn't with the knowledge of my superiors. Then again I carried a S&W M60 BUG and a patrol rifle in the vehicle.

I like Harrell but his "meat target" schtick is a real groaner. Obviously every slab of meat is going to a bit different and he rarely shoots more than a few shots. It would take a hundred pigs worth of meat targets to come close to statistical relevance IMO, something he could do much more reliably in gelatin. True, I won't be attacked by gelatin but I won't be attacked by a pork wrapped watermelon, either.

I never heard of a self defense shooting where the victim was attacked by a block of ballistics gel. I don't see any ribs or vertebrae in that gel either. Anyone that attacks me will likely have ribs and vertebrae as well as other bones. Yes, I carry hollow points but those tests don't impress me much.

I trust Paul's meat targets more than gelatin. Yeah, every slab ov meat is going to be different, sure, but every person is also different. Plus, people rarely put bone into gel as jonsey814 said; usually just an unrealistic 4 layers ov denim. Paul's target is more representative ov the dynamic human medium. Since there's so many variables in shootings, why test ballistics using the same static medium? Besides, he hunts and will often comment on his findings ov bullet performance on animals(different than humans, I know). That said, I do'nt see how 230gr 45acp fmj could theoretically penetrate less than 380acp fmj, what with the similar velocities and greater sectional density ov the former. But hey, if meat target testing and actual human shooting performance shows otherwise, it's something to at least consider. Personally, I carry HPs(xtp and penta lead) in 327 and xtp in the chamber, fmj in the mag for 380 at the moment.

Jonesy814 said:

I never heard of a self defense shooting where the victim was attacked by a block of ballistics gel.

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Neither have I.

I suppose that you can engage in a 'straw man' argument, but I don't believe that it'll get you anywhere meaningful. No one has ever claimed that gelatin blocks attack people.

Jonesy814 said:

I don't see any ribs or vertebrae in that gel either. Anyone that attacks me will likely have ribs and vertebrae as well as other bones. Yes, I carry hollow points but those tests don't impress me much.

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Testing in ordnance gelatin provides a confirmed, valid, repeatable test medium that represents the average density of the human body which also includes that of bones, tendons, ligaments, allowing for an apples-to-apples comparison of how bullets behave. Bullets taken from ordnance gelatin tests, especially those fired through four layers of 16-ounce denim, look very much like those recovered from real shootings. Anyone including bones (or anything else) in a block of ordnance gelatin demonstrates their ignorance of the model by doing so. Ballistic tests using meat are also worthless as it has been documented that dead tissue, drained of its blood does not accurately reflect performance in living tissue.

why test ballistics using the same static medium?

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Because if you want a meaningful scientific fact based comparison, the variables need to be removed.

I do see value in shooting meat targets, though. Quite a bit, actually.

Chompiras said:

I trust Paul's meat targets more than gelatin. Yeah, every slab ov meat is going to be different, sure, but every person is also different. Plus, people rarely put bone into gel as jonsey814 said; usually just an unrealistic 4 layers ov denim. Paul's target is more representative ov the dynamic human medium. Since there's so many variables in shootings, why test ballistics using the same static medium? Besides, he hunts and will often comment on his findings ov bullet performance on animals(different than humans, I know). That said, I do'nt see how 230gr 45acp fmj could theoretically penetrate less than 380acp fmj, what with the similar velocities and greater sectional density ov the former. But hey, if meat target testing and actual human shooting performance shows otherwise, it's something to at least consider. Personally, I carry HPs(xtp and penta lead) in 327 and xtp in the chamber, fmj in the mag for 380 at the moment.

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Then you're obviously missing the point. Ballistics gel is used specifically because it is uniform. Protocol requires that the gel be calibrated by firing a .177 cal BB within a certain velocity range into the gel block. The BB's penetration is recorded and must fall within a certain range. Scientific method requires that there be only one control. If your target varies as well as the load you are testing, then you have no way to compare loads because you don't know if the difference in performance was due to a difference in the round or in the target. Gel testing is done because it provides something that is consistent and repeatable. It gives a relatively realistic look at bullet performance while allowing results to be tested elsewhere and compared directly, because they are falsifiable. This is not possible when comparing "meat targets" and other variable density targets. And saying that shooting fruit is more realistic than shooting something specifically designed and calibrated to represent tissue is disingenuous. I like Paul's videos. He presents himself as knowledgeable and level headed--enough so that he should be aware of the limitations of his testing. Shooting fruit will always been an apples to oranges comparison to actual scientific testing, if you'll excuse the pun.

MTMilitiaman said:

Then you're obviously missing the point. Ballistics gel is used specifically because it is uniform. Protocol requires that the gel be calibrated by firing a .177 cal BB within a certain velocity range into the gel block. The BB's penetration is recorded and must fall within a certain range. Scientific method requires that there be only one control. If your target varies as well as the load you are testing, then you have no way to compare loads because you don't know if the difference in performance was due to a difference in the round or in the target. Gel testing is done because it provides something that is consistent and repeatable. It gives a relatively realistic look at bullet performance while allowing results to be tested elsewhere and compared directly, because they are falsifiable. This is not possible when comparing "meat targets" and other variable density targets. And saying that shooting fruit is more realistic than shooting something specifically designed and calibrated to represent tissue is disingenuous. I like Paul's videos. He presents himself as knowledgeable and level headed--enough so that he should be aware of the limitations of his testing. Shooting fruit will always been an apples to oranges comparison to actual scientific testing, if you'll excuse the pun.

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Well said and spot on. Without repeatability, tests mean very little.

Well, there is FMJ and there is FMJ.

Way back in the early days of the 9x19mm, even before the German Army adopted it, the round had what we call today a Truncated Cone bullet. Upstream someone mentioned a bullet with a flat metplat and that is a fair description of the 1902 verson of the 9x19mm the German Navy adopted.

Whether it was simply easier to manufacture or someon decided it just looked better or the style fed better in the Early Parabellum (that word was the wire address of DWM.....think prehistoric e-mail) Pistols we call Lugers in the US I do not know but the TC bullet pretty much went away after 1908.....

UNTIL

1980 when Hornady got asked to make some by the USAF. In the USAF test supposedly the TC bullets did better than traditional round nose profile in all the tests and work as reliably in all the test pistols as RN-FMJ.

I do know that some of the test where 9x19mm was found to be "as effective" as 230 grain RN-FMJ .45 ACP and far more effective than the USAF 130 grain RN-FMJ .38 Special used the TC bulleted 9x19mm.

Hornady was so excited by the results that they offered a 230 grain TC-FMJ .45ACP bullet and this writer loaded up a good bit of it and carried some of that to Europe on his next tour. I did not have gel or even groceries to shoot at.....but that load sure moved wet clay and modeling clay more than RN-FMJ at the same velocity.

I only played with the 9x19mm a little, only a couple of boxes and no penetration tests or playing with play-dough, but rather imagine that the TC bullets improved it as well.

I was rather excited by the prospect of the US 9x19 NATO headstamp possibly being a TC bullet. As I meantioned I had TC .45ACP for myselt when I did not load with 200 grain Speer Flying ashtrays.......figured when up on the boarder FMJ might be a good idea, but around Frankfurt a. Maine I figured HP would do nicely against Red Army Cells and the like. Alas, it was not to be. I carried commercial Geco RN-FMJ in my 9's that trip as supposedly it was a little hotter than NATO standard according to some folks and numbers were not as easily had back then.

Perhaps Gunny's shop cleaning will shame me into doing some of that myself and I may stumble across a round or two of one caliber TC or another.

I once discussed this bullet type F2F with Dr. Fackler and showed him some of my Hornady loaded .45ACP and he opined that it would likely do more damage than a RN-FMJ. We then segwayed into a discussion on to whether such a shape might work in an M1 Carbine and got lost in trying to figure out how to make such. We were both (being Carbine fans) interested.....but not enough to pay for it. He wanted to turn down a jacket to be filled with lead and I wanted the same machinist friend to make a swage die that we could mangle existing RN-FMJ 110 grain carbine bullets in. Either would have been expensive and likely very frustrating.......but feel free to experiment yourself.

-kBob

Why Four Layers of Denim Cloth?

The four-layer heavy denim test was jointly developed by engineer Duncan MacPherson and California Highway Patrol to force manufacturers to design bullets that will expand more reliably when heavy clothing is encountered in actual shooting events. According to MacPherson:

Modern JHP handgun bullet designs perform very reliably in testing; expansion failures are rare. It seems likely that occasional expansion failures in service are inevitable, but the number of failures in [actual California Highway Patrol shooting incidents] appeared excessive to me even though they were a relatively small fraction of all shootings. The unavoidable conclusion seemed to be that these expansion failures were a result of the fact that the expansion of existing JHP bullet designs were not robust; in engineering terminology, lack of robustness simply means that small changes in conditions are likely to cause failure. Initially, this conclusion seemed surprising because “heavy clothing” stages have been common in handgun ammunition testing protocols ever since this approach was initiated by the FBI handgun ammunition test protocol defined in 1989, and the best modern JHP bullet designs have almost no failures either in these stages or against bare gelatin. A little more thought made this seem less surprising, because the “heavy clothing” stages in various tests seem to have been selected to represent specific clothing without any systematic investigation directed at evaluating what aspects of the cloth were critical.

A thoughtful investigation of the effects of soft barriers (e.g., clothing, as opposed to the hard barriers represented by building materials and automobile glass) seemed to me to be overdue. [California Highway Patrol Firearms Training Unit Lieutenant] Ed Fincel agreed with this assessment, and he, State of California Associate Procurement Engineer Nick Miloskovich and I set about implementing this investigation in the last quarter of 1996.

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The four-layer heavy denim test is NOT intended to simulate any type of clothing; it is merely an engineering evaluation tool to assess the ability of JHP handgun bullets to resist plugging and expand robustly.

Shooting into the various forms of gel are probably the best way to predict what will happen when a bullet hits living flesh. But it isn't perfect and is a prediction. Shooting steel plates, concrete blocks, and animal flesh are far less reliable indicators.

The data compiled from numerous sources over the years documenting what actually did happen vs trying to predict what may happen is what I put my faith in. Several people have done this over the years and the results are pretty uniform. FMJ from any of the common cartridges seems to work effectively about 2/3 of the time with a hit in a human torso. The best HP ammo seems to average about 90%, but I've seen numbers as low as 85% and as high as 95% for individual loads. I've never seen any data showing a significant difference between 9mm, 40, 45, or either 357 Sig or 357 mag. You can even throw in 44 mag as well.

It seems that any of these rounds are about as effective as you can make a handgun cartridge. A rifle makes hits at longer ranges easier, but even that is not a 100% guarantee. People have stayed in the fight after 30 caliber wounds through the lungs and survived. You always have exceptions. There are some individuals that for whatever reason just don't go down until their bodies run out of blood or you hit the brain. A 45 caliber hole that expands to near 1" doesn't seem to affect these individuals any more than a FMJ 9mm bullet. But for "normal" folks a good HP bullet does improve your odds.

Truncated Cones #37
I once read that early 9mm P went from the truncated cone to roundnose for feeding from the trommel-magazin provided for Lang Pistole 08, the Artillery Luger.

I likewise read that the Hornady-USAF truncated cone gave way to roundnose for reliable feeding in the many different 9mms of NATO. Interoperability, they call it. I also saw illustrated an intermediate form not brought to the commercial market; what a Cowboy shooter calls a "roundnose flatpoint."

Another recollection from the days of ink on paper, it was reported that the .45 Hornady TC had deeper and straighter penetration than 1911 roundnose hardball.

CDW4ME said:

Lethal and quickly incapacitating are two different concepts.
22lr, 32, 380/9mm FMJ are all lethal, but the goal of self defense is stop (incapacitate) the threat ASAP.
.355 diameter hole has less stop the threat ASAP potential than a .6x hole (expanded 9mm HP)

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IMO, it is a fine, effective, and efficient cartridge. My experience is it over-penetrates. Upside is both an entry and exit wound,
and if it solidly strikes bone, it will do far more damage. To embrace the value of the 9mm FMJ, it would be preferable to hit
solidly, more than once. Anybody with 4 holes in them, and any additional damage caused, is not going to fare well, in short order.

I don't pretend to be an expert on bullet construction, expansion, or penetration, but in my limited experience, bullet placement counts a lot more than any of the other factors. How effective is a .44 caliber hollow point bullet if it misses the BG by six feet? I once saw the aftermath of a shooting (I didn't say "hitting") in which six shots from a .44 Magnum Ruger were fired "at" a home invader from about 8 feet away. None came within a yard of the then-fleeing BG, though other people in the room were deafened temporarily. (The shooter insisted there had to be a "blood trail"; there wasn't.)

Jim

Jim,

Thanks for the input. I had no difficulty with a P-1/ P38 but can see how that itty bitty feed ramp and maybe a worn out magazine in a P35 might have been an issue.

That snail magazine for the Luger had a reputation for being persnicity. As a kid a friend's dad had a 1914 artillery with a snail and two normal mags and they never loaded the snail mag......even during a riot. I got talked out of buying one at a show in Frankfurt FRG, "Oh we can find a better one than that". No, we couldn't.

Not sure that having a metplat on a otherwise RN-FMJ would lead to better feeding than the same sized metplat on a TC. I have to believe it would boost bullet performance though. Dr Fackler did some tests with SWC .38SPL /.357 Magnum and he told me that those did slightly, but noticeably, more permanent damage than RN designs. He found though that all the permanent damage was done by the metplat and not as was commonly thought by the bullet shoulder. To study this in gel he mixed construction sand in with the gel and captured the bullets. While the edges of the metplat showed damage from the sand, the bullet shoulders did not, indicating that they did not contact the sand filled gel in passing. Might be interesting to do this with those cowboy loads.

For a bit I was using a 200 grain SWC with a large metplat in my .45s and it worked in my admittedly throated Series70, an early Officers ACP, and a BDA marked Sig 220, but not in a Star PD which had issues with anything not FMJ other than some of the old FMJ profile Norma 230 grain HPs. As these Normas failed to expand in water at around 840 I just did not see the point of paying almost twice as much per bullet as Winchester FMJ and even more over RNL of that weight though....... Local bullet producer of those SWCs went under and I have not bothered to finds a replacement.

-kBob

Not sure that having a metplat on a otherwise RN-FMJ would lead to better feeding than the same sized metplat on a TC.

I am not sure either, but the USAF and Hornady were intent on improving "stopping power" and tried it on the way back to roundnose.

I have to believe it would boost bullet performance though. Dr Fackler did some tests with SWC .38SPL /.357 Magnum and he told me that those did slightly, but noticeably, more permanent damage than RN designs.

Hatcher thought so, too. He had a scale of performance factors for his Relative Stopping Power formula.
The values for bullet form factor for some bullet types are defined as:
F Bullet Type
700 Fully Jacketed Pointed
900 Fully Jacketed Round Nose
1050 Fully Jacketed Flat Point
1100 Fully Jacketed Flat Point (Large flat)
1000 Lead Round Nose
1050 Lead Flat Point
1100 Lead Flat Point (Large Flat)
1000 Jacketed Softpoint (unexpanded)
1350 Jacketed Softpoint (expanded)
1250 Lead Semi-wadcutter
1100 Hollow Point (unexpanded)
1350 Hollow Point (expanded)

Note that his baseline bullet was the lead roundnose. I normally point out that the Colt branded ammo, like .38 Colt Special vs .38 S&W Special, differs only by the 5% more deadly flatpointed bullet.

One gunziner also tested Large Flat bullets like the LBT WFN and found, like Fackler, that the meplat was the key, not the SWC shoulder that punches such nice round holes in targets.


For a bit I was using a 200 grain SWC with a large metplat in my .45s and it worked in my admittedly throated Series70, an early Officers ACP, and a BDA marked Sig 220, but not in a Star PD which had issues with anything not FMJ other than some of the old FMJ profile Norma 230 grain HPs. As these Normas failed to expand in water at around 840 I just did not see the point of paying almost twice as much per bullet as Winchester FMJ and even more over RNL of that weight though....... Local bullet producer of those SWCs went under and I have not bothered to finds a replacement.

A friend, since deceased, used to cast the Lyman 452460 SWC which is broader up front than the usual H&G #68 copy. Since he passed, I have bought a lot of commercial #68s, but am now belatedly moving to roundnose. Like you, I have or have had guns that would feed one bullet but not another and am tired of tailoring ammo. I hope to end up with RN for all, at the appropriate velocity for the application, except that I do hope the Commander will satisfactorily complete its trials with 200 gr XTPs.

I remember the Norma bullets, a small hollow in a large exposed lead nose. Poor feeding in my old Colt. I did not have a way to test expansion in those days, so I just carried the gun with a Norma in the chamber and hardball in the magazine.

kBob said:

Not sure that having a metplat on a otherwise RN-FMJ would lead to better feeding than the same sized metplat on a TC. I have to believe it would boost bullet performance though. Dr Fackler did some tests with SWC .38SPL /.357 Magnum and he told me that those did slightly, but noticeably, more permanent damage than RN designs. He found though that all the permanent damage was done by the metplat and not as was commonly thought by the bullet shoulder. To study this in gel he mixed construction sand in with the gel and captured the bullets. While the edges of the metplat showed damage from the sand, the bullet shoulders did not, indicating that they did not contact the sand filled gel in passing. Might be interesting to do this with those cowboy loads.

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Thanks for mentioning this. Somehow, somewhere, in a long-forgotten past life, I remember reading about this test (and the lack of abrasion on the shoulder of the bullet thanks to the cavitation produced by the flat nose), and the memory of which, must've been locked away deep in my mind. Reading your post above had it all rushing back to me. If memory serves, the bullet being tested was a 9mm 124-grain FMJFP, made by Hornady. This jives with what I have read recently that these bullets didn;t do much more, if any, damage than their round nosed counterparts.

I must admit funds have been a bit tight lately and I haven’t even scored any magic hollow points for my 92s. I’ve kept it chock full of some FMJ Winchester’s I bought. Ive practiced with it enough I’m fairly confident I can make a good shot. Then again those targets weren’t moving or shooting back. I’m a cooper file So I’m likely to just use the 9 to get back to my shotty.

MCMXIautomatic said:

I'm well aware that for self defense purposes, a good modern jacketed hollowpoint load is the overwhelming preference for dealing with a threat, for reasons which I already know and understand, so I need no explanation there. However, I've been wondering about it, and I'm curious to know exactly how effective (or ineffective) 9mm ball ammo really is, and has been historically, at incapacitating human targets based on existing scientific and/or anecdotal information. So far, I haven't been able to find anything conclusive about this after searching online; only a general acceptance of the demonstrable fact that jhp rounds are superior to fmjs for self defense, especially where overpenetration is a concern.

But to what extent the 9mm fmj round is lacking by comparison seems to me like something that could still be open to debate, and therein lies my curiosity.

Consider the reputation and widespread use of the cartridge. It has been putting people in the ground for over a century, in crime, self-defense, and in warfare, and has pretty much only been available as ball ammo for the majority of that time. Isn't there something to be said about the widespread adoption and apparent effectiveness of 9mm Luger, even only in fmj form?

People talk about the lackluster performance of 9mm fmj in real world defensive shootings, which is not something that I would necessarily argue with, but what about the use and effectiveness of the cartridge during combat in the world wars? Wasn't fmj the only flavor that it came in back then? What about all those pistols and submachine guns that were mass produced by the thousands or millions during the wars and were apparently used to great effect in combat with ball ammo? What about all those MP-40s that German NCOs carried and fought with as primary arms? What about all those Sten guns that were supposedly used so effectively by Allied troops and underground resistance fighters? Am I missing something here?

Since this question might be more focused on bullet configuration than caliber, I might also mention the even smaller caliber PPSH-41, which the Russians used in urban fighting with such great success that I've read they even had entire infantry divisions armed with them. Weren't those 7.62x25 rounds their weapons fired all fmj?

So, what are your thoughts and opinions on this? Is 9mm ball really that terrible as a manstopping round, even with proper shot placement? Or is it simply a matter of the bullet giving less than ideal, but still generally good enough performance to get the job done?

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Basically what you're asking is if our military is at a disadvantage since they are currently confined to FMJ? I used to assume so, along with everyone else, but I no longer do. If I were in a combat zone where civilian bystanders weren't a consideration, then I would choose FMJ over hollow points without a doubt.

BTW I dunno if anyone caught it but the paul harrell 45 video clip was about game penetration and not human penetration. Bigger ribs more simulated flesh. My mistake but the arguments seem to have become academic, and personally I wouldn't use fmj for self defense.

One of the things that started happening after the 1986 Miami Shootout is that law enforcement agencies started paying attention to bullet performance. Taking a more scientific approach to terminal ballistics in the field is what led Duncan MacPherson to work with the California Highway Patrol. Agencies were running candidate cartridges through the FBI tests - including the FBI Heavy Clothing test, but the bullets weren't performing as well in actual shootings statistically, as they were performing in the battery of tests.

My point here though, is that, generally speaking, agencies do pay quite a bit of attention to bullet performance and we now have over two decades of data on police shootings. The data shows that the bullets which expand yet penetrate within the FBI standards, and do well in the IWBA 4x protocol - serve officers well in actual shootings.

FMJ is no where near as effective as the best JHPs - like Federal HST and Winchester Ranger "T" Series.

The United States Army has already determined that using JHPs would make the XM17 MHS a more effective weapons system.

That vid does make a decent point though. Sometimes .45 fails to penetrate odd things. When .45 fails, it fails pretty spectacularly. But when it doesn't fail, it tends to perform better than most. I've seen wood and truck doors stop .45 a few times. Where .40 and .357 zip through. Just like the rare 9mm failure to pen a windshield.

HST is best, but good FMJ's still meet the coroners approval. Too often, the extra performance of the JHP's is wasted by missed vitals. Except for preventing overpen, that's always nice. My reloads are FMJ's, because I shoot all my carry ammo every month. The mag in my CCW is always HST or Speer Gold dot. 3 mags of JHP gets too spendy.