Clint Smith Only carries "High quality ball" 45 auto ammo?

I think his reasoning is that "ball" has the best chance of reliable feeding in the 1911s he favors, and I can't say I totally disagree with it. Moreover, .45 "hardball," due to its low velocity and blunt bullet, doesn't suffer quite the overpenetration that 9mm FMJ does. But, you should still use what works best for you, not necessarily what someone else does. Personally, if my 1911 doesn't feed a standard pressure, round nose profile JHP, I will get it repaired, or rid of it altogether.

This might be it: http://www.hornady.com/store/45-ACP-230-gr-FMJ-RN/. For the price, it'd better be high quality. Other than the feed issue, I've been told that a round with a muzzle velocity under 1000 fps won't reliably expand, essentially becoming a ball round, but with less penetration. A lot of the heavier HP, especially the 230 gr stuff, is moving a lot slower than 1000 fps. I still haven't settled on a round for carry yet, personally....

Isn't this silliness already well underway in this thread? :
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=626043

Short answer - No
Long answer - Nooooooooooooooooooooooo

You don't reduce the effectiveness of your defensive tools based on legend and war stories.

Yeah well my dad carries his Glock 36 and still only carries ball. glocks shouldn't suffer from those problems.

Click to expand...

There is no reason or excuse not to use the best ammunition available in a Glock. If the JHP fails to expand, it is still a .45-caliber hole. If it does expand, it makes an even bigger hole. There is no reason not to take advantage.

Your dad doesn't understand how bullets wound meat.

That round nose will make a single stabby wound, it isn't a .45" drillbit boring out a hole, the meat closes up after it passes through.
Which has very little to do with platform or caliber ... pass-through narrow wounds are simply not very good at producing involuntary stops rapidly.

There is no downside to using JHP. If it fails to expand, it has the same effect as FMJ. There is no upside to FMJ. It is what is, period.

All pistol bullets suck. None of them are adequate. You need to give yourself every possible advantage when you are fighting for your life, even if it is a small advantage. This includes premium JHP ammo.

With all due respect to Mr. Smith, (and I would very much like to go to his school and learn from him personally one day,) this philosophy reflects an old-school attitude on his part where 'simple is better'. He has been doing this so long, he remembers when most 1911s would not feed JHP ammo without custom work, and JHP ammo wasn't all that great anyway. This is not the case anymore. Pretty much all .45 pistols will feed FMJ ammo out of the box, and modern JHP bullets are much better than they were say, 25 years ago. Don't think of it as a .45. Think of it as a .675" caliber wound channel.

And I have never had any problem with any of the commonly available brands of FMJ in my Kimber. WWB, UMC, etc, it eats it all. I don't use steel-cased or dirty loads.

Gosh. http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=626043

I think he is saying this to emphasize the fact that where you place the bullet on the target is far more important than which bullet it happens to be.

Consider the Reagan assassination attempt, two accidentally well place rounds with a .22 were true one shot drops, out of the fight right now, while a poorly placed round had Reagan not even knowing he was hit, yet it darn near killed him about 20 minutes later.

I have a feeling Clint Smith knows handgun rounds are not all that effective and decided on using ball so as to a) not kid himself by using some guaranteed 'magic' HP stopper b) allow for practice with the very same ammo he uses (try that with DPX ammo) and c) he intends to aim well and not spray-n-pray.

And Clint is not a lousy shot.

Deaf

When I talked to him on the phone five or six years ago he said he carried ball simply to reduce the chances of feeding failures as much as possible.
I didn't ask which one, he didn't say.
Denis

Not to be nit-picky here, but do you have any idea as to what punctuation is? Trying to decipher your tale is hard as hell.

With all due respect to the highly opinionated, there is a very good reason why one might choose the 230gr. FMJ "ball" ammo in .45ACP. If you truly believe that you should practice/train with the same ammo you carry, and if you shoot IDPA matches... train often... practice regularly... you will go through a LOT of ammo and spend lots of $$$.

Buying in bulk, I pay about $359 a case for a thousand rounds of the above mentioned ammo. If I were shooting Speer Gold Dot at about $690 a case, it would cost me $331 more each case. Going through about 4 cases a year, it would cost me an extra $1324 each year to shoot the premium JHP.

Being that I am not independently wealthy, that I am much more accurate with 230gr. PMC Bronze hard ball because it is all I ever practice with, and that I do practice regularly, I am completely confident that my "ball" ammo will find it's mark more quickly and more precisely than anything else I might opt to spurge for.

I wont mind using FMJs. I currently load JHPs staggered with FMJs.

There is a good reason why LAPD and NYPD no longer use ball ammo.

I know of 3 cases personally where 45 JHPs underpenetrated.

Good to know that new loads like DPX and TAC-XP, along with FTX
seem to offer both adequate penetration and reliable expansion in .45 ACP in media testing.

The DPX crowd could probably tell you more about actual shootings.

Other than being expensive (but cost is going down) loads utilizing the
Barnes X bullet have a lot going for them.

who the hell is Clint Smith?

Clint Smith is the owner-director of Thunder Ranch. And if you watch Handguns TV you will notice that lately Clint is carrying and shooting the SA XD Tactical.

Clint Smith may suggest using ball ammo, but on two different trips to Thunder Ranch in Texas, I watched him unload hollowpoint ammo from his 1911 before inserting a mag of ball ammo for his pistol demonstration.

There really isn't any reason to worry about what Smith does or does not carry unless your particular skills, situations, and needs match those of his. Maybe nowadays he does carry ball ammo. Of course where he is located now, he is potentially at greater risk from wildlife than from other people.

Of course, Clint Smith can also be seen to use a coach gun with a flashlight rubberbanded to it.

If Clint Smith told you his EDC was a slingshot and a bag of marbles, would you follow along?

bigfatdave said:

Isn't this silliness already well underway in this thread? :
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=626043

Short answer - No
Long answer - Nooooooooooooooooooooooo

You don't reduce the effectiveness of your defensive tools based on legend and war stories.

Click to expand...

What if your personal experience, with your personal 1911, lead you to believe loading anything but FMJ might produce an FTF at an inopportune time?

I'd sure "limit the effectiveness of my tools."

It's like with .380. Many people would rather have the penetration of ball ammo. It's not necessarily better or worse. In 45ACP, most defensive JHP's barely meet the minimum FBI penetration guidelines. Some don't even get that far.

9mm is different. JHP is definitely better for most defensive uses.

All pistol bullets suck. None of them are adequate. You need to give yourself every possible advantage when you are fighting for your life, even if it is a small advantage. This includes premium JHP ammo.

Click to expand...

10mm creates little nuclear explosions when it hits, haven't you seen the picture?