LimaCharlie
Member.
All of the new and improved bullets today may work 5% better than the lead bullets I was shooting in the 1950s.
I start reading about hollow point ballistics and I know I'm not going to spend the $$ on finding out if it runs reliably for 100s of rounds, so - I just carry the ball ammo I practice with, cuase it has been tested. In a revolver I'll carry hollow point self defense ammo, but for me in a semi, I just carry ball. It will penetrate more and not expand, but sometimes you actually want more penetration and you do need to penetrate more than expand, so - ammo is all different and different types have strenths and weaknesses, so - since I know ball will cycle and go bang, I just pick penetration over expansion and roll with it.
1. The difference between bullet types isn't as dramatic as most people think it is.
This for me as well. Lab testing is well and good, but I prefer to rely on cumulative actual shooting data. There's no guarantees, and all shootings are individual events, but if a round is widely used in law enforcement, I think that's the best testimony for it as if there were consistent failures to perform possibly attributable to ammo selection, the thousands of departments across the country would reasonably start gravitating towards the consistent performers in their collective experience. Plus, obviously, this ammo gets cheaper because it's available in LE boxes (Ranger, Gold Dot, HST) of 50 rather than boutique boxes of 20.2 things for me I’d be waiting for
1) real world use data, likely from LEO. I’m not interested in videos of deer or whatever allegedly shot by the folks trying to sell the new thing
2) projectile prices being reasonable to developing practice loads (or, heck practice ammo) that have similar shooting to the often lighter defensive load.
Until then I’ll stick with what’s been tried and true, and also affordable.
Do you know if anyone/any agency has done such a thing?
Probably not since Thompson and Lagarde
On a semi-jacketed HP (exposed lead), I take a razorknife and put 4-6 "slices" in the lead in order to speed the "mushrooming".
Im very very skeptical of these rounds. I dont believe the fluting is going to destroy tissue outside of the crush cavity. At least not in duty caliber handguns. You start launching these things out of a magnum, we probably have a different story.
JTHUNTER,There is a little trick I have done to the HP ammo in my various handguns. On a semi-jacketed HP (exposed lead), I take a razorknife and put 4-6 "slices" in the lead in order to speed the "mushrooming". On jacketed HPs, I take that same knife and lightly groove the already existing grooves, again to make it easier for the bullet to mushroom. If I need penetration, the third round is a FMJ.
JTHUNTER,
HAVE YOU ACTUALLY TESTED YOU KNIFE CUT AMMO?
If you select a premium round like FEDERAL HST, REMINGTON Golden Sabre, SPEER Gold Dot or WINCHESTERA PDX,
Ya know. That might actually be legit. The .460, .475 and .500 weren’t around then.Next up - bear load threads from the 90s.
Not necessarily a good metric. On April 11th, 1986, while agencies around the country were carrying various semi-autos chambered in 9mm and .45, revolvers in .357 Mag (actually loaded with .357 Magnum ammo) the FBI was carrying revolvers loaded with .38 Spl.Research what the FBI carries,