When dealing with small calibers like the 25acp, 32acp, and 380acp; don't do the FMJ & JHP alternating stuff in the magazine. Matter of fact, I won't do that with any caliber. But ESPECIALLY with the small calibers. If you don't know what I'm suggesting, look up the term "RIMLOCK". And if you really want to see HOW it could happen, get yourself a box of American 32acp ammo such as lawman, winchester, etc... Then also get a box of fiocchi. Look at the rims. They almost don't even look like the same caliber. Definitely different shell manufacturing. But with the smaller calibers, like the 32acp, shoot all the same manufactured ammo. Your ammo won't nose dive, it won't rimlock, and you won't have other feeding problems.
Now; having said that, there is nothing wrong if the first round in the magazine is say a JHP and the REST in the magazine are a different type or brand, like a FMJ. Because the first round will be manually chambered. The rest are the same as each other, so it will be fine.
A couple of things regarding rimlock that haven't been mentioned - Most semi-auto cartridge cases are rimless so rim-lock is usually not a problem. The 32 ACP case is
SEMI-rimless and it is these small
SEMI-rims that cause the problem. The rim of the second cartridge from the top of the stack gets lodged in front of the rim of the top cartridge preventing the top round from sliding forward into the chamber when it should.
Two other factors in rim-lock are the OAL (over-all-length) of the cartridge and the FTB (front-to-back) length of the magazine. For some reason 32 ACP cartridges loaded with JHP bullets tend to be shorter than those loaded with FMJ bullets. If a magazine is designed to use only JHP cartridges, it can have a short FTB length and the likelyhood of rimlock is minimized or eliminated, but FMJ cartidges won't fit in these mags.
Kel Tec 32 ACP mags, for example, are designed to accept either JHP or FMJ cartidges so they tend to be longer front-to back. Using JHP ammo (either exclusively or mixed with FMJ) in these longer magazines makes rim-lock more likely unless the magazine is fitted with a spacer to shorten the FTB length or only the top round is JHP.
I've been in gunshops with otherwise knowledgeable personnel and asked if they were aware of rim-lock and most never heard of it. I borrowed a KT P-32 mag and a few rounds of JHP and manually induced rim-lock by usng a small screwdriver to push the second round forward in the mag and leaving the top round further back. I then gave the "experts" the rim-locked mag and asked them to chamber a round or simulate chambering it by sliding the top round forward. Their mouths dropped open with instant belief.
The solution to what otherwise could be a fatal malfunction is to use only FMJ or other cartridges that are too long to rim-lock or to use some type of spacer that slides down behind the shorter rounds to prevent some getting their rims in front of the top round or to use JHP in only the top round of the mag and FMJ in the rest.
If you study the data at the Goldenloki site I referenced in an earlier post, you'll see that in his tests most 32 ACP JHP rounds either did not expand reliably or if they did expand, they did not penetrate as well as FMJ. You might reach the conclusion that using only the better penetrating FMJ rounds is preferrable to using JHP rounds that perform poorly and can rim-lock.
*** I also would like to note that I did not personally come to all these conclusions. It was a group effort of members of the original KTOG forum (that's been around for more than 10 years) now found on Yahoo Groups
http://sports.groups.yahoo.com/group/ktog/
