MrBigStuff
Member
I was bored the other day and did some experimenting with a .25 Beretta Jetfire and a Kel-Tec .380. .25 vs .380 from similar barrel length--almost no difference in power in my book. Used Speer GD's, Winchester FMJ's, PMC FMJ's, and Hornady XJP's. Shot into 1 1/2 inches of wood ( whatever wood is used as support beams for your average house) covered by a 2 layers of denim and fired through a pillow (to reduce the sound). A large History book was used as a backstop.
***All aforementioned FMJ's ( from both guns 3 of each type) penetrated into the book slightly beyond the cover. The .380's marginally deeper ( very marginally).
*** The Hornady's ( 3 from each gun) didn't make it out of the wood, but when I broke the board to recover the bullets, I found that they had expanded big time. The .380's expanded slightly more but the bullet trajectory ( the path of which the bullet went when inside the wood) was on par with the .25
*** The Speer's offer much less expansion across the board. None of the .380's penetrated out of the wood and the expansion was almost non-existant. All .380's bullet path's inside the wood were eradic ( probably a good thing if used for defense). One .25 penetrated through the wood and embedded itself ito the backstop's cover. The 2 other .25's acted as FMJ's and came very close to exiting the wood ( if fact they both broke through the back of the wood and were visable).
Not the most scientific study, but if a .25 and .380 are the same size and their performance is nearly equal ( especially penetration wise), why not chose a gun that holds 9 rounds as opposed to seven?
***All aforementioned FMJ's ( from both guns 3 of each type) penetrated into the book slightly beyond the cover. The .380's marginally deeper ( very marginally).
*** The Hornady's ( 3 from each gun) didn't make it out of the wood, but when I broke the board to recover the bullets, I found that they had expanded big time. The .380's expanded slightly more but the bullet trajectory ( the path of which the bullet went when inside the wood) was on par with the .25
*** The Speer's offer much less expansion across the board. None of the .380's penetrated out of the wood and the expansion was almost non-existant. All .380's bullet path's inside the wood were eradic ( probably a good thing if used for defense). One .25 penetrated through the wood and embedded itself ito the backstop's cover. The 2 other .25's acted as FMJ's and came very close to exiting the wood ( if fact they both broke through the back of the wood and were visable).
Not the most scientific study, but if a .25 and .380 are the same size and their performance is nearly equal ( especially penetration wise), why not chose a gun that holds 9 rounds as opposed to seven?