Quick question, is there such a thing as Armor piercing 45 ACP?

[SB88LX]

Title pretty much says it all. I was talking to some girl at Friday's a week or so ago, and got around to guns. She said her father had armor piercing 45 ACP ammo, and I didn't have much faith in that claim. Be it, armor has varying definitions, but is there/was there ever any 45 ammo that posed a threat to any level of body armor? Thanks.

 

[TexasRifleman]

Well, there is this crap, but I doubt her dad has any of this laying around.
The rounds on the right in the photo, the THV:


http://www.firearmstactical.com/tacticalbriefs/volume4/number2/article422.htm

More on the THV. This is a video game website, but it has the pictures and concept correct.
I can't imagine anyone having any of the stuff though.

http://matrix.dumpshock.com/raygun/ammo/special/apro.html

 

[Jim Watson]

Quick answer - yes.

There were the Winchester Super-X High Velocity Metal Penetrating with a 230 gr bullet, slightly pointed and with thick jacket on the nose at 945 fps; and the Remington Hi-Way Master Metal Penetrating with 173 grain solid bullet, probably zinc, at 1140 fps.

However, this was in the 1950s and '60s long before soft body armor came out. They were made for car body penetration and I don't know what they would do against Kevlar.

KTW made their infamous green teflon coated pistol AP that penetrated Kevlar easily and got bad laws written.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

Although it does not deform or fragment in soft tissues it does fragment upon striking a hard, solid target.

This would appear to be the opposite of an armor-piercing bullet. (The other bullet mentioned is designed to penetrate soft body armor.)

I did a study on this when I was in the Army and someone proposed using "teflon coated" ammo. The ammo in question (manufactured by KTH) was in fact "armor-piercing" -- designed to penetrate thin, mild steel, like car bodies. The key was the material of the bullet (which varied from tungsten to drill rod) and velocity. The teflon was simply to provide a jacket for the rifling to engage, since the bullet proper was harder than the steel of the barrel.

 

[Jim Watson]

The Teflon coating on a KTW bullet was not thick enough to take the rifling. Tungsten and hardened steel core KTW bullets had copper half jackets, later ones were just monolithic bronze. The Teflon was for lubrication in the bore and in the target. It was claimed to increase penetration by up to 20% in some materials.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

The Teflon coating on a KTW bullet was not thick enough to take the rifling. Tungsten and hardened steel core KTW bullets had copper half jackets, later ones were just monolithic bronze. The Teflon was for lubrication in the bore and in the target. It was claimed to increase penetration by up to 20% in some materials.

It certainly did not increase penetration in soft body armor -- the first thing I did was get copies of both the Justice and Treasury Department tests.

 

[horge]

 

[Steelcore]

Peters had their Hiway Master amor peircing ammo.But that was 50 yrs ago.

 

[TexasRifleman]

This would appear to be the opposite of an armor-piercing bullet. (The other bullet mentioned is designed to penetrate soft body armor.)

Yeah, as I mentioned, I wasn't talking about the round being advertised, it just had a nice picture of the THV on that web page....

 

[Double Naught Spy]

Just something to keep in mind for this discussion. There are 2 types of AP ammo. The first type is the legal definition that classifies AP ammo on the basis of it composition. Here is a good link describing this...

http://yarchive.net/gun/politics/armorpiercing.html

The second type of AP ammo is ammo that is not made with the compositions noted in the legal definition, yet still manage to penetrate armor.

Also keep in mind that when folks talk about armor, there are two categories of armor, soft and hard as pertains to armor worn on the body.

Soft armor includes materials such as kevlar. There are different levels of kevlar armor ranging from I-IIIA. IIIA is the highest rated soft armor and it will stop the most types of rounds of soft armor. Each level represents the ability to stop certain types of ammo plus will stop anything also stopped by lower rated kevlar levels.

Hard armor is just that, hard. It may be made from ceramic, steel or other hard material. There are two levels, III (high power rifle) and IV (armor piercing rifle).

While ballistic vests are rated by the ability to stop various projectiles, AP ammo is not rated in regard to what type of armor (composition, thickness, hardness) it can penetrate.
.
In regard to SB88LX's female's story about her father having .45 acp AP ammo, keep in mind that a lot of ignorant gun and ammo folks think that hollowpoint ammo is made to penetrate soft armor. I can recall seeing an episode on Cops where a gun was arrested and a pistol taken from him. The New Jersey officer dropped the mag and looked at the ammo. It was hollowpoint ammo and he said it was designed to go through police vests and was a cop-killer ammo.

In reality, hollowpoint pistol ammo is less likely to penetrate soft armor than regular ball ammo. This is because on strking the soft armor, the sides of the hollowpoint collapse, pancaking, there my reducing the size of the hollow and making the bullet much wider. This all takes place on the exterior of the vest, with little or no penetration of the kevlar.

 

[SB88LX]

She said she had seen him "shoot it at a vest and it went through." Apparently he was a reloader. I may have been wrong to dismiss her claims, but it just didn't seem believable at the time (I didnt know of anything on the market with those capabilities).

 

[clone]

this is mean stuff as well.

http://www.packing.org/oldnews/article/?article=6005

http://www.aguilaammo.com/iq2.htm

 

[Joejojoba111]

That stuff sounds like Fun! Aguila site I can't find a price for .45s.

 

[Kurush]

Here's a review of the Aguila IQ (this was written before they named it "IQ", same stuff though)

http://www.firearmstactical.com/tacticalbriefs/volume3/number2/article2.htm

Cast aluminum??

 

[BluesBear]

Has anyone here, except me, ever seen much less fired any KTW ammunition?

As department armorer it was my responsibility to wade through all of the red tape to order some for my departmrnt way back in 1980!
The stuff was dang near impossible to acquire even then.


I'm going to have to agree with Vern here.

NOWHERE in any of the KTW literature did they ever say that the teflon was on the bullet for any reason except to help protect (not totally protect) the bore of the firarm it was used in AND for easy identification. As I recall they expressly stated, more than once, that it did nothing to assist penetration.

Since recovery of fired bullets showed the coating had been cut through by the rifling and since the mint green teflon coating used by KTW could be easily scraped away with a pocket knife, exposing the copper jacket, I feel the "for easy identification" was actually the greatest reason it was used.

 

[LAR-15]

When you mean armor piercing are you talking body armor or cars, tanks, trucks ect?

 

[BluesBear]

As I recall the old Winchester-Western and Remington-Peters ammunition was correctly labeled and advertised as "Metal Piercing" ammunition.

Armor-Piercing has, for the most part, been military nomenclature.

 

[Moonclip]

I don't think as BB mentioned that teflon helps really in AP capabilities. I have heard in rap songs and seen mentioned in the movie Ronin about just spraying an ordinary bullet with teflon thus making it AP and that always made me laugh.

Anyone remember French THV AP ammo let alone KTW? I've only ever seen it in books, especially as when AP handgun ammo was pretty much banned in the mid 1980's as I recall I was still a child.

My 7.62x25 and 30 carbine handguns fulfill my purposes of an AP handgun anyways so the lack of KTW or THV ammo does not bug me much.

 

[Kurush]

Here's an article about THV:
http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/THV.htm

I don't know how plastiline (some kind of clay) compares to gel, but 4-5.5 inches penetration is useless.

 

[grendelbane]

I remember both THV and Arcane from back in the 80s, though I did not see any in person, just in the pages of American Handgunner.

If my memory is not playing tricks on me, Midway used to sell the old .38/.357 metal piercing bullets in bulk.

There was also a lot of Czech surplus 9mm on the market at that time that had a steel core.

Times have changed.

 

[TrapperReady]

When you mean armor piercing are you talking body armor or cars, tanks, trucks ect?

[bradycampaign]
All of the above! I mean, .45 caliber is almost as big as .50 caliber, and that's enough to sink the largest main battleships and rip planets from their orbits.
[/bradycampaign]

 

[Trisha]

Isn't that the ammo made with the Unobtanium bullets?

 

[BluesBear]

4-5.5 inches penetration is useless

Well those Claymation® bagguys aren't as big as they appear in the movies.
Most are only about 12" tall.
So 4" would be more than enough.

 

[AndyC]

When living in South Africa, I bought a large number of SA-made THV bullets for handloading in 9mmP and .357 Mag (don't recall any .45ACP).

The bullets were made of turned brass and extremely lightweight (around 25 grains, IIRC) - so much so that we had to use the fastest-burning shotgun-propellant (MS200) available and not only fill the case to the brim, but also fill the hollow bullet with propellant, cover the base with tissue-paper to hold the charge in place when inserting the bullet into the case for seating and crimping.

Velocity in 9mmP was chrony'd to over 2,300 fps and while I don't recall the 357-velocities, the concussion and muzzleblast were extremely impressive. Performance on mild-steel plate was excellent, both 9mm and 357 making Swiss cheese out of 3mm steel. We tried wetpack (wet phonebooks) which resulted in a massive surface "wound" but not much penetration.

This led us to conclude, in the absence of any testing on actual body-armour, that it wouldn't penetrate kevlar or spectrashield due to little mass, but it may very well shatter a ceramic plate - albeit not being able to penetrate the layered fibre underneath. We had fun with THVs but decided not to carry the stuff - YMMV

 

[Quaamik]

If her dad is a reloader, he might well have been able to load somethign that would go through a soft body armor vest.

The idea is possible. I can think of three possible ways:

A saboted round. .45 caliber sabots are availabe for muzzeloaders, and if they aren't the correct diameter, a competent machinist could make something work from nylon rod. Couple it with a machined bronze "bullet" .30 cal or smaller and you might get enough velocity (.45 has a similar case capacity to .30 carbine).

A lightweight full diameter bullet. Possibly machined from bronze or soft steel (the last would be murder on the bore).

An extreemly lightweight HP, with a machined steel cor inserted. Alternately a lead "jacket" could be cast around a steel insert.

I'm pretty sure that all of the above would be illegal. But you asked if it was possible, not legal.................