New ammunition developments provide more effective loads
by R.K. Campbell
Contributing Editor
Today shooters are able to pick and choose the load they wish to deploy in their handgun. Reliability and accuracy potential are better than ever and so is versatility. In my favorite .45 ACP handguns, I may use the Black Hills +P JHP when roaming the woods. I may use the CorBon PowRBall in my old Commander that otherwise would not feed expanding ammunition. We may spend too much time on load selection. I believe caliber and reliability are more important. Much of what has been written concerning handgun effectiveness has been called stopping power. The proper term is wound potential, or the ability of a cartridge to do damage and produce a permanent wound.
Cartridge Integrity
When the Ohio State Patrol conducted a handgun test they covered every base. The primary goal was to choose a reliable handgun. During the test, 228,000 rounds of Winchester and Speer ammunition were fired without a single malfunction directly related to the ammunition used. The FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team pistol fired 20,000 rounds of Remington Golden Saber without a single failure to feed, chamber, fire or eject. Winchester’s new Bonded Core load, the latest choice of the FBI, also underwent rigorous testing. These service loads are the most proven reliable on the planet.
Conversely some of the loads commonly recommended by writers do not incorporate case mouth seal or primer seal. I think that this is a basic requirement of a service load. Cartridge integrity is perhaps a million times more important than a perceived difference in terminal ballistics. You do not have to perform a 20,000 round test program. But if you wish to use a loading not qualified by extensive police or government testing, then you must perform your own test. It is fairly simple to do so. I begin by dropping a single round of the cartridge to be tested in a cup of oil, another in solvent, and water respectively. I let the cartridges soak overnight. I wipe them off carefully. If they fail to fire during a range test, then we proceed no further. In my experience when the cartridge fails it is not the primer that fails but rather the powder. Poor primer seal might allow a primer to be contaminated, but in my personal test program this seldom occurs. Powder contamination, with the primer firing but the powder failing to ignite, is more common.
Case mouth seal is the culprit that allows moisture into the powder. I have fired many thousands of rounds over the past 45 years of shooting and see the occasional dud round and even a bullet or two loaded upside down from the Big Three. But, by occasional I mean five or six tops in all of this time! Statistically if a load fails in your overnight quality control test it is poor indeed.
The second test is conducted with rounds that have passed the first test. I take a magazine and load a single round. I allow the slide to run forward and load the round. I remove the cartridge from the chamber and repeat nine times. The bullet should not be pressed into the cartridge case. If it is pressed into the case, something is wrong with the case mouth seal or crimp or both. If the bullet is pressed into the case, pressure skyrockets. Firing characteristics change. And a bullet that has receded in the case has broken the primer seal. Moisture will find its way into the case.
Reliability and Caliber
The National Institute of Justice calls for 300 rounds between cleaning and lubrication without malfunctions in a service pistol. This seems remarkably low to the author but 300 rounds is a starting point. No failures to feed, chamber, fire or eject in 300 rounds is a limited but reasonable test of feed reliability.
Big bullets do more damage by creating more damage in the target and letting out more blood. The body is a pressurized system very good at self-sealing up to a point. I have not shot goats in controlled conditions and I doubt anyone else has but I do know that the only reliable mechanism of collapse is actual damage. Neural shock and a temporary cavity do not qualify for discussion. Men are about the size of a large deer and about as tenacious to life but much more susceptible to shock. Historical research must also be taken into account. Quite a few decorations issued during the World Wars and other battles revolved around pistol work. The Congressional Medal of Honor and other decorations are not given lightly. I have studied reports, including those by physicians from the Philippine Moro campaign. My research is not perfect but clearly shows that calibers such as the .38 Special and 9mm Luger are less than half as effective as the .45 ACP, when used with non-expanding ammunition.
Among the few studies I lend credence to is the Police Marksman’s Association test of nearly 20 years ago. This test gave the .38 and 9mm with ball ammunition a rating of 25%, or one in four stops with a single shot. I do not like to use statistics but rather rely upon laboratory test data and historical documents. Many years ago in the pages of his column at Guns and Ammo, the late Col. Jeff Cooper noted that statistics are used by rascals to impress fools.
All of this rating nonsense does not take into account differences in the point of impact and the subject’s level of intoxication. Street drugs most often have a basis in pharmaceuticals originally intended as painkillers. Some of these felons feel no pain. Only actual damage will stop such an assailant. A hit to the arterial region or the cranial-ocular region is the only sure stop.
Accuracy
Accuracy may make up for power. The reverse is seldom true. The key to stopping an assailant is shot placement. Not long ago a self appointed expert remarked in print that load selection is more important than marksmanship because we can control load selection but not shot placement. This flew in the face of decades of police marksmanship training. I see a novice taking this advice and loading +P ammunition in a lightweight handgun he has not mastered. Such an opinion as fostered by the writer in question would have been ridiculed at any rookie training class. I suppose all would be carrying .44 Magnum handguns! Combat accuracy is often minute of Mackinaw but accurate fire is possible. It happens all of the time. Surviving the tyranny of the moment isn’t easy and good training is essential. A typical .125-inch-wide front post covers about 1.5 inch of the target at 30 feet. Put that post on the target and press the trigger. Do not aim for an area but aim for the place on the target that will do the most good.
Penetration
Penetration is the single most important characteristic of a defense load. A small caliber with adequate penetration may get the job done if delivered correctly. A lack of penetration may be deadly. Twenty-five years ago I witnessed a dramatic under penetration of what was then the darling of the popular press, a 200-grain .45 ACP JHP. The bullet expanded to perhaps 1.00 inch but penetrated less than three inches in the bone and muscle of a heavy shoulder. The second shot did the business, but this is not something you wish to see over your own sights. A felon who is heavily clad in winter clothing or, as is often the case, firing from a vehicle would present a considerable obstacle to many high velocity expanding bullet loads. The old FBI stance that incorporated the weak-side arm over the heart while the strong side held the handgun made a lot of sense in the day when officers faced .32s and .38s for the most part. (Sophisticated thugs sought out Lugers and P-38s.) Modern 9mm and .40 caliber handguns have plenty of penetration with the right load.
If the felon has his arms outstretched firing at you, your bullet may have to penetrate heavy arm bone to reach the vitals. The felon probably will not be squared to you as he is on the range. You will not be facing a 6-foot 190-pound man as represented by the B 27. You may be facing a member of our protein-fed ex-con criminal class who has spent the past five to seven years pumping up his 325 pound frame at taxpayer expense. Or you may face an emaciated junkie who weighs 130 pounds sopping wet. The former represents a challenge in penetration to any handgun load and the latter doesn’t have enough meat to produce expansion. Somehow, the carefully formulated gelatin begins to look to me like a useful means of comparison of loads but not an indicator of expansion and penetration in a living body.
Choosing a load
Once you have qualified reliability in the chosen handgun and cartridge integrity, you will progress to choosing a load based on ballistic efficiency. The load should be controllable in the handgun. If you are not able to control the gun and load combination you may need another load or even another caliber. Next you wish to consider the balance of expansion and penetration. Expansion is unpredictable with forensic experts often noting that expansion of hollowpoint bullets occurs in perhaps half of all cases. Still, an expanding bullet is important to limit ricochet and over-expansion. Ideal expansion occurs when the bullet expands to 1.5 times the original diameter. This means .54 for the 9mm, .60 for the .40 and .67 for the .45. This doesn’t make a 9mm a .45 as the .45 runs .45 inch throughout the wound channel whether or not expansion is instigated. But these levels of expansion are ideal when calculated to penetrate a minimum of 12 inches of ballistic gelatin. A bullet that strikes bone may expand much more, but on the other hand the bone may clip the bullet nose shut, and the bullet will not expand at all.
There are seldom enough shootings of any one bullet to form a valid opinion but there are standouts. I don’t think anyone benefits from counsel telling them everything is lovely with their choice. This simply isn’t the case. Cartridge selection is critical. Choose a caliber of at least .40 and make certain the loading you have chosen has good integrity. Use the most powerful handgun you are able to control well and demand your personal best.
New developments
Among the outstanding developments I have tested is the new 185-grain +P load from Black Hills Ammunition using the Barnes TAC-XP all copper bullet. The TAC XP is fast enough due to its light weight but the construction allows the bullet to penetrate deeply enough to produce penetration in the ideal range. This is an outstanding load.
CorBon’s PowRBall is a wide-mouthed hollowpoint with a polymer ball in the bullet cavity. This polymer ball allows perfect feeding. When the bullet strikes the target, the ball is compressed and aids in bullet expansion. This load will feed in older GI guns that do not feed wide-mouth hollowpoints. Modern off-brand pistols are often less reliable than a Colt or Kimber and the PowRBall gets the job done.
When it comes to handgun load selection, there are many choices. Choose a load that is proven reliable in your own test program and practice diligently. You have better choices than ever.
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