One of the recent Emails that I received asked me to recommend an off-the-shelf, commercial defensive cartridge for their autoloader.
This wasn't unusual in itself, but my reader was rather demanding. You see, they not only wanted me to tell them which cartridge was the absolute tip top best so far as performance, but it also had to be absolutely no-excuses-accepted reliable as well!
Hmmmm. Tricky, that.
Before I discuss what I said in the reply Email, let me go off on a tangent for a moment. You see, I hate hate hate endorsing a particular product. This isn't because I'm holding out for the big money from the firearms manufacturers, as I don't think any of them realize that I even exist and are not about to make an offer.
Instead, it has been proven time and again to me that one size or solution never fits all. I would be doing my students a grave disservice if I pointed to one specific caliber, firearm manufacturer, or make of handgun and said "THIS is the only thing you need, EVER!" Not only that, but I am very wary of anyone who does so. If they aren't getting paid to push a particular product, then such statements show a brand loyalty that probably blinds them to any faults in their favorites.
Anyway, it does so happen that I could answer the question put to me by my reader.
I've explained in the past that hollowpoints, AKA expanding bullets, increase the effectiveness of every shot that strikes home. This is why I strongly urge my students to use a gun that can reliably use hollowpoint ammunition, since any advantage that you can gain in a life or death struggle should be grabbed with both hands.
The problem is that some autoloader designs are finicky with certain types of hollowpoints, and sometimes individual guns can get balky even though the design is essentially sound. There is really no way to tell of a specific gun is going to start to jam when loaded with a particular hollowpoint unless the owner tries a few hundred rounds out at the range.
But there is one particular brand of hollowpoint that really isn't a hollowpoint!
The ammo firm of CorBon offers a hollowpoint design named Pow'RBall. This is a conventional expanding bullet with a polymer ball stuck on the front. This means that the shape is the same as common ball ammo, which is the most reliably feeding ammo there is. If your gun starts to jam when loaded with this stuff, it will probably jam when loaded with anything.
The problem with Pow'RBall ammo is the expense. It is important that the defensive shooter becomes used to their particular brand of ammo, so they really should go to the range and shoot off at least 100 rounds before they have to rely on the stuff to save lives. Since Pow'RBall ammo costs more than $1.00 USD per cartridge, this makes it too expensive to practice up to a minimum level of proficiency.
Could someone just buy a box of the stuff and load it in their main defensive handgun without practicing?
Well, sure, someone could do that. It would be a really bad idea, though. They wouldn't know what the report, the perceived recoil, or the point of aim would be like for that particular load. All of that would be a surprise the first time they had to draw their gun in the gravest extreme. The one thing no one wants when fighting for their lives is a surprise, let alone a whole string of them.
Could someone just load their own? After all, the Pow'RBall stuff is nothing more than a conventional hollowpoint design with a little plastic ball stuck down in the cavity.
Again, I don't see any reason why something similar couldn't be loaded up on your home reloading press. But I'm not really sure that it would be very practical. The first hurdle would be finding just the right sized plastic balls to stick into the cavity, and a Google search I just ran didn't turn up much by the way of little plastic balls for sale. Not only that, but the balls would have to be crimped in to the hollowpoint pretty solidly to prevent having them work loose in your magazine. It would be ironic to put together some of this type of ammo at home because you are worried about reliable feeding, only to have your gun jam because there are a few little plastic balls rolling around in the action.
If you have your heart set on the Pow'RBall solution, then it looks to me like you are just going to have to resign yourself to paying several hundred dollars a year on practice ammo. But there are other options.
The type of ammo I use for my own defense is Silvertips, which is a design offered by Winchester. I usually urge my students to start with this particular brand as a base for building experience, and then they can experiment with other designs until they find something that fits their own needs.
Keep in mind that Silvertips, which is an older design, is neither as reliable nor as effective as the Pow'RBall. But they feed better than most hollowpoint ammo, they can be found in just about every gun store and shooting range, and they are significantly cheaper than most of the other stuff out there. Just the thing for training a new shooter.
Anyway, that was my reply. Pretty long winded, huh? That means I better stop before this post grows any larger.
Comments (9)
When I get a new auto that might be a defense gun, I shoot a few hundred rounds of different ammo through it, usually including a box of Walmart Hollowpoints. The Walmart hollowpoints are only a few dollars more than ball, and they aren't what I'd carry. If it feeds all of that completely reliably, I run at least 40 of my chosen defense ammo (In my case, usually the Short Barrel version of Gold Dots, since my carry guns all have short barrels)
If a gun is ammo-specific finicky, but feeds some brands without problems, I might try the high-end defense ammo, but I'll need to shoot a bit more of it before I trust the gun. My P3AT fell into this category--It didn't like to extract Remington hollowpoints at all, didn't have problems with anything else.
Posted by sevesteen | May 8, 2008 9:45 PM
Posted on May 8, 2008 21:45
Good points, I agree that reliability is the most important. I am not much of a believer in the magical effects of hollow points though:
Handgun Ballistics
Posted by mostlygenius | May 9, 2008 4:41 AM
Posted on May 9, 2008 04:41
Most military and law enforcement contract acceptance tests are a 5000 rounds endurance on each of a sample of weapons. When I was QA manager for a major US manufacturer producing revolvers for multiple federal agencies, the daily endurance test sample was 3 units selected at random from normal production for EACH ongoing federal contract. If one weapon of three failed during a test, the sample size was doubled, the daily regime repeated and the results pooled. A staff of six test technicians and an engineer worked full time on QA audit shoots conducted under direct supervision of the government's Quality Assurance Representative.
Malfunctions are classified as either CRITICAL, Major or Minor.
CRITICAL defects impact user safety or degrade reliability or function, taking the weapon is out of action, requiring parts replacement, armorer or depot/factory level repairs which cannot be accomplished by at the user level.
Major defects preclude continued firing within one minute after taking immediate action at the user level, but do not require second level maintenance.
Minor defects do not impair safety or seriously impair function, and enable firing to continue after taking immediate action at the user level.
Before I would consider a gun for daily carry I would keep a logbook on it and use it for weekly practice until it had logged 1000 rounds. That could take a month or six weeks.
No Critical or Major category defects are permitted.
Minor category defects require analysis to accurately determine the cause and solution. They may be caused either by ammunition, improper cleaning or lubrication, or by mechanical conditions in the weapon.
Proper ammunition selection in a carry gun is critical. I will tolerate no ammunition which gives ANY failures in a 1000 round sample.
Minor mechanical conditions, tuning and adjustments are often necessary in new weapons. Adjustments in carry guns generally should be done only by a professional gunsmith or factory-trained military or LE armorer.
Follow manufacturer's instructions and agency or unit policy on weapons maintenance.
If your personal handgun of choice isn't durable enough for a 1000-round shakedown, you REALLY should consider something else. You need to know all of its foibles and a few hundred rounds isn't enough to shake out the wrinkles and hiccups.
And what do I most often carry?
Ruger SP-101 2" .38 Special with Crimson Trace lasergrips, loaded with either Winchester X38SPD, Remington R38S12 or Federal 38G.
If I were to carry an autoloader, I agree with Jame's choice of Winchester Silvertip, but would also deem acceptable Remington Golden Sabre or Federal Hydrashock loads in 9mm, .40 S&W or .45 ACP, depending upon operational needs and personal preference.
Posted by ke4sky | May 9, 2008 8:04 AM
Posted on May 9, 2008 08:04
I dislike the PowRball Corbon stuff for a couple of reasons: it rarely shoots with the same POI compared to any cheap practice stuff, since it has very light for caliber bullets driven at high velocities, and it performs abysmally as far as penetration. There's a number of gelatin tests on it floating around on the internet, but to give a specific example: http://www.thegunzone.com/powrball.html
The same general problem happens with the federal EFMJ design, though it has better, though IMHO inadequate penetration numbers.
I'd personally lean towards the more modern design, mainstream loads, like Remington Golden Sabre Bonded, CCI gold dots, Winchester Ranger T, or Federal Bonded/HST. If you keep your eyes open on gunbroker and the various internet ammo sellers you can usually pick up the mainstream loads listed above pretty reasonably priced, around what you'd pay for silvertips at a gunstore.
Nothing against silvertips, but, they're sort of the ballistic technology equivalent of a 1975 Camaro. Sure there's nothing wrong with it, but there's a hell of a lot of advances in the last 30 years that you're missing out on.
Though admittably, I like silver tips in 32ACP since they feed nicely and are available.
Posted by Bob | May 9, 2008 4:49 PM
Posted on May 9, 2008 16:49
One suggestion - Federal makes Expanding Full Metal Jacket in a number of calibers. I've never tried it, and haven't seen enough after-action reports on it to offer an opinion. It's supposed to feed very reliably and expand well, but, again, I don't have any experience or data for it.
Your emailer is requesting a Magic Bullet/Gun Combination which - I'm pretty sure - doesn't exist.
I usually respond to similar questions with "the biggest gun you can comfortably carry, in the most powerful caliber you can control and get good with, and afford to practice a lot with." For handguns I usually recommend a caliber starting with a 4, but someone who is well trained and highly skilled with a .380 and can consistently hit what they aim at, at reasonable self defense distances, quickly while under pressure, is in better self defense shape than someone with the latest Sooper 45 Wiz-Bang loaded with The Latest Hot Ammo, but who practices only once a year.
By "well trained" I mean the full manual of arms - drawing, aligning sights, fire, reload, clear jams, muzzle awareness, finger in register, etc. plus having drilled with fairly realistic shoot/no shoot scenarios under time constraints so they have both speed and a high comfort level with the gun.
Guns are just tools, the real weapon is the one between the ears. Learn to use that one to its fullest, which means training, practice and more practice. That's time and money, which usually gets short shrift when there's a shiny new gun to be had.
Posted by Homer | May 9, 2008 5:30 PM
Posted on May 9, 2008 17:30
I believe homer hit my comment but used different language than I will so I will repeat it. Gun and caliber and ammo are irrelevant if you don't have good shot placement a trained person has a better shot at putting down an attacker with ball .380 than a novice does with .45 PoweRball. Tell him to buy the gun that fits his hand best and find a place where he can practice like mad then practice with the defensive load that he is comforable firing.
Posted by Chris | May 10, 2008 12:47 AM
Posted on May 10, 2008 00:47
Hyrashocks load well in all my Glocks, I've never had a jam with them and I think they're a pretty decent round. The last thing I'm worried about is the ammo in my gun.
Posted by el duderino | May 10, 2008 3:35 AM
Posted on May 10, 2008 03:35
While this is somewhat off topic, may I ask what your experience has been with 22LR ammunition, regarding reliability of the ammo? I have shot as many brands of 22LR I could find over the past decade, and had very few failures to fire. Until recently, that is. One bulk box (550 rounds) of Remington Golden Bullet 22LR exhibited 4 failures to fire within the first 100 rounds tried. As I had two 22LR pistols with me at the range that day, I tried every dud in the 2nd gun, confirming that the bullets were the problem.
This is the worst box of ammo I have ever found. I have never had more than one or two rounds out of a bulk box fail to fire, and those duds show up only every once in a while.
Have I been lucky or is 22LR ammo becoming less well controlled out of the factories?
Posted by Mikee | May 11, 2008 2:10 AM
Posted on May 11, 2008 02:10
el duderino I liked Hydrashocks as well but I have heard a rumor that Federal has decided that they are discontinuing them. I keep checking their website and this hasn't been announced yet and they are still posting them on their defensive ammo page. So I guess keep watching for it and be prepared to find a new round.
Posted by Chris | May 12, 2008 12:45 PM
Posted on May 12, 2008 12:45