Testing my JHP carry ammo.

[WanderingSol07]

I thought I could do a Paul Harrel and test my carry ammo. I went to the range and setup four one gallon milk jugs full of water in a row. I put them on a board at an angle so I could easily shoot through all of them. I taped a terry cloth shop rag folded to get four layers on the first jug.


I setup three of these to test my Fiocchi 115gr, 124gr, and 147gr JHP 9mm ammo in my S&W Shield (3.1" barrel)


Shooting from three yards at all of them the bullet went through all four jugs with the bullet holes all about the same size. Some of the jugs split along a seam too.


I obviously did not get any expansion. Once I replenish my jug collection I'll try again with six or seven. But I'm already disappointed in the ammo hoping it would have gone only through two or three with some expansion.


I finished my range time by shooting the now empty jugs with range ammo, Midwest 115gr. Again I was surprised, shooting from twenty yards I could not knock an empty milk jug over. I was hitting them and putting holes through them, but they did not move. I have one jug with twenty plus holes in it and it never moved while I shot at it.


Has anyone else actually tested their carry gun with JHP ammo? If so, what were your results?

 

[johntheplinker]

Don't be too surprised. Water jugs just don't make a good test. Looks cool as hell but suck for a real test. Also when empty there isn't enough resistance to actually bounce them around much.

Back when I was doing a lot of shooting and testing I made a contraption that I thought made a better test than even ballistic gel. Problem with gel and the like is its one single density throughout, and not varying like a person or animal. Gel is good because it is consistent and thus easy to compare one bullet to another. What I used was a plastic tote, cut a big hole on one side. Over the hole I'd stick some rags or old clothing, then inside would be a piece of inner tube to simulate skin. Up against the rubber would be layers of wet paper, cardboard, magazines, etc to simulate muscle. Then a piece of 1/2" plywood representing bone. Then a empty milk jug in place of lungs. Then repeat the different layers to replicate the other side of what I was shooting. On the far side I'd add in more wet paper to catch the bullet IF it went all the way through. For hunting ammo I'd leave off the cloth but use a little thicker rubber for large game, then increase or decrease the thickness of the layers depending on what I was attempting to represent. And yes, it was a real pain to set up and use as you can imagine.

What did I learn? Most non-bonded bullets will come apart. Most soft point and hollow points will expand. FMJs like to make small holes. Match grade HPs usually expand, or they might act like a FMJ.

 

[JeepHammer]

The 'NON-Official' way we looked into expansion,

A plastic garbage bag in a cardboard box, wet newspapers in the box.
If you want to, an old sweat shirt and/or leather jacket/purse (purses being cheap at the goodwill type stores).

As you shoot a little, some of the water leaks out, and you shoot again, first standing water, then without standing water.

This was back when the gold dot/black talon/XTP/silver tip (I forget the other one) debates raged in every magazine & gun shop...
Wet news print makes a pretty good analog for animal tissue, we even added some cow rib bones and hit them with the three or four most popular calibers of the day.

I was occasionally hunting with a long barrel hand gun back then, XTP was, and still is, my favorite handgun hunting bullet.
I started loading my 9mm pocket carry with black talon, and in .45 acp it was a toss up between XTP & black talon.
My 10mm gets XTP now, but this is a while down the road from black talon.
I have to say, Winchester Silver tips did well in about anything...

There were two or three of the 'X-treme Defense' (gold dot, etc) which didn't do worth a crap.
Didn't even expand when when they hit water or bone, wet news print, etc from pocket gun length barrels.
Never performed as advertised in full size handguns, still not expanding in most cases.

Don't know how they do today, haven't done expansion testing in a long time, but they weren't worth crap back then.

.380ACP, .38 spl/.357, 9mm, .45ACP, .44 Mag if I remember correctly, the .38spl/.357 was both 2" & 4" barrels, the .44 was a little over 7" barrel.
9mm in both (about) 2" and 5" barrels.

I do distinctly remember the 9mm black talon expanded nearly fully out of a 2 shot Derringer, but the firearm was so unsafe it only got fired a couple of times... I don't remember any other 9mm expanding to full size out of short barrels.

 

[openwell]

I reload for every center-fire handgun & rifle I own except 7.62 X 39( cause costs more to reload than it's practical).

however;

for self defense in my semu-auto handguns I stick to factory hp's.

my semi-auto rifles in .223 rem/ .556 nato and .308 win. I
reload using RCBS SMALL BASE DIES.....

Therefore, only range tests I do is on....

can I hit my target, calling the shots.....

AND will my action cycle.....

and if not, I work to fix it.

YMMV

 

[PRasko]

If you're interested there's a youtuber that has ballistic tested hundreds of carry ammo.

Tnoutdoors9 i believe is name is.

 

[rosejm]

If you're interested there's a youtuber that has ballistic tested hundreds of carry ammo.

Lucky Gunner has also done a fair bit of gel testing, w/ well organized results, video and pictures.
https://www.luckygunner.com/labs/
https://www.luckygunner.com/labs/self-defense-ammo-ballistic-tests/

 

[DadSmith]

If a HP does not expand in water i doubt it will expand at all.

 

[Rubix]

I often hear pistol calibers have benefited greatly from modern bullet design, but what is this newfound design and what were the deficiencies of the old design? I mean, it's not rocket science. I reload and would carry them if I had to (had to). I carry factory HPs. With all the reloading I've done there is no amount of marketing that will convince me on not being able to exceed what any manufacturer can put out.

 

[John3354]

I often hear pistol calibers have benefited greatly from modern bullet design, but what is this newfound design and what were the deficiencies of the old design? I mean, it's not rocket science. I

Basically, penetration.

Older designs of hollowpoints were designed to expand as fast as possible to dump all of their energy in to the target as quickly as possible. After the 1986 Dade County shootout the FBI went over the failings of the firearms and ammo that they were using. In the process they realized that what they were using did not penetrate well enough for some applications.

Fast forward to today and after many years of ammunition and projectile development we have 9mm that will penetrate well enough to adhere to FBI ballistics requirements, most of those gains have been made via controlled expansion of the projectile.

 

[jason867]

Your shields short 3" barrel may not produce the necessary velocity for the jhps to reliably expand.

You might be better off with jhp ammo designed for short barrels. Speer makes some short barrel gold dots, and federal makes some short barrel HSTs.

 

[Rubix]

Sounds like all they did was change a radius or two and the volume in the HP cavity.

If 45 was superior to 9 back then... the application of modern bullet technology to all pistol calibers still makes 45 superior to 9 today! Sorry, had to, gotta fan the flames of old debates. Now I'm a sad troll...

 

[jason867]

I believe they also change the powder charge and type, to better suit the short barrels burn time.