.357 SIG

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Dc9Loser

Moderator
OK, I've been reading up a storm on the best instant incapacitating pistol round. You read about temporary wound cavity, penetration, expansion, hydrostatic shock, and data gleened from real world shootings .... etc ...Blah blah blah. I am no expert but:

The conclusion I've come to is:

.44 mag, .41 mag, and 10 mm have lots of energy but seem to have a tendency to penetrate all the way through a body and so not all the energy transfer is absorbed by the target.

Bigger calibers than the above are not reasonable to actually be carrying when you happen to wander into a fight. And come-on there are 4 pound AR-15 Pistols that are just as easy to CC as some of the .50 pistols. A rifle is a better option compared to any of the mine-is-bigger calibers.

9 mm with the right rounds is OK. With bad rounds not so much.

.380 is kinda of a joke. There are rounds out there that might cause damage, maybe.

I have a friend who was shot point blank the other day. He was not knocked down. He recovered after a short hospital stay. I saw a COPS episode where a guy took a .380 in the stomach - he is walking around and talking normally, kinda like he just got up from tripping on the curb.

.38 special was the standard police round forever and has a terrible record.

.40 S&W is a good round but:

.357 mag with 125 grain JHP's is kinda of a golden standard in real gunfights for one shot knockdown power. This is documented in numerous police shootings over the last 70 odd years.

.357 SIG has basically the same ballistics in 125 grain loading .357 mag in a standard loading. It has been adopted by the Secret Service and by Federal Air Marshals because they need an instant incapacitating round.

100% of the shootings by the Virgina State Police since adopting .357 SIG have been one shot man down and done.

The .357 SIG square combustion chamber leads to very consistent ignition (kinda like in 6mm PPC and other rifle target rounds) and hence is very accurate.

.357 SIG has from 500 to 600 ft/lbs of energy.

.357 SIG is hence the best round going for a self-defense caliber.

Why am I wrong?
 
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Muzzle engergy and velocity doesn't incapacitate bad guys; putting holes where they weren't intended to be does.

The 125gr SJHP .357 Mag wasn't introduced until the late seventies, and doesn't get 96% one-shot stops as some fictional book writers would lead you to believe.

Having said that, i have a Glock 22 with .357 Sig drop-in barrel that suits my needs very well. Accuracy, excellent terminal ballistics, flat trajectory when needed, functional reliability - the .357 Sig has a lot of positive attributes going for it
 
I think the .357 Sig is a fine self-defense caliber, probably one of the better ones. But in your post, you sort of glossed over the .40 S&W and failed to address the .45 ACP at all. The .45 is bigger than the .41, .44 and 10 mm, but there are plenty of suitable carry pistols chambered in .45 ACP.
 
What about hydrostatic shock?

Seems I always hear about wound cavities and actual damage to vital organs or the nerve system as means of an instant incapacitation.

That ignores the shockwave damage which a high velocity round seems to be able to transmit to the body. You can witness this in ballistic gel tests where the penetration might not be much more than a standard 9 mm but the entire gel blocks is shaking with energy after a hit.

The only automatic pistol rounds in common use that can do this are the .357 SIG and 10mm.

Do you not think that the energy shockwave might have a strong effect in knocking someone down, if for no other reason than they really know they took a hit?

I did ignore .45 ACP, sorry. It is big and slow and achieves its effect by making a big deep hole. If you don't hit something vital I do believe it will not always work, and in real shootings this is about what happens. .40 is a great round but I'm saying the 9mm slug from the SIG traveling at a higher energy does the job better from the same case.
 
DC9 - please read THIS link

Hydrostatic shock is generally reserved for high-velocity rifle rounds above 2,000 FPS. Temporary and permanent cavities are also part of the equation.
Only rifles have the ability to effectively displace tissue in the temporary stretch cavity to cause damage. Handguns soley rely on permanent stretch cavity - the bigger the hole the better off you are

The .357 Sig doesn't quite have high enough velocity to displace tissue in the temporary cavity.

Do not rely on some unproven force like "ballistic pressure wave" or hydrostatic shock to incapacitate the bad guy. As i said before, putting holes where they weren't intended to be does.


To quote Dr. Vincent DiMaio, "stopping power= where you hit the bad guy, how many times you can hit them"

Please view the link i posted above
 
Duncan McPherson, his book "Bullet Penetration: Modeling the Dynamics and the Incapacitation Resulting from Wound Trauma" - look on Amazon.com

Avoid the Evan Marshall/Ed Sanow "Stopping Power" books because they're fiction..
 
I will buy and read it.

Yeah, I bought a Glock 33 last week to replace my Kahr CW-9 for CCW.

Came close to buying a Glock 30 (45 ACP) but I thought the 33 in .357 SIG would be better for when I am hiking in the woods, and it is smaller.

Just want started this thread to get a read on whether SIG was the right decision. I listed my research above.

I will read some more.
 
What about hydrostatic shock?

Seems I always hear about wound cavities and actual damage to vital organs or the nerve system as means of an instant incapacitation.

That ignores the shockwave damage which a high velocity round seems to be able to transmit to the body. You can witness this in ballistic gel tests where the penetration might not be much more than a standard 9 mm but the entire gel blocks is shaking with energy after a hit.

The only automatic pistol rounds in common use that can do this are the .357 SIG and 10mm.
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Sorry for the long winded reply...:o


Hydrostatic shock that incapacitates is a real phenomenon, but you need to have at a MINIMUM somewhere between 1500 and 2000 ft-lb of force striking the body to start to get it. Unless you chamber something like a 30-06 or .308 into a pistol, you can't get it. Not even with full power 10mm or .357mag. Even when fired from a rifle, a .30-06 does not incapacitate only with hydrostatic shock, tissue damage and blood loss are still needed.

You also posted that the bigger magnums have more likely pass through hits which transfers less energy to the target. That is correct, but mostly meaningless (IMHO). The ability to incapacitate the target with a handgun is from blood loss and tissue damage not from energy transfer. The distance traveled AFTER expansion is where a majority of the tissue damage and bleeding occurs. Plus 2 holes will bleed more than 1 hole. If incapacitation was from energy transfer, the shooter would also be damaged from the "equal and opposite" reaction. Even a high powered rifle has less energy than a hard punch. The bullet exiting the body is not wanted, not because it is less incapacitating, but because it is more dangerous to unintentional targets down range.

But in the real world all of it is bunk for the most part anyway. A decent caliber bullet (normally defined as 9mm or .40s&w minimum) when placed COM will incapacitate adequately in all but the most aggressive of attackers. Adding a follow up shot or 2 right next to it will quiet the rest. There is no 100% single shot, drop them in their tracks magic bullet or caliber that I know of. (although a 3" 12ga 1oz slug comes close - but I wouldn't want to fire them from a pistol!)

The .357sig is a fine round, if you want to shoot it get one. But, you still have to put them where they can do the most good.
 
I was pretty enamored with the 357SIG for awhile after I bought my first one a number of years back. These days, while I still have one (Glock 31), I've returned to 9mm in its hotter loadings to fulfill that need, as +P+ 9mm is basically the equivalent of 357SIG in its base loading.

The 9mm is just cheaper to practice with, cheaper to buy ammo and reload for, and in the case of the Glock, doesnt beat up the gun like the 357SIG has been doing to mine.

As a side note to the beating up part, Lone Wolf offers $100 drop in 9mm barrels for the .40/357SIG that work well and allow for cheaper, less abusive practice, if that interests you. All you need other wise, are a couple of 9mm mags.

Caliber seems to always be such a debate, and I know I've been caught up in them myself, but these days, I really dont think they are all that far apart, and all things a being pretty close to equal, if the gun is easier to shoot well with, and carries more ammo, I see that as being a better thing and the one I'm going for.
 
It has been adopted by the Secret Service and by Federal Air Marshals because they need an instant incapacitating round.
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This is simply not true in it's overall meaning. Yes, they need that, but ALL law enforcement agencies need an instant incapacitating round; the Secret Service and Air Marshalls need a cartridge that will incapacitate with minimum over-penetration.

The Secret Service oft-times protects people in the middle of a lot of other people. Hitting an exact target, with the least chance of over-penetration is mandatory for the conditions they may be required to shoot under.

The same holds true with Air Marshalls. Over-penetration in a plane, especially one full of people simply isn't an option.

Which makes the .357 Sig a great choice when it's loaded with the right ammo.

The .357 Sig is a great cartridge, and it's gaining in popularity among various law enforcement agencies. Even so, the .40 is still being used by far more agencies than the .357 Sig is. That doesn't make either one better than the other, BTW; all it means is that certain cartridges are prefered over others for the various law enforcement applications they're used for.

Pick what works for you. It doesn't have to be better than anyone else's choice, as long as it's the right one for you.

Daryl
 
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I have an XD .357 and it's usually the biggest boom for a semi-auto at my local range. It puts out a wicked blue flash.

As far as knock down and energy, the .357 is able to penetrate car doors, and has the energy to stop an attacker. It comes in second for semi-auto in knockdown power. 10mm is first with the exception of desert eagle rounds.

I can put a 3 inch group at 15 yards with my .357 and I have loaded Hornady 115 and 124 grain XTP's.

I am fond of the 115gr, because it's less recoil while still being more powerful than a .45
 
Dc9Loser, the .357 Sig is a good round - proven in our tests to have plenty of velocity, and shown to have good penetration of barriers. I carry one (Steyr M357) fairly often, and trust it to do its job.

But I also trust a .45. Or a .38 J-frame. Or a 9mm. Any of those are reasonable self-defense cartridges, and I carry one or another pretty much without worry about the preference - it just depends on how I am dressing and whether I think I need to have more or fewer rounds available.

Mostly, it's a matter of preference when it comes to handguns. None of them are rifles. None of them are shotguns. None of them are Claymores. They're handguns - a trade off between size and power that only the carrier can make.

The critical thing is to chose what you shoot well, and practice with it. Then carry it. Or practice with what you *will* carry.

Jim
 
Good info all.

I have not yet shot my Glock 33, bought it last Friday, just got some ammo in the mail.

I will give it a try and compare the handling to my Kahr 9mm, Taurus .40, S&W J model, and Glock 17. I have a few boxes of ammo for each laying around.

I've heard that the recoil is worse and better than the .40. I guess I will find out.

I still think the .357 SIG rocks but only in theory so far.

Earlier this year I shot a 106 lb wild hog. I hit him on the run from 50 yards with a .308 rifle shooting 168 gr federal match ammo. Entrance hole was about two inches and the exit was about 6 or 7 inches with a big piece of lung and other tissue hanging out.

In spite of that hit where his blood was gushing out like a firehose leaving a solid red stripe on the forest floor - he still ran 70 yards - before running out of blood and keeling over.

So maybe ya all are right about the lack of hydrostatic shock.
 
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Dc9Loser:
All the calibers you listed are HANDGUNS, so they are ALL "kinda of a joke."
My rule of thumb for handguns is this: Carry the most powerful, (i.e., the largest bullet traveling the fastest), caliber you can use well, and practice like hell. A hit with a .380 beats hell out a miss with a 10mm. (What a cliche!)
I like the .40 S&W for an all around cartridge, but guys at my range regularly out shoot me with their 9mms, so I'm thinking about switching.
The "practice like hell" part means you have to reload, and that means commonly used calibers like 9mm and .40, not .357 Sig.
However, I do reload ALL the .41 magnums I shoot, and .41 are not that easy to get.
Say... I might have to start checking out the availability of .357 Sig reloading stuff. It's the one round I have not tried yet... :p
 
Shot placement first, penetration second, then comes everything else.

.44 mag, .41 mag, and 10 mm have lots of energy but seem to have a tendency to penetrate all the way through a body and so not all the energy transfer is absorbed by the target.
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A gross overstatement. There may or may not be "over penetration" depending upon the exact load and, of course, what the bullet hits. Most of us would prefer over penetration than under penetration. And, just think, those FBI standards call for 12 to 16 inches of penetration in ballistic gelatin. That would mean a lot of calibers/loads meeting the FBI standards might exit out the other side of a person. Also, don't get too enamored of the "energy dump" theory. The energy transferred to the target may manifest itself in a variety of ways such as temporary cavitation or greater expansion/greater permanent wound channel. The fact more energy is transferred to a target means little in and by itself.

.357 mag with 125 grain JHP's is kinda of a golden standard in real gunfights for one shot knockdown power. This is documented in numerous police shootings over the last 70 odd years.
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I agree this is an excellent defense round. However, the .357 mag hasn't been commonly loaded with 125 gr. loads for that long. For much of that 70 years, the standard round included a 158 gr. bullet. I don't think the 125 gr. load was common until well into the 1970s. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong. While this is a proven self-defense round, I'll reiterate warnings from others. Don't fall for the Sanow/Marshall one stop statistics because they have been proven to be statistically invalid.

.380 is kinda of a joke. There are rounds out there that might cause damage, maybe.
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No, getting shot by a .380 is not a joke. There are stories of people getting shot with all handgun calibers who live to talk about it. Then there are those who get shot with a .22 and die. Robert Kennedy was assassinated with a .22 handgun. The .380 may not be the most effective caliber out there but it is no joke.

.38 special was the standard police round forever and has a terrible record.
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You're kidding right? The .38 special was THE police round for over half a century and saw service with the military as well. It is true that the 158 gr LRN bullet was not the most effective round out there but that is more of a reflection on the design of the bullet than the caliber. There are a number of highly effective rounds in .38 spl out there today, especially in +p loads. A lot of police officers carry these as backups and there are a lot of civilians who chose the .38 spl.

100% of the shootings by the Virgina State Police since adopting .357 SIG have been one shot man down and done.
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Source? Don't tell me Sanow/Marshall. How many shootings? I agree this is an excellent defensive round, but let's don't spin a lot hyperbole.

The .357 SIG square combustion chamber leads to very consistent ignition (kinda like in 6mm PPC and other rifle target rounds) and hence is very accurate.
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I'm not sure what you're talking about here but there are are very few people out there who can shoot a quality, accurate handgun to it's full potential. If the caliber had any greater inherent accuracy than other pistol rounds, it's lost on all but a very tiny percentage of shooters. Even then, the increased accuracy would make little difference in defensive shooting.
 
The recorded performance of both the 38 and the 9mm need to be read and re-read in detail when comparing effectiveness. The 38 was designed as a military round, but turned out not to be the huge improvement it was touted to be (resulting in the army adopting the 1911). The failings of the .38 in combat where a result of the military ball ammo and its use at distances more typical to military engagements (regularly in excess of 25m). It ended up being a decent trench pistol in WWI, but thats the highlight of its military service. When law enforcement used the .38 on the other hand, the performance was markedly better as a result of the much shorter distances and the introduction of hollowpoint ammunition.

The story is the same for the 9mm. Many of us in the armed forces lambast the M9 as inadequate. However, the main reason for that is because we are limited by the geneva convention to FMJ ball ammo, which is not as effective as many of us would like. In LE and homeowner hands, properly loaded hollow points are more than adequate for the vast majority of situations that will be encountered.

In short, make sure you are comparing ballistic results from similar applications. Comparing a phillipines-era .38 FMJ to a modern hornady XTP, or a 9x19 NATO load to a federal hydrashock is apples to oranges.
 
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KyJim,

Lots of good points.

RFK though was shot in the head from a distance of one inch. So yeah, a .22 is pretty good at that range as would a quality air pistol. But yeah, people die from .22's all the time from hits to the body.

I was standing next to a buddy when I was about 19 doing an ammo dump after killing jack rabbits with his M1 Carbine and my 30.06 (very effective one shot rabbit killers BTW). Anyway, some guy about a hundred yards away was plinking with a .22 and hit my buddy. The bullet hit right above the elbow as he was shooting and traveled up to the shoulder and exited. Damage? When I got him to the doctor he basically applied bandages to the entrance and exit holes. No biggie.

So pretty hit and miss with a .22. I really think it would have been an entirely different story with a 357 hit.

The .22 bullet which hit him was traveling directly toward his heart. His arm extended out in front of him holding his M1 in a shooting stance had blocked the bullet and deflected it along his bicep to exit 8-10 inches up toward his shoulder. I fear a .357 round would not have been deflected and he might have been dead rather than getting two bandages from the doctor.

My other buddy who was shot by a .380 the other day. Same thing - he was shot point blank in the chest (by a friend with a CCW no less). I think he'd be very lucky to be alive if it had been a .357 with point of impact and everything else being the same.

It is way too easy to discount the differences in ballistics as not important. They are.

I really don't know very much on this subject and I do appreciate your responses. There seems to be a lot of truth, especially the part about being good with your weapon, for sure a .454 is useless if ya can't hit with it.

But, I would like to compare calibers not expertise.

The guy above who said that the biggest round you can shoot well is exactly right, but lets hold the expertise and cost factors as not being important.

For me the time is harder to get to practice than the cost of the ammo. And so the size of the weapon as being appropriate to use as a CCW is the limiting factor.

Today, I wore my glock 33 all day with a cheaper IWB holster, 97 degrees in Florida, and it was pretty comforable, better once I get a good holster.

I made a bunch of claims about .357 because that is what I as a non-expert on this stuff found out from some internet reading. Lots of holes in my claims for sure.

Question - what is the best CCW round based on the above factors - that is if cost is not a factor and realistic concealment in a hot climate is??
 
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Dc9, you asked if the Sig was the right choice. Only you can make that decision. What is right for one person may not be right for someone else. That is one reason there are so many out there to choose from. The 357 Sig is a fine cartridge for personal defense, but there are others out there that are fine to. I was required by various regulations to carry a handgun that chambered the 38 Special cartridge for the better part of 30 years. I never felt out gunned or that the 38 Special was inadequate for defending me and those I was hired to protect. I have carried most of the calibers you mentioned and find that any of the following is good for the purpose at hand; 38 Special +P, 357 Magnum, 9MM (with a good Hollow Point), 40 S&W, 45 ACP, 44 Special. In the woods where large bears or other such animals the 44 Magnum is also good. I have found that where you put the bullets fired has more to do with stopping someone than the caliber or platform the bullets are launched from. If you feel confident with one caliber or another who here can say you are wrong. For my entire life my mother trusted an old 22 caliber RG 10, while my dad trusted just about anything he picked up that would fire. Also change your name. You are asking questions and learning from people who may have a piece of the puzzle that you may need. That is not a Loser, to me that is a Winner.
 
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