FMJ's vs Hollow's for self defense

Nice try, but people and their clothing are not made out of jello. Working in an ER, I've actually taken care of people who were shot with .22 and no, none of them had any kind of dangerous penetration of the rounds. Now, if you are attacked by Jello, guess you can make an impact with your 22. A miss with a 45 will send the bad guy running unless he has a really good reason to stay and fight it out with you (e.g., you've double crossed your drug dealer, or you are the bar manager and everyone and their brother knows that whenever there is more than $50 in the register the cash goes into your right front pocket, etc).

And, since at least somebody will feel the need to tell me that the FBI or Scotland Yard or whatever accepts that ballistic gelatin is a "validated" model of the human body, PLEASE do show me some proof of that, including photos, that shows identical rounds fired into human bodies with matching penetration and wound channel details side-by-side with data generated with ballistic gelatin. Jello can be mighty tasty, but there is just no science to shooting bullets into it.
 
Gelatin does not give an exact duplication of what a bullet does when impacting flesh.
It does give a comparison of how different bullets and rounds are likely to act when impacting flesh.

I'm not a huge fan of HP's for SD/HD. Too likely for a HP to not penetrate enough. Who said Mr BG is going to stand in front of you with his chest bared waiting to be shot? It's quite likely for a bullet to have to penetrate a hand, a heavy coat, couple layers of clothing, fat, arms, shoulders, etc., all of it, on it's way to vitals and CNS. I'll take a LSWC, TCFP, or RNFP with the largest meplat that will function reliably in my gun any day. Ball ammo in a handgun is less than ideal IMHO but if it's what ya got, or it's what makes your gun tick, when you get mad dog mean they ain't gonna be throwing it back at ya.

Has anyone ever seen a gelatin comparison of various solid bullet designs alongside HP's?
 
I'm not a huge fan of HP's for SD/HD. Too likely for a HP to not penetrate enough. Who said Mr BG is going to stand in front of you with his chest bared waiting to be shot? It's quite likely for a bullet to have to penetrate a hand, a heavy coat, couple layers of clothing, fat, arms, shoulders, etc., all of it, on it's way to vitals and CNS.
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That's why the FBI's penetration standards, which most modern JHP's in major calibers meet or exceed, are, on the surface, excessively deep. 12-16" is easily completely through the torso of an average adult male in a straight frontal shot. However, it's generally still enough to reach the vitals if the shootee is very large, shot at an oblique angle, or shot through an intermediate barrier. Lack of penetration was a legitimate concern with JHP's 20-30 years ago but today it's only really a worry if you're using very small calibers or very dated bullet designs (and even some old designs like 125grn or heavier .357 Magnum semi-jacketed hollowpoints and .38 Special lead semi-wadcutter hollowpoints still manage to penetrate adequately).
 
I think it really depends, With a .45 a hp isnt exactly nessesary but if your gun will feed it, There really is no downside to them imo. With a 9mm then yes an hp would be highly desirable over a fmj, As for sub-calibers such as .380,.32, and .25 I feel fmjs allow for much more penetration which is needed at their lower velocities.
 
I won't beat around the bush, your friends are morons when it comes to their ammo choice. Sorry if that hurts anyone's feelings.
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That's the best answer I saw in this thread! FMJ's in a .380 because of under penetration? Really? Says who? You aren't gonna use a .380 at ranges longer than maybe 5 feet. You willing to stand there and take the slug that close out of one? I ain't. Maybe 20 years ago, before ammo makers made huge advancements in their field. But I'll betcha a .380 jacketed hollow point at close range isn't a pleasant experience.

To those advocates of full metal jacketed rounds, sorry, but you're gonna bore a nice small hole in the bad guy trying to kill you, and if you didn't place that shot into a real vital area, he ain't going down. But he's gonna be real mad. Make that same shot in even a less than vital area, and it's gonna slow him down a lot.

People discount a 9mm as insufficient as a defensive round. I'm not going to stand there and let you put a 9 mm JHP into me either. It's bound to hurt a lot.
 
I carry fmj and here is why. i have shot numerous deer with a variety of handgun calibers using hp bullets that did not expand. So why carry something that may or may not work like it is supposed to and put yourself in a bind with the lawmakers if you would have to act in self defense.
 
Jello Junkies vs Morgue Monsters

Some members here seem to knock the use of media testing(jello, wet phone books, water jugs, sides of raw beef, etc) and say only real, documented use of force events(shootings) should measure a round's value(HP or FMJ).
Others point to the media testing as a good way of measuring a round's merits under controlled conditions.

I see the merits of both sides. If a handgun JHP does well in both field tests and many documented uses that makes more sense than picking a round based solely on 1 reason(feeding, expansion, weight, cost, etc).

To choose a HP or FMJ in a carry/protection firearm should be based on staying alive and ending a fire fight quickly.
 
Originally posted by Braintrain
I carry fmj and here is why. i have shot numerous deer with a variety of handgun calibers using hp bullets that did not expand. So why carry something that may or may not work like it is supposed to and put yourself in a bind with the lawmakers if you would have to act in self defense.
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If a JHP does not expand, it will almost always act just like FMJ. That being the case, what's the down side of using JHP's? At worst, you're no worse off than you are with FMJ and at best you've got better bullet performance. Also, remember that the anatomy of a deer is significantly different than that of a human. What works in one will not necessarily work in another. Finally, unless you live somewhere where JHP's are specifically forbidden for personal defense, I wouldn't worry too much about the legal ramifications of using them. Massad Ayoob, who is quite knowlegable about legal matters pertaining to self defense, has stated numerous times that use of JHP's can be defended fairly easily in court by pointing out that the vast majority of U.S. Law Enforcement uses JHP ammunition.

Originally posted by ClydeFrog
Some members here seem to knock the use of media testing(jello, wet phone books, water jugs, sides of raw beef, etc) and say only real, documented use of force events(shootings) should measure a round's value(HP or FMJ).
Others point to the media testing as a good way of measuring a round's merits under controlled conditions.

I see the merits of both sides. If a handgun JHP does well in both field tests and many documented uses that makes more sense than picking a round based solely on 1 reason(feeding, expansion, weight, cost, etc).

To choose a HP or FMJ in a carry/protection firearm should be based on staying alive and ending a fire fight quickly.
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That's a pretty sensible outlook. While both gelatin tests and case studies are useful in the study of bullet effectiveness, neither is perfect. While gelatin is useful in examining bullet performance under controlled conditions, nothing but living flesh and bone reacts to gun shots quite like living flesh and bone. While there have been attempts at using living animals as a substitute for humans to judge handgun effectiveness such as the Thompson-LaGarde tests or the controversial (and possibly fictional) Strasbourg Goat Tests, the problem there lies in that the anatomy of animals is quite different than that of humans. Finally, case studies like the Marshall-Sanow study while useful do not represent a controlled environment. What may be a one-shot-stop on one individual may be barely even noticed by another. I don't, however, think that it's coincidence that many of the loadings which perform the best in gelatin also perform admirably in the M-S study. Picking a cartridge and load that does well in both areas, IMHO, gives the best results.
 
To those advocates of full metal jacketed rounds, sorry, but you're gonna bore a nice small hole in the bad guy trying to kill you, and if you didn't place that shot into a real vital area, he ain't going down. But he's gonna be real mad. Make that same shot in even a less than vital area, and it's gonna slow him down a lot.
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Well all I can say is go out and get yourself shot just once. Please report your findings.

When did folks get the idea it is OK to tell others what to do and how to do it? When that person knows what works for him? or do some just want to argue their point till others concede or just go away?

These threads are silly at best. I will continue to carry FMJ and I sure wont feel underammoed at all. A .45 will hurt a person, heck I think one guy might have been killed by one hard to belive.
 
Wyatt Earp would probably say, "What is a JHP, anyway?"

People were fighting (and some winning) gunfights a long time before JHPs came along...
 
When did folks get the idea it is OK to tell others what to do and how to do it? When that person knows what works for him? or do some just want to argue their point till others concede or just go away?
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Welcome to corporate America! Where the finest propaganda is king, but can you sift thru it??:confused::eek:
 
To those advocates of full metal jacketed rounds, sorry, but you're gonna bore a nice small hole in the bad guy trying to kill you, and if you didn't place that shot into a real vital area, he ain't going down. But he's gonna be real mad. Make that same shot in even a less than vital area, and it's gonna slow him down a lot.
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Like a hit in the pinky finger is gonna take BG's arm off?

My guess is that he hasn't seen many bullets hit live flesh or examined flesh wounds to compare HP vs SWC or any other solid bullet with a fair meplat.
 
"No, I don't agree with that. A .22 in the exact right spot might penetrate and might cause a serious injury. But it is doubtful that the round will penetrate unless shot placement (eyes, throat, or under the arm) is just exactly perfect. And, the low noise and low flash is unlikely to shock the bad guy into retreating. Say what you want, but i do not buy the baloney that a hit with a 22 is better than a miss with a 45. The miss with 45 is much more likely to make the bad guy turn and flee than a hit with a 22."

This is a ridiculous statement. Do you realize how many people have died from .22 wounds? Posting stuff like that is beyond irresponsible- it's dangerous.
 
Anyone who says that a .22 won't penetrate is completely oblivious of actual facts and is likely falling into the extremely dangerous fallacy of equating performance and ability with size. Far too many people look at the .22 and see just a cute little round that just OBVIOUSLY can't be dangerous because it's far too tiny and cute compared to larger rounds.

A .22 caliber bullet, after hitting a door frame and deforming significantly, penetrated deeply into Ronald Reagan's chest and almost killed him.

An individual I worked with years ago was shot accidentally by a friend at less than 10 feet with a .22 semi-auto pistol.

The bullet hit him in the right chest, broke a rib, traversed the chest cavity bounced off a rib in the left chest, and ended up in his left kidney. In total, probably close to 15 inches of penetration and a wound that shouldn't have been survivable, and almost wasn't.

To those who doubt that ballistic gelatin is a valid testing media. The reason it was chosen as a testing media is because it approximates the average mean density of all human tissue in the body. That's why bone isn't cast into testing gelatin - it would throw off the average mean density figures.

What's seen in ballistic gelatin testing by FBI and the industry (which has largely adopted it as their testing media, as well) has been, to a large degree, born out by what is actually seen in the same bullets fired into living humans.

Dr. Martin Fackler of the Firearms Tactical Institute has written extensively on this subject.
 
+1 for COL Fackler...

MI made some good points.
US Army COL Martin Fackler's research on ammunition and wounds are worth bringing up.

US military and LE research/T&E has helped save lives and protect 1,000s of officers/service members. A few of these board members may negate it but they should be mature adults about it.
 
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