Brian Pfleuger
Moderator Emeritus
I agree. I'm just saying that there seems to be little modern application for that particular data and yet it continues to be the subject of debate.
Martin L. Fackler
- Thread starter Anibal
- Start date
I agree. I'm just saying that there seems to be little modern application for that particular data and yet it continues to be the subject of debate.
Assuming a non-expanding rounds of the same weight, the .357 magnum should penetrate deeper and thus come into contact with more tissue and cause more damage. The .357 may pass through a person when the .38 does not, meaning the target is bleeding from two holes.
Using hollow points, the .357 will have an additional advantage. It should both expand well and penetrate deeply enough. With lower velocities, the .38 may not expand as much or penetrate as deeply. Modern hollow points are better but there is still a smaller margin for error. Having said that, I certainly feel comfortable with carrying .38 special +P Gold Dots.
I also recognize there may be a psychological factor involved with getting shot with a bullet with more energy which may cause some/many "bad guys" to stop upon being hit when they might not with a bullet with lower energy.
I hate to be nitpicky, but the FBI load in 10mm was a 180gr bullet at 950fps for ~360ft/lbs of energy. When the FBI adopted the 10mm, they adopted the 10mm Lite loading right from the start (the introduction of the 10mm Lite actually predates the introduction of the 1076 that would fire it). The load was chosen because it produced performance almost as good as the full house 10mm (in ballistic gelatin testing based on Fackler's methods) with half the energy and corrosponding decrease in recoil and muzzle blast.
It's not a theory. In high powered rifle bullets the temporary or stretch cavity is everything. Tissue, including blood vessels are stretched beyond their ability to recover and are damaged or destroyed.
In most pistol bullets, it's nearly impossible to measure. If it plays a part in incapacitation, it's not reliable.
It's interesting that, where the .357 mag. is concerned, some would offer different theories regarding it's effectiveness, but never consider that the higher velocities result in the temporary wound cavity's contribution to incapacitation. Same goes for jacket separation.
This is true. The FBI never officially tested, approved or issued full house 10mm loads. Recoil was never the issue. From the start, it was the 10mm "FBI Lite" version that beat both the 147 gr. 9mm load and the 185 gr. .45 ACP load, which were supposed to be the best loads of those calibers of the day.
http://www.firearmstactical.com/pdf/fbi_10mm_notes.pdf
In a sense, it was the ballistics of the .40 S&W which did better in overall testing.
The problem is that they were not at all predisposed to take their results at face value and ended up picking what they "knew" to be the best in what amounted to a very subjective evaluation.
The fastest kill on their live animal tests was from a single round of .30 Luger through the lungs. No other caliber killed faster in spite of the fact that all the other tests involved shooting the animal more than once.
I'm not suggesting they should have picked .30 Luger, just pointing out that if the test had REALLY been about determining effectiveness the .30 Luger should have been rated a good deal higher than it ended up in the reported results.
The real problem with the live animal testing was that it was surprisingly unstructured and there was little or no attempt made to control for variables. Animals varied tremendously in size, and the number of shots, intervals between shots, shot placement, etc. were also variable.
From what I can tell the live animal testing results were pretty much discarded and the decisions were made based on shooting cadavers and watching them swing. Based on the swing, the calibers were rated subjectively ("That's a 100.", "Oh, that looks like an 87.") and the table of ratings was what was reported as the "results of the testing".
The idea was very good but the implementation was miserable. It's a bit surprising that it's still spoken of as anything other than a very bad example of how a test should be run.
warrior poet
New member
Shoot twice. No matter what caliber/bullet design/bullet weight, hammer pairs or controlled pairs work better than one shot. If a pair doesn't work... them head or pelvic shot is next, depending on the situation. The various "bullet theories" won't help you in a firefight... tactics will.
Got that right. In many cases ammo that M&S say works is also recommended by Fackler, including 230gr 45ACP JHPs of various sorts. M&S can't be completely dismissed.
The biggest difference between M&S and Fackler seems to involve high-end 125gr 357s and similar "light and fast" expanding slugs, and other "edgy" situations. Fackler also likes big-bore non-expanding slugs over small-bore expanders of similar energy levels.
Backtracking a bit: I appear to have been wrong on the FBI playing with big horsepower...or, maybe "partially wrong". It's clear enough they intended to run more horsepower than the 9mm, and in picking the 10mm they must have played with full-house ammo of around 700ft/lbs+ in testing. I didn't realize they never used that level of power in the field even briefly. I did know that almost all street use of the 10mm guns was at 40S&W horsepower levels, didn't realize it was "all" instead of "most".
That still doesn't discount my basic thesis...if anything it supports it: law enforcement never dabbled much in really serious power up over 700ft/lbs energy, at least not department-wide in decent sized agencies. And therefore Fackler's attention likely wasn't pointed in that direction, dismissing that as impractical.
In my case, I've figured out how to daily-carry 800ft/lbs energy daily using a heavily customized fanny pack and a sixgun. So I appear to be into territory the FBI never paid significant attention to, at least in modern times with modern projectiles.
You're probably right. I've never seen any serious study by any agency using that kind of power level.
But modern bullets have been optimized to work at regular 9mm, .40 S&W, or .45 ACP pressure levels.
I'm not sure a bullet with nearly twice the energy level as normal self defense ammo will translate to faster incapacitation or faster stops.
Military people who have survived combat during wartime have reported that sometimes enemy troops have continued to advance even though they received mortal wounds, and even with limbs blown off.
And remember in the Trooper Mark Coates incident where the good guy used a high velocity, high energy .357 Mag. Even though he got four good hits on the bad guy, it failed to stop an obese but determined criminal.
I think I would rather get two good hits with a regular .40 S&W rather than one good hit with a 10mm with a much higher energy level.
And remember the British experience with the .380/200. In combat, they figured out that a heavy, 200 gr. bullet would have about the same effect of the larger .455 Webley. In combat use, this proved correct, so they were able to use lighter weapons. This 200 gr. bullet only traveled at about 650 fps. Very low energy levels, but effective in combat.
Until I see something more definitive, I'll stick to the pedestrian 9mm, .40 S&W or .45 ACP loads.
Mike Irwin
Staff
"The problem is that they were not at all predisposed to take their results at face value and ended up picking what they "knew" to be the best in what amounted to a very subjective evaluation.
The fastest kill on their live animal tests was from a single round of .30 Luger through the lungs."
I have a somewhat different take on that, John.
I suspect that they realized that they didn't place the shot where they wanted it and ended up putting a bullet through something very vital, like the pulmonary artery. That would have caused rapid death in the animal.
That result was also a complete anomoly when compared to the other similar cartridges that were used in the tests.
They likely knew just how ineffective the .30 Luger was at creating wounds from the cadaver testing/autopsy results. There's a good reason why the Germans called the PPSh submachine gun "The Icepick" during WW II - it made wounds not unlike those made by an ice pick.
While we certainly can't know for sure what Thompson-LaGarde thought about the ultimate result from the .30, we know what the animal's reaction was when it was shot with the .30 -- nothing.
"It's a bit surprising that it's still spoken of as anything other than a very bad example of how a test should be run."
On the contrary, it SHOULD be spoken of.
Why?
1. It was the first attempt to quantify this sort of information. The FIRST. It's important to emphasize the FIRST because how many scientific endeavors are 100% spot on classically perfect the first time out? Albert Einstein didn't walk into the staff crapper at the Swiss Patent Office one afternoon devoid of any scientific thoughts and come out 20 minutes later with the a perfect special theory of relativity written on a roll of Charmin.
2. Like Marshall and Sanow's work, it actually predicted to some degree what was seen in two world wars and in later years. The .45 (a pre version of what would become the .45 ACP) performed well.
The .30 Luger and other small, relatively fast cartridges didn't perform as well, unless they hit bone.
The most direct correlary to the .30 Luger in military service was the 8mm Nambu in World War II (the 7.62 Tokarev round had significantly higher velocity), used in their handguns and, in the later stages, in two types of submachine guns.
The Americans and British/Commonwealth troops had virtually no respect for its ballistic capabilities.
The fastest kill on their live animal tests was from a single round of .30 Luger through the lungs."
I have a somewhat different take on that, John.
I suspect that they realized that they didn't place the shot where they wanted it and ended up putting a bullet through something very vital, like the pulmonary artery. That would have caused rapid death in the animal.
That result was also a complete anomoly when compared to the other similar cartridges that were used in the tests.
They likely knew just how ineffective the .30 Luger was at creating wounds from the cadaver testing/autopsy results. There's a good reason why the Germans called the PPSh submachine gun "The Icepick" during WW II - it made wounds not unlike those made by an ice pick.
While we certainly can't know for sure what Thompson-LaGarde thought about the ultimate result from the .30, we know what the animal's reaction was when it was shot with the .30 -- nothing.
"It's a bit surprising that it's still spoken of as anything other than a very bad example of how a test should be run."
On the contrary, it SHOULD be spoken of.
Why?
1. It was the first attempt to quantify this sort of information. The FIRST. It's important to emphasize the FIRST because how many scientific endeavors are 100% spot on classically perfect the first time out? Albert Einstein didn't walk into the staff crapper at the Swiss Patent Office one afternoon devoid of any scientific thoughts and come out 20 minutes later with the a perfect special theory of relativity written on a roll of Charmin.
2. Like Marshall and Sanow's work, it actually predicted to some degree what was seen in two world wars and in later years. The .45 (a pre version of what would become the .45 ACP) performed well.
The .30 Luger and other small, relatively fast cartridges didn't perform as well, unless they hit bone.
The most direct correlary to the .30 Luger in military service was the 8mm Nambu in World War II (the 7.62 Tokarev round had significantly higher velocity), used in their handguns and, in the later stages, in two types of submachine guns.
The Americans and British/Commonwealth troops had virtually no respect for its ballistic capabilities.
I think that's a good thesis and a hard one to defeat given the opinion of some experts. Mike Venturino, for example, is on record about the .38spl as saying that he knows "for certain it is about the largest cartridge non-enthusiast people can be taught to shoot with any degree of proficiency."
For whatever reason, they were clearly unhappy with the results and not at all willing to factor that information into the results.
The .30 Luger was the ONLY round tested on either day to kill an animal with a single round. It was also the only round on the first day of testing to kill animal in under a minute. The second day they shot another animal multiple times with the .30 Luger but killed it via other means after an unspecified time. The second day's testing results are not easily deciphered since they don't list times or bullet placement in some cases.
I can't find anything suggesting that there was anything approaching systematic autopsies performed on the cadavers. In fact, other than noting whether bone was hit or not, there doesn't seem to be anything in the results indicating that autopsies took place at all. The only use I can see that they put the cadaver shooting to was to rate the swing caused by bullet impact to a bone shaft. Even in that case they didn't measure the swing, they apparently rated it subjectively.
That's just it, Mike, if you look at the results, it's hard to find anything in the live animal testing that suggests any of the cartridges performed significantly better than the others. If one is ready to discount the .30 Luger's impressive single-shot performance on the first day's testing, then to be consistent, one would have to also view results from other cartridges on the second day with a similarly jaundiced eye.
And as pointed out, the cadaver testing, from what I've seen of the results, selected purely for momentum transfer. Maybe that was a good parameter to focus on, but if so it seems to have been purely serendipity that led them to it.
In fact, if one were to look at the tests purely objectively, the REAL result is that expanding ammunition seems to virtually always outperform non-expanding ammunition. (Expanding ammunition used in a test to select military ammuntion? Yeah, that's kind of weird, isn't it. A bit easier to understand, perhaps, when one sees that only the .45 calibers got the benefit of expanding bullets in the testing.)
Yes, the .45ACP performed well as an issue round, but so did the 9mm issued on the other side. We kept the .45ACP for decades after due to its performance and the militaries issuing the 9mm back then are still issuing it today. So everyone was happy with the performance they got out of their issue handgun round, whether it was .45ACP OR 9mm.
In other words, the T-L testing didn't select for incapacitation (like the live animal testing suggests) it selected for momentum transfer. That turned out to be a reasonably good choice based on issue performance, but there's no decent evidence (again based on issue performance) that it was a better choice than the 9mm would have been.
Mike Irwin
Staff
"The .30 Luger was the ONLY round tested on either day to kill an animal with a single round."
Uh, wait one second, I'm not so sure that's correct.
Cartridges of the World, 4th edition, page 373. The article is a survey overview titled "Handgun Lethality" and does a VERY quick and dirty trace of handgun bullet development, amongst other things.
"With the .30 Luger, in no instances did an animal drop by the tenth shot adn in fact none of them appeared to suffer great pain, shock, or distress even after the tenth shot. Animals shot with the 9mm or the .38 Colt auto showed greater distress and by the sixth or seventh shot showed great distress, shock or exhaustion and usually dropped before the eighth shot. The effect of the .38 Colt Army revolver was about the same although perhaps not so pronounced as the two automatic rounds.
With the .45 Colt revolver the animals showed great shock and distress and dropped by the fourth or fifth shot. With the .455 and .476 caliber revolvers the animal usually dropped by the third shot. Those shot by the large calibers would begin to bleed from the nose and mouth by the second or third shot. This did not happen with the smaller calibers."
I no longer have access to a copy of the original report. Where are you getting your information that the .30 Luger was the only cartridge to result in a one shot kill?
"I can't find anything suggesting that there was anything approaching systematic autopsies performed on the cadavers. In fact, other than noting whether bone was hit or not, there doesn't seem to be anything in the results indicating that autopsies took place at all."
Ibid, pages 372 and 373.
"The test series consisted of first firing shots from all of the handguns into human cadavers. Movement or oscillation on impact of the shot was noted as well as the apparent tissue and other damage. Results were studied both by X-ray and dissection."
I recall distinctly in the original report published by Thompson and LaGarde that they included representative images of wound paths and X-rays.
"That's just it, Mike, if you look at the results, it's hard to find anything in the live animal testing that suggests any of the cartridges performed significantly better than the others."
See the passage I quoted above. If what is in COTW is accurate, and I believe it to be from what I remember of the report when I read it 15 years or so ago, there was a MARKED difference in response between the .30 Luger and the larger calibers, certainly far more significant a response than what you're claiming.
"That turned out to be a reasonably good choice based on issue performance."
And given US military experience with the .38 Long Colt in the Philippines, that was the entire point of the exercise.
"the militaries issuing the 9mm back then are still issuing it today."
Given the relative issuance and usage levels of handguns in American vs. European military structures, I'm not so certain that there's an adequate way of determining that yes, the German military was, in fact, truly happy with the performance of the 9mm, or whether it was just OK.
I'll also note that when the German military first investigated adopting the Luger automatic to replace the Mauser revolver, it first looked at the .30 Luger and rejected the cartridge as being inadequate for military purposes. It requested that Luger develop a cartridge firing a larger diameter bullet of greater weight. He did that by expanding the .30 Luger to 9mm and shortening the case slightly.
Here, also, is an interesting tidbit from COTW, 4th, page 166: "For self-defense, it (.30 Luger) leaves much to be desired because a man can absorb quite a few poorly placed bullets without being put out of action."
Uh, wait one second, I'm not so sure that's correct.
Cartridges of the World, 4th edition, page 373. The article is a survey overview titled "Handgun Lethality" and does a VERY quick and dirty trace of handgun bullet development, amongst other things.
"With the .30 Luger, in no instances did an animal drop by the tenth shot adn in fact none of them appeared to suffer great pain, shock, or distress even after the tenth shot. Animals shot with the 9mm or the .38 Colt auto showed greater distress and by the sixth or seventh shot showed great distress, shock or exhaustion and usually dropped before the eighth shot. The effect of the .38 Colt Army revolver was about the same although perhaps not so pronounced as the two automatic rounds.
With the .45 Colt revolver the animals showed great shock and distress and dropped by the fourth or fifth shot. With the .455 and .476 caliber revolvers the animal usually dropped by the third shot. Those shot by the large calibers would begin to bleed from the nose and mouth by the second or third shot. This did not happen with the smaller calibers."
I no longer have access to a copy of the original report. Where are you getting your information that the .30 Luger was the only cartridge to result in a one shot kill?
"I can't find anything suggesting that there was anything approaching systematic autopsies performed on the cadavers. In fact, other than noting whether bone was hit or not, there doesn't seem to be anything in the results indicating that autopsies took place at all."
Ibid, pages 372 and 373.
"The test series consisted of first firing shots from all of the handguns into human cadavers. Movement or oscillation on impact of the shot was noted as well as the apparent tissue and other damage. Results were studied both by X-ray and dissection."
I recall distinctly in the original report published by Thompson and LaGarde that they included representative images of wound paths and X-rays.
"That's just it, Mike, if you look at the results, it's hard to find anything in the live animal testing that suggests any of the cartridges performed significantly better than the others."
See the passage I quoted above. If what is in COTW is accurate, and I believe it to be from what I remember of the report when I read it 15 years or so ago, there was a MARKED difference in response between the .30 Luger and the larger calibers, certainly far more significant a response than what you're claiming.
"That turned out to be a reasonably good choice based on issue performance."
And given US military experience with the .38 Long Colt in the Philippines, that was the entire point of the exercise.
"the militaries issuing the 9mm back then are still issuing it today."
Given the relative issuance and usage levels of handguns in American vs. European military structures, I'm not so certain that there's an adequate way of determining that yes, the German military was, in fact, truly happy with the performance of the 9mm, or whether it was just OK.
I'll also note that when the German military first investigated adopting the Luger automatic to replace the Mauser revolver, it first looked at the .30 Luger and rejected the cartridge as being inadequate for military purposes. It requested that Luger develop a cartridge firing a larger diameter bullet of greater weight. He did that by expanding the .30 Luger to 9mm and shortening the case slightly.
Here, also, is an interesting tidbit from COTW, 4th, page 166: "For self-defense, it (.30 Luger) leaves much to be desired because a man can absorb quite a few poorly placed bullets without being put out of action."
Actually, I find the arguments between the two groups to be a classic science problem, one that has existed in many areas of study.
Fackler attempted to make his tests as scientific as possible. He uses a test to do this. Like many tests, it is simplified, to make it easier to control the factors involved and to make it easier to interpret the results. Simplifying also allows you to more clearly see the relationship between a particular set of circumstances and a result. The problem with a model like this is you risk getting further from reality for each factor that you eliminate.
Martin and Sanow use real world data and statistical analysis. This is not necessarily a bad thing. While criticized as less "scientific" by some, Valid mathematical models like this are very useful.
They are not necessarily useful for finding specific cause and effect results, and do not show concrete mechanisms for why a particular result ensues. The correlations discovered may not really be related.
They can be very useful, however, for discovering what areas seem to work, and identifying what areas need further study.
Each method has to be evaluated only in the areas that it is useful for.
Problems start when people read too much into the studies, or try to interpret them in ways that were never intended.
Fackler attempted to make his tests as scientific as possible. He uses a test to do this. Like many tests, it is simplified, to make it easier to control the factors involved and to make it easier to interpret the results. Simplifying also allows you to more clearly see the relationship between a particular set of circumstances and a result. The problem with a model like this is you risk getting further from reality for each factor that you eliminate.
Martin and Sanow use real world data and statistical analysis. This is not necessarily a bad thing. While criticized as less "scientific" by some, Valid mathematical models like this are very useful.
They are not necessarily useful for finding specific cause and effect results, and do not show concrete mechanisms for why a particular result ensues. The correlations discovered may not really be related.
They can be very useful, however, for discovering what areas seem to work, and identifying what areas need further study.
Each method has to be evaluated only in the areas that it is useful for.
Problems start when people read too much into the studies, or try to interpret them in ways that were never intended.
Mike Irwin
Staff
"Like many tests, it is simplified, to make it easier to control the factors involved and to make it easier to interpret the results."
How so do you mean "simplified"?
You are aware of the preparation that goes into getting the blocks of ballistic gelatin ready for shooting, and also the different scenarios that are used? They're quite complicated. It's not like shooting a cherry jello grape and mini marshmallow mold at the church picnic.
If you're referring to there being no bones cast into the blocks of gelatin, the ballistic gelatin very closely matches the average mean density of all of the tissue found in a human body. The end results are very close to what is actually seen of bullet performance in real life shootings.
Casting bone into the blocks actually greatly skews the results and diminishes the ability of the tests to predict and match what is seen in actual shootings.
How so do you mean "simplified"?
You are aware of the preparation that goes into getting the blocks of ballistic gelatin ready for shooting, and also the different scenarios that are used? They're quite complicated. It's not like shooting a cherry jello grape and mini marshmallow mold at the church picnic.
If you're referring to there being no bones cast into the blocks of gelatin, the ballistic gelatin very closely matches the average mean density of all of the tissue found in a human body. The end results are very close to what is actually seen of bullet performance in real life shootings.
Casting bone into the blocks actually greatly skews the results and diminishes the ability of the tests to predict and match what is seen in actual shootings.
No, No, No! That's the whole point. The M&S stats do NOT use valid mathematical models. That's the whole BS part about their work.
See, http://www.firearmstactical.com/marshall-sanow-discrepancies.htm
See, http://www.firearmstactical.com/marshall-sanow-statistical-analysis.htm
Mike, you are making my point for me. Bullets don't always hit areas in the body that represent the mean tissue density. Then you can start playing around with clothing.
A test like this also doesn't take into account the mental status of the person being shot, whether they moved or what angle they were shot at, how accurately the shooter was able to place the round, etc.
I'm talking about all the factors that go into a real world shooting.
Whether or not M&S used an accurate mathematical model or not, I really don't know. I was talking about good statistical analysis in general, and what it can or can't tell us.
To further clarify, my point is that neither group can give us all the answers, and the problem most likely really isn't with what either study shows us, but with how people are trying to interpret and use it.
A test like this also doesn't take into account the mental status of the person being shot, whether they moved or what angle they were shot at, how accurately the shooter was able to place the round, etc.
I'm talking about all the factors that go into a real world shooting.
Whether or not M&S used an accurate mathematical model or not, I really don't know. I was talking about good statistical analysis in general, and what it can or can't tell us.
To further clarify, my point is that neither group can give us all the answers, and the problem most likely really isn't with what either study shows us, but with how people are trying to interpret and use it.