Which defensive 9x18mm round?

Which defensive 9x18mm round?

  • CCI Blazer

    Votes: 9 26.5%
  • Hornady XTP

    Votes: 15 44.1%
  • Barnual JHP

    Votes: 10 29.4%
  • Glaser Safety Slug

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    34
Hornady XTP's get the vote in mine. Mild recoiling and with a wide mouth design that will ensure expansion. The HP cavity is almost the same size as the bullet diameter to start with.

I will say that it is slightly milder than most of the other offerings, but double taps are extremely controllable. I'll take a controllable load over 50 fps velocity any day.

Ohhh....and kinda on another subject, the grips on a MAK make a BIG difference. During a side by side comparison of Maks the other day my dads Russian .380 Mak recoiled more than my Bulgie Mak with 9x18. Or should I say "percieved recoil". His has standard slim issue type grips, mine have the fatter thumbrest type.

Good Shooting
RED
 
Two good things about the CCI Blazer load: 1) It uses the outstanding Gold Dot bullet, which is less likely than conventional JHPs to experience a core separation and fragment (an important consideration with low-penetrating rounds like .380, 9mm Mak, etc.); and 2) it is cheap to shoot.

For some reason, the E. German Mak I use doesn't like the XTP round, and will occasionally fail to feed.

I have some of the Federal Classic Hi-Shok, but haven't tried it yet. Still, as a general proposition, I prefer the Gold Dot bullets to the Hi-Shok, XTP, Sierra (CorBon) and God-knows-what bullet the Barnaul load uses.
 
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