The host of Sam Gun Revolver Ballistics tells us what he really thinks of the Hornady Critical Duty load which is used by the FBI and compares it against his personal favorite defense load: the Federal HST in .40 S&W. He tests the two head-to-head in a heavy clothing gel test as well as shooting through a barrier designed to mimic a car door. Note that he also uses fiber board after the first few inches of ballistic gel to account for having to go through ribs, so there is an additional barrier built into his tests.
Spoiler: the .40 S&W load had a larger wound channel and expanded better than the 9mm load. However, because of its greater expansion, it did not penetrate as far as the 9mm--in fact, it was a few inches shorter. Sam thought this was a clear win for the .40 S&W but I'm not so sure. For the car door barrier test, the two had almost identical performance so that was a wash.
However, Sam brought up a good point--and one that has informed my choice of a 9mm defensive load--which is that as civilians the hard barrier penetration (such as through a car door) is probably less important to us than the performance against a bad guy wearing heavy clothing.
Overall, I don't think carrying a larger gun with more recoil is worth the marginal extra performance. But that's me. What do you think?
VIDEO: "The Current 9mm+P FBI Load is Junk - What Caliber/Ammo I would Have Picked Instead - Ballistic Test" - Gun Sam Revolver Ballistics (23 min.)
No comments:
Post a Comment