Quote:
Originally Posted by Forte Smitten Wesson
I would like to contribute to this thread, but unfortunately I've never shot upwards of 1000 rounds of Self-Defense ammunition through any of my firearms, and I doubt that I ever will.
Heck, even if I had the kind of money to buy 1000+ rounds of carry ammo and shoot it all at the range, I can't say that I would, because frankly I'd rather stock up on it and shoot less expensive FMJ.
I only shoot Self-Defense loads under two conditions, to test it out and see if it runs reliably in my carry gun, or otherwise after the ammo I have loaded in my carry gun has been in there for upwards of a year. Unfortunately, I don't really keep track of how many rounds I've shot either since it's generally an infrequent thing with just a couple magazines full of ammo.
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Not judging here, but you've hit on one of the large problems with boutique self defense ammo.
Ask people what the 'best' self defense ammo is in any given cartridge and more often than not you'll get a lot of answers involving bullets that penetrate at least 12" in ballistic gel and expand to 1.6x or 1.65x their original diameter. Those rounds are usually expensive and can be hard to find.
The end result is that people don't shoot them in their self defense pistol all that often and carry them in their self defense pistol way too long. It ends up being the crappiest ammo they own.
There are other downsides.
- Many people don't shoot enough of their self defense ammo to really be sure it is 100% reliable in their pistol. IMHO that number is *at least* 200 rounds, with at least 100 rounds shot using each magazine you intend to carry. Way too many folks put a couple magazines or maybe a box of 50 rounds of their self defense ammo through their self defense pistol and call it good. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't.
- Even if it is 100% reliable, they don't shoot enough of it to be 100% familiar with it's recoil impulse and it's point of impact. Most FMJ ammo, even in the same bullet weight, is loaded to a lower velocity than even standard pressure self defense ammo and will have both a different recoil impulse and a different point of impact.
- That, combined with inadequate practice overall means that shot placement suffers and good shot placement with a mediocre hollow point bullet will be far more effective than poor shot placement with a boutique hollow point, and infinitely better than a miss.
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Personally, I handload and use 124 gr XTPs in my 9mm pistols. It's not fancy, but it is very accurate, gives good penetration and reliably mushrooms to about 1.5x it's original diameter with max loads.
I can also find the same equivalent in a factory load pretty much anywhere in their American Gunner load for reasonable money.
Remington's plain Jane green and white box 9mm hollow points perform very well and they make a great ammo choice for someone who doesn't handload. They work as well as the slightly more upscale Remington UMC load and the Remington UMC 115 gr JHPs can still be found for $0.29-$0.30 per round.
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So my advice to anyone is to skip the spendy self defense hollow points and shoot something affordable with reasonable performance and then shoot it a lot more often.
If you expend the carry ammo in your pistol and spare magazine(s) on every range trip over time, you'll have hundreds of rounds of your carry ammo through your carry pistol and you'll have a high degree of confidence about it's reliability. You'll also be much more familiar with the recoil impulse and you'll know exactly where it's point of impact will be. You'll also probably do a better job of finding FMJ practice ammo that has a similar recoil impulse and point of impact.