Bought some winchester fmj ammo and noticed it was flat nosed. I have never had any fmj in 9mm that was flat nosed. I'm new to 380 guns and was wondering if there are a lot of flat nosed 380 brands of ammo, and if so, why fn vs. rn. Thanks for any input.

Flat nosed otherwise known as truncated cone are said to be better sd loads than round nose.

Good questions. Recent Winchester FMJ .380 ammo has FP bullets
rather than the traditional RN bullets and as mentioned, some people
think that the FP design is more effective for self defense. As with any
SD issue this is debatable. They do tend to track straight in soft tissue
with their debatable flat nose advantage but RN bullets often tumble
and create a larger wound profile. My objection to the Win FNs is that
they chronograph about 50 fps slower than other brands that have RNs
and I did have one round of FN that hung up on the feed ramp of my
pistol. The .380 is a low power SD round under any circumstances and
realiability is top priority. So with it's better reliability and near
certainly of tumbling in soft tissue I'll stick to RN FMJ in my guns for
SD. For tin cans or sitting rabbits, whichever is cheapest.

I haven't searched this out yet, but do you have to worry about over penetration with any fmj, or is the 380 load not strong enough to over penetrate?

.380 FMJ will penetrate about 18" of ballistic gel according to
the various test results that I have seen on the net. It seems
to be about the same whether it tumbles or not or has to
penetrate denim first. You only have to worry about this "over
penetration" if you are desperate for something to worry
about. If your life is on the line you should be worried more
about not seeing tomorrow if your SD ammo malfunctions or
underpenetrates.

Interestingly , the truncated cone came out when the 30 cal Luger was enlarged to 9mm, the .30 wasn't quite effective enough and the 9mm with 120 gr. TC bullet was more effective. This was around the start of WWI. It was claimed by those on the receiving end to be too effective , German soldiers caught carrying the ammo were executed and thus the bullet was dropped in favor of the more "humane" 115 grain round nose. Both being the required full metal jacket as to comply with the "rules" of killing your enemy . And now the truncated cone has come back around, it's hardly a new thing.
Gary

That was very informative. I didn't know that about the TC bullet.

__________________
15T,15-22,5946 & some not S&W

I've used the Winchester truncated round in my M&P .380 and it works fine. Researching it on the web it penetrates/performs the same as round nose. I use it, when I can find it, b/c it normally comes in a 100 round box and is comparatively inexpensive. My self defense round is the HPR 90 grain hollow point b/c of its 12" - 15" penetration.

__________________
Old Cop
LEO (Ret.)

I've used it also in my bg380 with no problems. My walmart sells it at a very reasonable price.

When I bought my .380 I did a lot of research on ammo. I found a great video comparing around 10/15 brands and loads and the one that had the best results for consistant penetration and expansion was 'Precision One 90gr HP/XTP'. In fact just about any of the XTP's did well but this one came out on top in every test. Just putting this out.