I was asked last week about the 45 Colt Gold Dot load, but at that time I hadn't finished my tests. Here's how it did yesterday:

775 fps for a 5-round average @ 10 feet. 14" on ballistic gelatin penetrated. Expansion to .763". I'm impressed.

Like is now inactive, so I deleted it. Complete article below.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Parson Colt,

I presume this is the 250 gr. factory load? I've thought about loading this bullet into the .45 ACP 625 where I should be able to get at least 900 FPS. Another consideration is my short Redhawk .45 Colt at 1100+ FPS. It should perform well at the higher velocities.

I have always felt that Speer factory loads the Gold Dots way too soft. I guess it's just a sign of the times.

Dave Sinko

David, this is the factory load. And, there's no advantage to loading them faster. You actually get less expansion and penetration from these bullets if you load them outside the velocity window for which they were developed. Just a guess on this particular bullet, but I'd say anything over 900 fps would be counter productive. It would expand faster then fold back before adequate penetration was reached.

This ballistics lab was quite an eye-opening experience.

The link no longer works. I'll change it when I figure this out.

Speer’s Gold Dot in 45 Colt

By Gary W. Campbell, AKA Parson Colt

A great number of people these days are involved in some form or another of cowboy shooting sport, and the great majority of them shoot fixed sighted revolvers. Currently, the favorite calibers are 38 Special (often fired in 357 Magnum chambers) and 45 Colt. Now, it only makes sense to use the handgun you practice with the most as your home defense gun, and if that handgun happens to be a single-action revolver, the only handicap you face is speed of reload. If you don’t think a single-action can’t be fired as quickly and accurately as a semi-auto, I invite you to attend your local cowboy action match.

If the single-action of choice is a 38 Special or 357 Magnum, the ammunition choices are legion. However, if the 45 Colt is the choice, finding a modern hollow point defense load meant paying big bucks to one of the smaller ammo producers. We can all admit that many of the small producers make great ammo, but the cost can be prohibitive.

When I heard that Speer CCI Ammunition had come up with a 250 grain 45 Colt load featuring their excellent Gold Dot bullets, I thought I’d found my answer. I often carry my 45 Colt Ruger Blackhawk at the ranch loaded with 255 Laser Cast semi-wadcutters at 969 fps, but when going to town, I need to change to factory ammunition. Without getting into the controversy of hand loads verses factory ammunition for defense loads, which has already used up way too much bandwidth on various forums, those of us living in Oklahoma who have concealed carry licenses are directed by Oklahoma’s Self Defense Act to use factory ammunition.


Testing ammo over the chronograph during the Speer Ballistics Lab.

The idea behind the 45 Colt Gold Dot is to have a defense round that hits approximately the same place on a target as the standard 45 Colt ammunition. Now, my standard 45 Colt is close to the 1873 original, which hit a bit over 900 fps out of a 7 ½” barrel, only I load it hot enough to get that speed from a 4 5/8ths in barrel. So, I expected the Gold Dot load to be a touch slower than my loads. First, I shot some groups comparing the point of impact between my hand load, Black Hills 45 Colt Cowboy Load, and Winchester 45 Colt Cowboy Load with the Speer Gold Dot. They weren’t in the same holes, but they were close enough at 25 yards that I would have no hesitation to use the Gold Dots for defense. Closer targets, like typical gunfight ranges, would show even closer points of impact.

Satisfied there, I stepped to the chronograph. My Speer Gold Dots only chrono’ed 767 fps. Oops! Everyone knows you have to have at least 1000 fps at the muzzle to insure expansion of a hollow point. Now, that deep – and it is deep – hollow point is going to be more effective than a round nose slug even if it doesn’t open, but I was hoping for some expansion here. 767 fps is a long way from the 1000 fps necessary. Still, it shot tighter groups than the old-tech ammo I had been using, so I dropped the Gold Dot load into my Blackhawk whenever I headed to town.


That little box on the left is the 45 Colt awaiting its opportunity.

Then I got the opportunity to observe in Speer’s Ballistics Laboratory held at the North American Shooting Academy (http://www.northamericanshootingacademy.com) in Guthrie, Oklahoma, run by Range Master Glen McEntire. McEntire directed the firearms program for the State of Oklahoma’s Council on Law Enforcement and Education and Training (CLEET) for over 20 years. To say McEntire knows his stuff is like saying Einstein knew something about math.

Speer’s Law Enforcement Ballistics Laboratory demonstrates to law enforcement personnel the terminal performance of handgun and rifle ammunition using the FBI protocol set up after the disastrous Miami/Dade shootout in 1986. As part of the demonstration, ammunition is chronographed then fired into ballistic gelatin to simulate body tissue. Depth of penetration and expansion are measured. According to the FBI, penetration of at least 12 inches of ballistic gelatin is necessary for defense ammunition. I had attended one of the first of these demonstrations back in 1991 or ‘92, and I recalled that after the instructor had fired Gold Dot and many competitors’ ammo, he had asked if anyone had brought something they would like to test. I hoped to have that opportunity to test the 45 Colt load, so the Blackhawk and the 45 Gold Dots went with me.


The 45 Colt penetrated 14 inches of ballistic gelatin.

That opportunity did present itself. The law enforcement loads preformed admirably, as I knew they would, and most of the competitor’s ammo did nearly as well. Then it was the 45 Colt’s turn. After watching ammo that chronographed around 1000 fps, I really didn’t have much hope the slower Colt load would impress anyone. On that hot day, Speer 45 Colt Gold Dot chrono’ed 775 fps average for 5 rounds – 8 fps more than my earlier test. Pretty good consistency, but far from the 1000 fps necessary for reliable expansion. Then came the real test. Would it make 12 inches of penetration at the prescribed 10 feet from the muzzle? Would the slow 250 grain hollow point expand at all?

I shouldn’t have worried. Speer’s 250 grain 45 Colt Gold Dot penetrated the gelatin block exactly 14 inches, and expand? I should say! The perfectly mushroomed bullet measured .763” in diameter and retained all but 1.4 grains of its weight. I’m impressed! No longer do I have any doubt that this load is an exceptional defense load for the 45 Colt. And, what happened to that knowledge we all had that 1000 fps was a must for expansion? Apparently, the engineers at Speer had never learned that you can’t make a bullet expand at slow speed. Since they didn’t know they couldn’t. They did.


Check out that expansion! .763" and perfectly mushroomed.

This Gold Dot ammo has very light recoil as you might expect from a 775 fps load. It’s very accurate, and follow-up shots are lightning quick because of that light recoil. I highly recommend it.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Parson Colt,

My department uses the 180 gr. GDHP in .40 S&W and I have chronographed it at 998 FPS in the duty gun. We have had a few shootings of dogs and humans where the bullets have literally fallen out of the body due to lack of penetration. I personally witnessed one incident where two of them fell out of a subject after he had been rolled over. Either these bullets expand too quickly or they lack velocity. I think it may be a little bit of both. I don't see how more velocity can hurt; even if the front of the bullet is blown away, the back should still be solid enough to continue penetrating. The mass of the 250 gr. bullet certainly helps overcome the low velocity, but I don't see how a couple of hundred feet per second can hurt with this bullet. I think it's one of the best out there and one of the few that really can benefit from extra velocity.

Dave Sinko

David, that means they're doing what Speer designed them for. They aren't supposed to exit the body. You may disagree on whether it should exit, but the Speer rep informed us that they intend for the bullet to remain in the body. So, it's doing what they intend.

I was looking at the depth of that 45 Colt hollow point last night, and I think pushing it to 900 or 1000 fps could be very interesting. At 775 fps, there's still probably 1/16 to 1/8th of an inch that hasn't expanded yet. What I think would be a waste of time is trying to use it on "Ruger only" type loads.

If you're in Oklahoma ParsonColt you might try some of the offereings from Reeds Ammunition & Research, Oklahoma City OK.

.45 COlt 185 gr. Golden Saber JHP @ 1,150 FPS
.45 Colt 250 gr. Hornady XTP JHP @ 850 FPS
R.A.R. also offers 3 hotter loads recommendded for Blackhawks & T/C Contenders I have a 625 & have some R.A.R. offereings in .45 Auto Rim
the same 185 gr. Golden Saber is 1,100 FPS &
225 gr. Barnes XPB HP I have doesn't have a FPS claim so I need to Chrono it as well as see if the all copper bullet expands

I have an 1894 Marlin in .45 Colt I need to break-in this summer - 20" Bbl. it will be interesting to chrono some of the same loads and see about velocity gains.

Randall

Sounds like a decent load, but I'll stick with the +P 200gr JHP Cor-Bon load.

I like the CorBon +P, too, animalmother. It does, however, hit at a different spot on the target than the heavier bullet loads. I'm lazy, and I change loads in my Blackhawk when I go to town with it, taking out my swc handloads. The Gold Dot serves my purpose. I was mainly very impressed with all that expansion at such a low velocity.

BlindJustice, I wasn't aware of RAR, and I work in OKC. I'll have to check them out. What I've observed in the past is that xtp's don't expand as much and penetrate more. That's not necessarily a bad thing. Just depends on what you're looking for.

Parsoncolt - Ron Reed runs R.A.R. I was looking for somebody to Custom load some .45 ACP as I found 350 new Remington cases I had bought back in the early 1980s. R.A>R. Custom order is 250 rds minimum. So, I shipped them to R.A.R. and asked for the Leadhead 200 gr. SWC which run about 7 cents each. I think with shipping adding 3 cents a round the total per round was 21 cents each. I also had R.A>R. roll me up 500 rds of .45 AUto RIm with the same bullet and also loaded to 1,025 FPS. The .45 AUto RIm ran about 43 cents a round.

The new offerings in .45 AR with some 250 gr SWC are a good price and 909 fps seems interesting

I do keep .45 ACP SPeer 230 gr. Gold dot JHPs
in the 1911 mags. Heck I live 30 miles north of the CCI/SPeer plant in Lewiston ID. SPeer
Gold Dot Bullets are pricey though .45 is $45/100 ouch.... XTPs run a little over 20 cents each.

Randall

quote:

Originally posted by animalmother:
Sounds like a decent load, but I'll stick with the +P 200gr JHP Cor-Bon load.

I was using the Corbon load also but recently switched to the 250 Gr Gold Dot. Mt practice / fun load is a 250 Gr cast semi-wadcutter at a similar velocity and they hit close together.

Take a look at this data
http://stevespages.com/page8f45colt.html

A couple of things I notice is that the Gold Dots hold their weight while the Corbons are losing 20 - 25% of their weight. The Corbons also appear to shed pieces of their jacket. Yes, these are secondary missiles but I would rather retain the weight.

I did some shooting into a big stack of wet magazines.... and noted the same thing about CorBon Conventional JHPs.... they shred... I did some research and it seems they use Sierra JHPs - The DPX line on the other hand are the all copper Barnes XPB HPs I did n't have any Gold Dots that day but some Win 230 gr. SXT
were the best JHPs of the day for expansion and
retaining bullet weight.- .45 ACP fwiw

I know that Speer makes at least two different hollow point configurations for the Gold Dot. The 9mm, .40 and .45 ACP versions I have seen and used all have visible deep hollow cavities and the bullets are a bit long. The 158 gr. version for the .357 Magnum has a shorter profile with much sharper edges and it appears the jacket has been folded over into the hollow point. I guess the former is designed for smooth feeding in the autos while the latter was made for revolvers and looks like it would "bite" better if it struck a barrier at an angle. I have never seen a .45/250 Gold Dot, so is it the one with the wide, sharp hollow point?

All the expanded bullets I have seen usually expand far enough so that you can see the "gold dot" in the middle. I guess they're engineered to stop at this point and I never shot one fast enough to see if it would disintegrate or fail. I imagine they can take a lot of abuse, since you should be able to get at least 1800 FPS from a .454 Casull.

Dave Sinko

Wide and VERY deep. They "tune" the hollow point for the performance they desire in each cartridge. What amazes me is how do they get that 250 at 775 fps to expand better than a pure lead bullet? I don't know how, but it does.