.380 Winchester Silvertip Holowpoints

[Capt Steve]

While playing golf this morning with a retired LEO buddy of mine the subject of ammo availability came up. I told him 9mm and 22lr seem to have come back but can't find any .380 at Wally World or the local sporting goods stores. We both carry Bersa Thunder .380's as our primary CCW guns, I got mine largely based upon his recommendation. He was in a gun shop the other day and someones widow had brought in a case of the Winchester Silver tip, 85 grain hollow points. They were offered for $15 a box (of 50), and my buddy bought them all. I now have a box and the Bersa and the back up mag are loaded with them.

Anyone out there have experience with this particular round. The next trip to the range I'll shoot a couple of mags to get the feel for them. For CCW they would appear to be a better choice than the Winchester FMJ's I had been carrying. Pro or con on this round for CCW?

 

[flop-shank]

I think it's a decent round based on what I've heard, but haven't personally tried them. They're probably on par with the best rounds today, excepting perhaps the Gold Dot. If the gun likes them, I would run with that load.

 

[max]

I would have bought them all also. They work fine in my ppk/s.

 

[Erich]

Great price. I'd personally rather carry the FMJs, based on the fact that I've seen cases in which .380 JHPs failed to penetrate adequately (two cases, three shootings with failures in total in those cases) - it makes me wonder about the wisdom of putting hollowpoint "brakes" on a slow-moving, lightweight bullet.

I've never seen a case in which a .380 FMJ failed to adequately penetrate (even against large individuals) and have seen one instance of probable overpenetration by such a round from a longer barrel.

Good luck with whatever you decide to use - and here's hoping that you never have to shoot in anger, ever.

 

[mrwildroot]

I carry Silver Tips in my Chiefs, and XD45c.
Corbon DPX may be a better .380 self defense round, but the Winchester ST round should work just fine.
I would like a box of those for myself to test!
Mrwildroot

 

[flop-shank]

www.stoppingpower.net fired .380 DPX into gel (just do a search in the test bed section). IIRC it only penetrated ~ 8". I like DPX and the Barnes X bullet, but in .380 loads like the Speer Gold dot, Fiocchi Extrema, and Hornady critical defense you can get 12"+ penetration. In tests I've seen, .380 Golden sabre was shallow too, although expansion ws impressive.

www.goldenloki.com and www.brassfetcher.com also have gelatin tests that you may find on use. I don't remember if Golden Loki has .380 tests or not. In ammo I started a thread called Perma-Gel Test Results. If you study the resources I listed, you should be able to pick a good JHP load, should you choose to go that route. Just make sure your gun is 100% reliable with whatever you pick.

 

[mkk41]

The .380 Silvertip was highly rated in the old Marshall/Sanow reports which compiled actual shooting results. It has an aluminum jacket which seems to peel back better that a copper alloy jacket. I used to carry them in my old AMT Back-Up. Still use them as recommended in my Seecamp.32.

 

[44forever]

Regardless of the ammo

I'd be reluctant to carry it in a self defense semi-auto until I had run enough of that particular load through that particular gun to be sure they would feed, fire and eject reliably.

 

[BarbC]

I use them in the KelTec .380 and never had a failure to feed or eject.