We have issued the 124gr +P Gold Dot for years, and it has been a VERY successful police duty load for us.
In 2006 we could not get the Gold Dot so I issued the 124gr +P Ranger-T load, and we found through several OISs that this was also a superb choice for duty/carry.
What's great is how many good choices there are today.
Thanks to names like Fackler, Wolberg, McPherson, our own Dr. Roberts, and all the other IWBA guys, the ammo world is a very different place today then it was 30 years ago.
Looks as though standard jacket 9mm hollow points are still meeting the FBI minimum penetration through auto glass. Makes me wonder if there is even a need for bonded loads when the regular stuff is doing this well. Also......is there a point to the .40 now since the primary complaint about the 9mm in the late 80s was poor penetration through auto glass?
As noted previously, there is a great thread on this very issue over at LF:
http://www.lightfighter.net/forum/ba...le-performance
http://pistol-forum.com/forumdisplay.php?19-Ammunition
I saw the post on LF. Great post Doc. I feel very confident in my selection of Winchester 127gr +P+ (RA9TA) ammunition in both my Glock 19 and 26, and the ammunitions performance from both weapons.
It's a tough call, and I think Doc has covered it from the different angles. I personally have no use for .40, but if I were back on the streets, making vehicle stops, I might feel differently.
Bonded vs non-bonded, same thing. With some of the non-bonded rounds doing 90%+ as well as bonded in barriers, and exhibiting better performance in bare gel, I'd only worry about bonded if vehicles were a top concern.
Great post.
One question - do you have any information on the difference between the Winchester 147gr Ranger-T series vs the 147gr Ranger SXTs?
Most of my carry battery is 124gr +P Gold Dots with some 147gr Golden Sabers for variety, but I aquired a box of the SXTs at some point or another (ordered them online sometime last year, thought they were the Ranger-Ts).
These aren't the civilian SXTs and they aren't the 8-petal, rather the 6 petal variety, but I have heard less than satisfactory things about the older SXT loads. I'm just not sure if I know how many different iterations of the SXT bullets there have been, and which ones I got my hands on...
Ranger-T is generally good to go, the older SXT variants, not so much...
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