https://www.americanrifleman.org/art...mag-cartridge/
Hmm. I guess I was expecting dramatic improvement over the .38 Special. I suppose most people automatically equate felt recoil to terminal performance...
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https://www.americanrifleman.org/art...mag-cartridge/
Hmm. I guess I was expecting dramatic improvement over the .38 Special. I suppose most people automatically equate felt recoil to terminal performance...
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“The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."
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Maybe I missed something but he did not show the penetration of the 4-inch barrel roll, nor comparison relative to the shorter barrel.
Really found this not to be a very useful article.
What most people don't realize is the weight of the powder contributes to felt recoil as it's converted to gas that exits at muzzle velocity.
so a load that achieves the same muzzle velocity in a given barrel length with less powder way will recoil less.
Many 357 loadings shot in Stubbies have a very large amount of unburned powder when the bullet exits, so don't really out perform a better tuned 38 loading yet have higher recoil
This is very apparent in rifle caliber pistols for hunting and IHMSA shooting. And why 7br is so popular vs 7mm08, etc. Achieves similar velocities much more efficiently. And thus with less recoil. And some accuracy improvements.
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Well, that's true for the most part but don't forget the weight of the pistol also plays an important role. Of course a GP100 or SP101 is going to be more pleasant than an LCR or S&W Airweight when fired with the same load(s).Originally Posted by pinzgauer
Articles of this type aren't ever going to be the do-all end-all. The simple fact is there are just too many loads in 357 to ever do a complete and thorough test. Lucky Gunner has similar testing that includes 4in barrel data but they also don't cover all the choices out there.
The real benefit is to get people to seriously think about what they carry and why. Just assuming you have a 357 snub in your possession gives you some kind of magic death ray is flawed thinking. This ties in with how many people still look at muzzle energy as a way to judge terminal performance.
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“The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."
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I wish they would test actual .357 magnum level loads. Just because it says .357 on the box doesn't mean it's a magnum load, it only means it's in a magnum case. Most of those in the article are just a little hotter than .38. The one exception I saw was the Federal 125 JHP at 1435 and even that's a little bit on the light side. The .357 Magnum used to push a 158 grain bullet to 1500 FPS. They downloaded that slightly to make the guns last longer and proceeded to use it quite successfully in LE for about 60 years.
I have a handload that launches a 158 grain XTP from my 2.5" Model 66 at 1250 FPS and that's the starting powder charge right out of the VV manual. That same load runs 1389 out of my 6" 686 and I've never seen a reason to go higher since it's a 158 grain bullet and it shoots well.
It's getting to the point that if we wheel gunners want true magnum performance we are going to have to load our own or buy from Buffalo Bore or Underwood, because the factories aren't loading to the cartridge potential or design parameters in most cases. Instead they choose to load to whatever flavor the current penetration standard happens to be and call it a day.
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Did you not see the 140gr Buffalo Bore load?
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“The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."
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I guess I did overlook that one. But my comment wasn't really pertaining to them either because they actually do load full power rounds and then some.
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Would shooters want full-house 357 Mag loads for EDC/concealed carry? Take a look at just about any thread relating to lightweight 357s and you'll see a number of comments about ungodly recoil.
I think the best option available for the snub is going to be some sort of 'tween load. Something that basically duplicates full-size 9mm performance from the short revolver barrel. Something that offers more pop than a 38 or 38 +P but isn't pushing the upper limits as far as pressure goes.
Hornady appears to be there now with the Critical Duty load. That is a 135gr bullet at 1,100fps. Still probably a bit snappy from a plastic 5-shooter but not likely something that can't be figured out with some practice.
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“The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."
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That's essentially what you are getting with full pop magnum loads out of a snubby and always has been for the most part. So the saying that .357 isn't any better than .38 is basically bogus, and again, it always has been. There's a great article on this on the snubnose files site. Basically it states that starting out faster in velocity still ends up faster in snubs. My chrono experience mirrors this.
If you look at the loads that performed well in the denim/gel test in this article you'll basically see that these bullets are designed for 9mm velocities. The Hornady load particularly illustrates this. Did you notice that both Gold Dot loads were clocking almost identical velocities? There's a problem with that. I can just about guarantee that the rest of the loads failed due to denim plugging or over expansion (the 95 Magtech & 110 Win). I really would have liked to see the old Remington 125 semi jacketed HP and it's heavier brother tested for comparison. All of the big 3, Rem, Win & Fed used to make these loads and they sold zillions of them.
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The Federal 125gr Classic was tested. While it turned out 1,200+ FPS it didn't penetrate well and lost a bunch of weight. How would that same load do with a modern bullet like the Gold Dot or HST?
“The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."
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That Federal load went very close to 12". Remember this was out of a barrel less than 2". Even the Hydra-Shok that everybody loves to hate on went 11". I seriously doubt a 125 grain .38SP would have got that far in the same gun.
And there were two Gold Dots tested. One was the 158 and it failed miserably by today's standard. This tells us that the old saying that if you can only have one thing, pick penetration. Because it always works.
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