One area where the 357 shines over other duty calibers is penetration. However extra penetration is not wanted most of the time. Most self defense or duty 357 ammo now a days is made to meet FBI criteria which means they have to keep penetration down. So Speer Gold Dot 135 grain 357 are a little slow but expands to .6 and penetrates 16 inches (Im using generalities, not actual numbers) which isnt much different than 9mm loads. But if you take full house hunting rounds like a Hornday XTP you get a bit less expansion and a bunch more penetration.
Im betting that the 158 grain loads from years ago fall more in line with the hunting loads of today. Moderate expansion and a shit load of penetration. Compare that to the light weight hollow point 38s and 9mms of the time and you are going to to a marked improvement in performance shooting through limbs and at odd angles.
A couple guys on my squad got into a shooting over the summer with a woman. Long story short my buddy shot this chick in the shoulder. she had a full side profile to him so the bullet is going in the outside of the arm towards the chest. Round was a 230 grain +P HST fired from a Glock 21 at a distance of about 10 yards. Bullet hit the humerus right at the top where it starts to go into the shoulder joint. Shattered the bone and completely immobilized her right arm but it had very little penetration after and never made it into the chest cavity. Im betting a full house 158 grain 357 would have penetrated more based on what Ive seen it do animal bones.
C co 1/30th Infantry Regiment
3rd Brigade 3rd Infantry Division
2002-2006
OIF 1 and 3
IraqGunz:
No dude is going to get shot in the chest at 300 yards and look down and say "What is that, a 3 MOA group?"
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