
Originally Posted by
dbrowne1
Your "evidence" doesn't prove anything other than ability to penetrate a specific barrier material. It tells us nothing about how the bullets behave after passing through. You can set up all sorts of impressive demonstrations where a very high velocity rifle bullet penetrates a steel plate that will stop a pistol bullet, yet that "impressive" rifle bullet lacks the sectional density to reliably penetrate and incapacitate in tissue.
The reason why the "preferred popular belief" is "preferred" and "popular" is because the tests that form the basis for these conclusions actually looked at the wounding ability of the projectile after it passes through the barrier - not just how many barriers it can go through before it stops.
Most 5.56mm rifle rounds have terrible terminal performance after passing through any kind of barrier, even a thin piece of auto glass. They fragment easily, flatten, lose velocity rapidly, and generally exhibit poor penetration after passing through most barriers. 9mm pistol rounds consistently perform better in these tests (unless specific, barrier-blind 5.56mm bullets are used). How can you claim that the 9mm is safer with respect to bystanders on the other side of a house wall when it retains more wounding ability after passing through those barriers?
[sigh]
Energy is energy and it doesn't matter what the projectile is passing through. The reality is when the .223 round leaves the firearm is has approximately THREE TIMES as much energy as a 9mm round. So regardless of the medium there is THREE TIMES as much energy to be dissipated. This is true in wood, sheet rock, ballistic gelatin and people.
And that is because one is a high energy rifle round and one is a low energy pistol round. This is also what makes the 5.56 terribly effective at 100 yards and the 9mm not so effective at 100 yards. If the 9mm was the high energy super penetrator some folks are trying to make it out to be we'd be using MP5s as our primary military rifle.
But the desire to use 5.56 in CQB range is so strong it has made some people less intelligent and unable to see things like the basic energy difference between a rifle round and a handgun round.
It's hard to be a ACLU hating, philosophically Libertarian, socially liberal, fiscally conservative, scientifically grounded, agnostic, porn admiring gun owner who believes in self determination.
Chuck, we miss ya man.
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