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38 special ammo
cornbean
Member Posts: 172 ✭✭✭
Will a 1948 S&W military & police 6" barrel revolver handle the +P ammo? Also what would be the best kind of ammo to buy for target and self defense shooting? Thanks
Comments
The best answer is: If a S&W is marked "+P" on the barrel by the factory, you can expect to fire a substantial quantity of +P loads safely & without excessive wear.
Your gun is not rated for +P, but there is no good reason to feed it, or any other standard .38 special, anything but standard .38 special ammo. You do not want to cause premature wear, & risk possible damage to your gun, for a marginal increase in performance.
If you feel under gunned with standard .38 special ammo, you need to move up to a .357 revolver.
.38 special wadcutters perform well for target shooting. There are many good choices for defense, & the shooter's skill & the environment where you expect to use it will determine the best type.
Neal
Will a 1948 S&W military & police 6" barrel revolver handle the +P ammo?
This may be a bit controversial, so I'll just state my opinion.
So long as the gun is otherwise in good operating condition, yes its safe to fire +P through a K-frame Smith revolver like the Smith M&P.
Contrary to popular misconception, +P ammo is at BEST only 10% more powerful than "standard" ammo, and has been specifically designed NOT to be harmful to properly built guns. I say "at best" because when chronographed, some of the so-called +P ammo doesn't actually run any hotter than standard ammo.
No WWII-era gun is ever going to be marked "+P" on the barrel or anywhere else, because the term "+P" didn't exist until quite a bit later (I think the early 1960s). And even after +P became a standardized item, it was understood that +P ammo was safe to run through any quality gun. Actually labelling guns as "+P" didn't happen until quite a bit later yet (IIRC not until the 1980s).
For example the SAAMI pressure standard on ordinary .38 special ammo is 17,000 PSI, with .38+P supposed to run up to 20,000 PSI. In the mid 1970s, the US Air Force issued high pressure .38special ammo that ran at 20,000 PSI, effectively the same as today's "+P" ammo, and that was before guns were labelled as such. The famous "FBI load" (which was a 158 grain semiwadcutter +P) was also typically fired through guns not actually labelled as "+P" capable.
Bottom line is, in my opinion, you're not going to hurt either your gun or yourself with occasional or limited use of +P ammo. At worst, hundreds or thousands of rounds of cumulative use of +P ammo will accelerate wear to the guns lockwork and reduce its service life.
Whether or not that matters, depends on you and the gun. IE is this a "beater" gun purely for defense, or is his a family heirloom you want to pass down to your great-great grandchildren? In practice, very few shooters ever really put 10-15K rounds through their revolvers to the point where service life becomes an issue, and at that point, the cost of the actual gun becomes negligible compared to the cost of the ammo run through it.
Personally speaking, the *ONLY* .38 special ammo I carry/load for defense is +P, even in older non-+P rated guns. My take is basically, if I ever actually have to shoot someone, whether or not the gun will last another 20,000 rounds after that, or only 10,000 is irrelevant. I'll have much more important things to worry about at that point!
quote:Also what would be the best kind of ammo to buy for target and self defense shooting? Thanks
Well, as mentioned, +P ammo will contribute a little extra wear and tear to both your gun and to your wallet. So I'd say its best to reserve it for pure defensive use or carry, maybe occasionally shooting some to rotate the stock and get a little bit of practice.
In general the best ammo for defense is premium commercial ammo labelled "for personal defense"; nowadays all, or virtually all of it will be labelled "+P".
For target ammo. . .that depends a little.
For general practice, whatever good factory loads you can find.
For shooting paper targets in general, flat-nosed "wadcutter" ammo is typically low velocity for low noise and recoil, highly accurate, and uses flat nosed "wadcutter" bullets designed to cut perfectly round large bore holes in target paper for accurate and easy scoring. You may not find this at a typical "big box" or sporting goods store, but if you can find it, its good for shooting targets.
If by "target" you mean serious competitive bullseye competition, almost all competitors handload their own match wadcutter ammo, and that's what you'd want to do.
If 38 Special ammo is available where you live, or you can obtain them on-line. The inexpensive "white box" types are OK for practice. Since the M & P has crude fixed sights. You would be just wasting your money by buying pricy target ammo. For personal protection ammo I would buy the 158 grain lead HP's. There standard pressure loads specifically made for use in the older fixed sight revolvers. I believe most of the ammo manufacturers make similar loads. The almost dead soft, 158 grain lead HP is supposed to be quite effective expansion and penetration wise. From the longer barrel revolvers.
But I would load it with the FBI's 158 gr lead hollowpoint +P for defense. Enough for familiarization and occasionally repelling boarders would not wear the gun out.
I would not bother with any sort of jacketed bullet.
Only the hottest .38 +P+ is going to have a chance of expanding a JHP, and the dinky plated econoball from cheapmart is not going to shoot to the sights.
But wait, that is what I actually do with any .38 of any size and age.
There seems to be a vacant space in defense load recommendations on the gunboards.
One is to insist that only the Meanest Magnums are adequate.
The other is to use standard or even target loads and depend on marksmanship.
The center, with good stout loads but not too hard on gun or shooter, seems less represented. The FBI and other agencies did well with the lead hollopoint until the autoloader fad took over.