Plugged HP

**eyegore** · February 8th, 2009, 03:14 PM

Went out shooting today with the PM9. Shot CorBon 115+p HP, Speer 124+P GDHP, Hornaday 124 TAP FPD and Remington 115 HP. Zero malfunctions with all ammo. But as I was packing up, I noticed some bullets at the back stop that I was shooting at. After some comparison of what I shot, 2 of these came from the Remington 115 HP loads, the other the Hornaday. I was shooting at about 5 yards into a piece of plywood. Did some digging but could not find any other bullets from the other loads. These definitely won't be part of any carry loads for me because of the plugged HP with no expansion. Is this common with all HP's at that range through plywood? I know that there has been issues with expansion from the short barrel handguns but having a HP plug without any expansion is a little disconcerting. Any thoughts?

**RaisedByWolves** · February 8th, 2009, 03:49 PM

I think that is pretty much normal. The plywood plugged up the tip and it acted like ball ammo from there. The HP tip is ment to work in meat and tissue and or liquids, clothing and other substances can plug most of them and cause them to not expand.

.

**Shawn.L** · February 8th, 2009, 04:03 PM

why would it expand after it passed through one thin layer of anything?

HP expand A LOT in jugs of water, but imagine them passing through a small waterfall. There is no constant pressure into the cavity.

I am not sure if I am thinking this through and explaining it right.

If you plan on defending yourself against BG's with plywood armor (thats a funny image) then you should test against shooting through plywood with ballistics gel on the other side.

**lexington86** · February 8th, 2009, 08:25 PM

HPs work because of the principles of hydraulics, meaning they need to pass through some sort of aqueous-like material to expand. This is why shooting HPs into water yields the maximum amount of expansion. The "plugging" you see is quite normal for HPs that pass through wood or drywall or clothing. What sets the good HPs apart from the bad ones is that the good ones will still reliably expand after being clogged by foreign material.

**625** · February 10th, 2009, 11:38 AM

This is one of the reasons why I will always pick .45 or .40 over 9mm if given the choice. The .45 will at least give you a .45 hole. The 9mm may only give you a .35 hole. From what I've read, heavy denim and leather jackets tend to plug hollow points as well. Box-o-truth.com has some interesting tests and results, but they hardly do extensive testing using scientific methods. I wish someone would compile a list of people that actually got shot, and show some useful info, like distance from gun to "target", type of ammo, what the target was wearing, angle target was shot, etc.

**Yoder** · February 10th, 2009, 12:00 PM

I've read a lot about hollow points and I've come to the conclusion that unless your attacker is naked, they are no better than ball ammo. Check out boxotruth, they shot through clothing and it plugged all the rounds and they never expanded. FBI ballistics reports said that expansion is not effective with handgun rounds so your best bet is using a larger caliber to punch a bigger hole. They have some new ballistic tip stuff that might be better, i need to check it out more.

**WVBob** · February 10th, 2009, 01:21 PM

Good info to have. I read a story a number of years ago that said not to use HP's when hunting hogs with a pistol because the hide could form a plug. They said to use a JFP. That's what I carried as a backup in a .357. My primary was a 12GA 870 with two buck and a slug.

**andrewjs18** · February 10th, 2009, 01:40 PM

ok...to end this...who is willing to get shot in the ass so we can test what HP ammo works best for shooting through clothing and flesh? hahahaha

**eyegore** · February 10th, 2009, 05:08 PM

Anyone see these yet?
http://www.hornady.com/story.php?s=786

**625** · February 10th, 2009, 05:32 PM

Originally Posted by eyegore

Anyone see these yet?
http://www.hornady.com/story.php?s=786

Yea, I believe Cor-Bon has a similar design they call Powrball. I was never a big fan of Cor-bon myself. Not that it's bad, but just overpriced, IMO. Hornady, I do like. They have a long history of developing high quality, high performance bullets. I think they are better known for their bullets than their loaded ammo, but those look pretty good.