Shot placementOriginally Posted by Tom_Jones
I sincerely hope your Mrs. is doing better!
Shot placement
I sincerely hope your Mrs. is doing better!
I needed a Griffin taper muzzle comp for my 10.5 inch LMT upper so I can put a can on it after ATF gives me permission. I went with linear comp with the idea that blast would be directed forward and hopefully be effective if shot without the can on. I can't say it's quieter with it on but it sure throws a much bigger flame.
We could isolate Russia totally from the world and maybe they could apply for membership after 2000 years.
I'm working my way through the thread and just finished post #1130. I have a couple of questions that it doesn't appear will be answered as I go through it and would appreciate some guidance.
The main question is what's wrong with using the subsonic rounds in a defense mode? Isn't that (anti-personnel) mode the way the military is using it?
The numbers show the subsonic rounds slightly better than a .45 caliber Personal Defense Weapon (PDW), for maybe some increase in size over a Pistol-Caliber Carbine (PCC) and maybe some increased blast, concussion, noise. If that trade-off is acceptable, it appears to me the ability to add in supersonic rounds, even with some slight re-configuration like a different buffer, would make the 300 BLK a no-brainer over a PCC.
I notice that some experienced people are not doing it this way, so there must be something I'm overlooking. School me, please.
The overarching benefit of a PDW or PCC over a conventional handgun is a marked improvement in ability to consistently hit the intended target. Expert skill with a handgun requires significant commitment to achieve, is perishable, deteriorates rapidly under stress, and, thus, is vanishingly rare when things go sideways, even among the community of serious shooters. A PDW/PCC brings considerable help to those difficult challenges.
The overarching benefit of a PDW over a PCC is that it brings a rifle cartridge to the party. Terminal effects of a rifle round over a pistol round are profound.
Alas, that rifle round, triggered in an enclosed space, brings a significant increase in blast and concussion. Triggering a supersonic round from a PDW in one's bedroom is likely a permanent trade of some of your hearing for stopping whatever it is that needs being stopped.
It was in recognition of all those competing demands that gave birth to the .300 Blackout. A subsonic loading of that cartridge, preferably with a suppressor, retains much of the terminal effectiveness of a rifle round, without destroying your hearing.
Yes, many of us think it very much has a place.
OK I'm not trying to start a fight, I have 300 BLK rifles and I'm a fan, but it's not my impression that much of the terminal effectiveness of a rifle round is retained in a subsonic 300 BLK load. Are you saying that a load making just over 1000 fps is producing permanent stretch cavities like a true rifle round running, say, 2500 fps? My impression of the subsonic BLK is that its' wounding capability is similar to a handgun, but with better SD and therefore better trajectory and longer effective range.
I'm ready to be schooled if I'm wrong.
The biggest drawback of 300 BLK subsonics is the lack of projectiles that will reliably open up at those velocities. Off the top of my head, the only two choices are the Lehigh offerings and the Hornady 190 gr Sub-X. The former seems to be proven in hunting circles, but is too expensive for most of us to be able to practice with any regularity. I had great hopes when the latter was announced, but from what I've read it doesn't open up reliably enough to trust for home defense. The 220 gr loads that you (used to) commonly see on shelves are great for plinking, but they won't open up since they were designed for .308 velocities. I've read that they're known to drill right through a railroad tie without much deformation. A 9mm or 45 would probably do much better.
From what I have heard of military use, it's only issued to Special Operations and only used in niche cases. I was lucky enough to buy a few thousand once-fired 300 BLK casings at the beginning of the 'Rona panic. The seller said that they came from the test range at the NSWC Crane facility in Indiana. Ninety percent of the casings were Remington and very very sooty, so I'm guessing they were the subsonic load with the 220 gr match bullet. My wild ass guess is if that's what the SEALs are using, they're for nighttime raids where they're trying to take out a building or compound without alerting the entire neighborhood, but you're talking about a team of elite soldiers with dual-tube NVGs, IR lasers, and the numbers to cover each other. Multiple headshots are probably the order of the day, and they most likely have supersonic loads handy if things go south.
The general consensus seems to be suppressed pistol calibers if you prioritize your hearing, and 5.56 and supersonic 300 BLK if you prioritize terminal performance. Personally, I picked up a Ruger 77/44 so I can play with heavy 300 gr subsonics.
Last edited by 757_Magnum; 11-11-2020 at 07:09 PM.
No, you're not wrong. I overstated the case for subsonic 300 Blackout a bit.
What I will say is that subsonic loads from a 300BLK PDW give you the upper end of conventional handgun performance out of a platform with much higher capacity and much higher hit probability. I'd much rather have one of those than the Glock 21 that rests on my nite stand.
But, yeah, to get true rifle round terminal performance you'd need to go supersonic.
A post from another thread by a forum member that has operational experience with 300 BLK:
As some of you may know, I don’t give a fuck what gelatin test results look like. I care what meat and bone testing results look like. They are different often enough that the former holds very little sway over my ammunition selection decisions.
I’ve only used 110 TTSX and 220 OTM subs for social work, and if given the choice, I’ll take the subs all day.
The 110’s do a lot of damage to be sure. But they don’t suppress well, for what (I hope) are obvious reasons. The subs often don’t look terribly impressive on paper or in gel but the results they produce when popping skulls open is undeniable, and they are substantially quieter than their supersonic half-weight counterparts.
Since most infantry engagements are inside 200 yards, and most civilian engagements are substantially closer than that, the terminal differences between subs and supers are negligible. As for “outperforms” claims, according to who and in what capacity? When it comes to shooting assholes, If you can shoot, whatever you are shooting will outperform the ammunition being used by people who can’t shoot.
I don't know if that reply was in support of my post or not. I do remember that member's post, and I can't argue with his results, especially 220 gr subs to the head. There's still the issue of overpenetration that we have to deal with as civilians. I also agree that gel tests don't tell the whole story. However, I've also read numerous posts on other forums where subs acted like an arrow on deer and hogs, letting them run for a distance or even getting away, but supers were observed to deliver DRT performance better than 5.56 hunting loads. I'll also add that the esteemed DocGKR discourages the use of 300 BLK subs for home defense, and I'm comfortable taking his advice.
I had David Stark the owner of Discrete Ballistics in class recently and I have to say I’m pretty impressed with his 188 gr solid copper Selous round.
https://youtu.be/c4KtcBeoBuU
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