Originally Posted by
WDR
That is the pressure for that particular combo, in their testing, of those components, at their listed max charge, not the specification for .38 Special. IE: the pressure they measured in testing of their listed max load.
I understand your reasoning for pursuing this idea, and the thoughts have occurred to me as well. I suspect if the demand was there, you'd see some of the more modern 9mm bullets adapted for .38 or .357 use... but the demand just isn't there I guess. The closest things to a modern .38 JHP load to date, IMHO: Winchester 130gr bonded bullet, the 135gr Speer Gold Dot bullet, and the Federal 130gr HST (which seems like a flop, IMHO). I was excited about the HST load when I first heard about it, but the unconventional "wadcutter" style loading seems to have turned some folks off of it, me included. I'd have preferred to see a more conventional HST bullet in .38. The new .38 Punch load seems close. I've not yet been tempted to try it though.