Home Barrel length Short and Loud: The 16 inch 308 Win Precision Rifle Short and Loud: The 16 inch 308 Win Precision Rifle. Average penetration is about 12 inches, depending on testing variables. It is also generally accepted as an effective cartridge for personal defense. I had initially assumed that someone took a barrel and a hacksaw and recrowned the barrel at 16, 14, 12, 10, 8…. I can't imagine many OTC brands you would find at local stores getting much faster than that unless you use +P. To get their .357 loads to run through my coonan I had to drop from a 24# recoil spring to a 20#. Each load was fired off the bench from a distance of 25 yards. is one of those cartridges we all take for granted. Conversely, a bullet that fails to expand (usually after passing through a barrier that collapses or plugs the hollow cavity) will not increase in diameter. I've noticed about a 100-200fps increase in velocity between the pistol barrel and the 16" one. SD 16 06-25-2010, 03:14 PM #4: bmcgilvray. I have owned both barrel lengths in Rossi m-92s in 357 mag. .38+P comes close, but falls short, despite the test .38 special having an extra half inch of barrel(4″). Small revolvers of this type are a common choice for lawful concealed carry and make an excellent choice for discreteness. The good news is we have a new data point to consider with this load. And remember to also check the list of ammunition tested as part of the Cylinder Gap tests. The .357 Magnum delivers a maximum average pressure of 35,000 PSI, with … I fired five groups of fire rounds each for a total of 25 rounds with each load. Click here for a Muzzle Energy graph for the tests in this caliber. Compare all 38 Special ammunition manufacturers on one easy to read chart. Back in 2004 I did a test with 9mm ammo velocities. I am considering buying a ruger sp101 3 inch barrel in either 38 sp or 357 mag. I was just so happening to test out some short barrel .357 loads from the speer book and took some 38spl I was working on. Barrel length is not a stand-alone determiner of velocities and therefore energies. Bullets are .357″ for jacketed and .358″ for lead in diameter. Bullets recovered from bare gel are pictured on the left while bullets recovered from clothing are on the right. Given the commonality of concealment revolvers chambered in .38, I thought it might be interesting to see how this cartridge fares from a short barrel using part of the FBI testing standard. Posts: 361 Some .38 Special Velocity Tests . Unfortunately, there’s not really a way without testing for yourself with a chronograph or someone else who already has with a 16” barrel. 5 5. February 13, 2015 Bill Marr Barrel length, Barrel length and velocity, Precision Rifles, Rifles 0. 7 2 27. comments. Buy a chronograph. VELOCITY VERSUS BARREL LENGTH. JHP: Cor Bon 200 gr. Without hand loads, any particular brand ammo I may have luck with? Zundfolge, Oct 27 ... 16 inch barrel with modern ammunition,even with pistol caliber,would rarely result in something like that. The crux of the FBI’s terminal ballistics testing is that a handgun bullet, to have a good chance of causing rapid incapacitation to an assailant, must penetrate to between 12” and 18” in 10 percent ordnance gel. less to start.) We now have a pretty good idea how this load may perform at a velocity less than 800 feet per second. The .38 Special round is generally accepted as an effective cartridge for personal defense. (See note on Powders below or read all about various Powders.) But, i also feel comfortable with a bigger gun. Most loads either lacked the velocity to reach the minimum 12” mark or were of an unreliable design that would not reliably expand when passing through clothing. You are looking for a 158 grain .38 standard velocity, available at most stores. There are some truly excellent bullets available for these two cartridges and either makes a good choice for both duty and defense. TestPilot, Oct 27, 2006 #3. real* world weapons: Cor Bon 165 gr. https://www.outdoorlimited.com/handgun-ammo/38-special/federal-american-eagle-handgun-ammo-rebate/federal-38-special-american-eagle-ae38b-158-gr-lrn-50-rounds/, Out of my Rossi you might as well be shooting .22lr in terms of of recoil. by Andrew Butts - Just "guesstimating" based on BBTI data, it looks like most 38 special … Expanding on the line of +P personal defense loads taking aim at those packing subcompact handguns, Federal's new 130-grain .38 Special round packs a punch. That doesn't seem to jive with what I experience on a day-to-day, range-trip to range-trip experience. Smith & Wesson made a bazillion .38 Special Model 10s, most with tapered five-inch barrels. The .38 Special round delivers a maximum average pressure of 17,000 PSI. While shootings involving law enforcement officers and shootings involving legally armed citizens may not be exactly comparable, the need for handgun ammunition that meets the FBI’s testing parameters is an important point to consider. The bottom line is that the short barrel really appears to tax the 38’s performance. While the .38 Spl. The 16 inch was more handy in tight brush and a little lighter. Thanks, that's what I was thinking heavy projectile and standard load. 253 ft. Without hand loads, any particular brand ammo I may have luck with? That's what I hoped to find out when I recently enlisted Jason Weaver of DVC Labs to gelatin-test an even dozen different .38 Special loads in the two-inch barrel. Member . Get the American Rifleman Insider newsletter for at-a-glance access to industry news, gear, gun reviews, videos and more—delivered directly to your Inbox. With light loads, it boosted a truly anemic .38 Special cowboy load up to +P velocities, and it gave the .38 Special +P equivalent load a 20 percent velocity increase. has always been known as an accurate cartridge and most loads produced groups under 3”. Factors such as barrel/cylinder gap, (in revolvers) chamber dimensions, chamber throats, (in revolvers) barrel throats, rifling depth and dimensions, rifling style or type, barrel material, bullet material and powder burn rate, etc., all have an impact on velocity achieved. inches, but that’s clearly not the case. ITEM 20C. Trying to estimate barrel length velocity progression for 38special, since guys at ballisticsbytheinch say that 16 inch barrel makes 38 special > 1100fps. Most are going to be going slower out of a 16 inch barrel than out of a 7 inch barrel due to powder burn times. All shots were fired from a distance of 10 feet from the gel blocks. Those are the only barrel lengths I use in 5.56. The front of each block was covered with a four-layer heavy fabric barrier (denim, fleece, and two layers of cotton) to simulate clothing. Our customers wanted some devastating 38 SPL loads that would fill the following criteria. Winchester White Box 130gr is advertised as being like, 800fps muzzle velocity for example. This obviously changes with different bullet types/weights. SinterFire Special Duty 110 gr Frangible HP: 16.3 inches; Winchester SilverTip Super-X 125 gr JHP: 15.96 inches; Federal LE Hi-Shok 125 gr HP: 15.82 inches; Deepest Penetration: Black Hills +P, 125 gr JHP: 22.12 inches deep. This is fine for a cqb weapon which is what the 10.3/5 is. But how does it fare from a short barrel using part of the FBI testing protocol? (Non +P) 2. Complete 38 special ammunition ballistics Chart. Yea but that's probably out of 4-5inch revolver.. It has been around forever, is available in a dizzying array of handguns and varieties of ammunition and has a good reputation for accuracy. The loss of mass results in shallow penetration. That will answer all of your questions. Gold Dot Short Barrel Personal Protection 38 Special +P. .38 Special Terminal Ballistics Suck. 2522.38 AVG 2535.38 AB39 Mk316 Mod0 Lot FC-09A750-001 ... data I could find indicated that the 16" barrel length was just about the point that the "knee" on the curve of muzzle velocity vs. barrel length occurred. As a control, I also took a box of Speer 135gr +P "Short Barrel" ammo.Here's what my Labradar recorded (Average 5rd strings): Looks like you still get more velocity with the longer barrel length, and it doesn't look like it slowed down. My testing indicates that the .38 Spl., when fired from a short-barreled revolver, struggles to meet the minimum FBI penetration specs. All told, I tested a total of eight different loads for both accuracy and terminal performance. This makes it a mild-recoiling and easy to shoot self-protection load. That's from a longer barrel, while out of a snubbie, it generates more like mid-800s fps. Join Date: Oct 2006. I took a Smith Wesson model 60 with 2" barrel, Smith Wesson 686 with 6" barrel and a Ruger 77/357 with 18.5" barrel. Once a standard choice for law enforcement work, the .38 revolver is still a prevailing choice for today’s home defender or concealed permit holder. This was followed by firing three rounds into a block that had been covered with a layer of denim, a layer of insulation and two layers of cotton shirt material. Posted by 1 year ago. This doesn’t necessarily mean that a bullet that reaches these depths in gel will penetrate as deep in flesh and bone. This is understandable since these two cartridges have become the standard for law enforcement. The K-frame grip is one many shooters find comfortable, and every grip maker who makes grips for revolvers makes them for the K frame. 20 Round Box. It continues to climb in velocity to 16 inches where the data stops for that load. So what about the .38 Special? None of the loads tested met the penetration requirements in both bare gel and gel covered by clothing but, were I to choose to carry any of these loads, I'd pick one that expands consistently while meeting the minimum penetration spec after passing through the clothing barrier. 357 continues to climb past 18 inches though. The accompanying photos summarize my testing. Much of the currently available terminal ballistics data for handguns is for .40 S&W and 9 mm Luger. Due to customer demand, we've developed this defensive 38 SPL ammo. Due to different barrel lengths, … Archived. The GP100 represents a common size and is likely to be carried while hiking or placed within a home in case of emergency. 1. This can result in excessive penetration and reduce a bullet’s overall effectiveness. RIA produces one of the most accurate 38 special revolvers, the M200. Although it still does not explain how they know the bullet’s velocity when it is at the 8” mark in a 16” barrel. The S&W 686-3 also showed a major drop in velocity with the Magtech 158 gr .357 Magnum load even though the same barrel had comparatively high velocities with some of the other loads. It won't hurt older/fragile/alloy revolvers. We followed all of the same protocols for our .38/.357 tests that we used in our semi-auto tests. Generally speaking, a bullet that breaks apart will lose its mass as it penetrates. 9mm still beats .38 special. All the others seem to max at around 16 inches too. 3.16″ 4″ 4″ 4.2″ 6″ 17″ ... which took a huge nose dive in velocity with the two jacketed .38 Special bullets compared to the 3-inch barrel and the other two 4-inch barrels. share. This durability yields a bullet that not only expands reliably but also is strong enough to pass through bone and muscle without breaking apart. This box may be representative of this particular lot of 38 Special +P GD Short Barrel and that's as much as I care to read into this test. 5-inch barrel Handload: 158 grain round nose lead /3.8 grains Bullseye MV 804 fps ME 227 ft./lbs. The .38 Spl. I know that a lot of the performance of higher rounds is lost in a shorter barrel, and shooting the higher performance rounds just results in more kick, muzzle blast, and weight. FTX loading is only 110 grains, it has an advertised velocity just over 1000 fps. Although … ES 32 SD 9 Remington 148 grain hollow based wadcutter MV 727 fps ME 174 … Redlg155 Member. For the terminal ballistics tests, I chose a Ruger LCR with a 1.87” barrel. This is the case even with the hotter +P loads. There’s a notion that in order to take advantage of high-velocity revolver loads, such as .38 Special +P or .357 Magnum, you must have a long barrel. The .38 Spl. Standard Pressure Short Barrel Low Flash Heavy .38 Special Ammo 158 gr. After the infamous “Miami Shootout” in 1986, the Bureau’s ballistics lab went to work establishing testing protocols that remain the standard nearly 30 years later. Personally, less carry weight and felt recoil are valued characteristics of a gun. Utilizing the data from the 16.5″ barrel, average velocity loss per inch of barrel length was 22.5 ft/sec for the UMC 223 55-grain cartridge, 25.7 ft/sec for the Federal M-193 cartridge, 30.3 ft/sec for the Winchester M855 cartridge, and 22.8 ft/sec for the Black Hills 68-grain heavy match cartridge. I'm still waiting for can stamp to clear so cant test myself :(, New comments cannot be posted and votes cannot be cast. Minimal 38 special velocity out of 16 inch barrel? In 1930, Smith & Wesson introduced a large frame .38 Special revolver with a 5-inch barrel and fixed sights intended for police use, the Smith & Wesson .38/44 Heavy Duty. No sooner had I finished posting above, when I remembered Ballistics By The Inch. While a 2"-3" barrel is fine for shooting .38 Special loads at short range and convenient for concealed carry, it is an abomination for a cartridge that must burn the volume of powder in a .357 Magnum case. In other words, the 16" barrel is just at the point at which if the barrel is shortened, the amount of muzzle velocity lost starts to increase more and more. Close. Joined: Dec 25, 2002 Messages: 2,725 Location: NW Florida. Privacy Policy   •   Contact Us   •   Warnings   •   FAQs   •  © 2021 National Rifle Association of America, Women On Target® Instructional Shooting Clinics, Volunteer At The Great American Outdoor Show, Marion P. Hammer Women Of Distinction Award, Women's Wildlife Management / Conservation Scholarship, National Youth Shooting Sports Ambassadors, NRA Outstanding Achievement Youth Award Presented by Brownells, National Youth Shooting Sports Cooperative Program, Marlin Model 1895: Top-Selling Lever-Action Rifle of 2020, Colt's Model 1855 Revolving Rifle in the Civil War, © 2021 National Rifle Association of America. The practical minimum barrel length for any .357 revolver is 4". Bullets designed to meet the FBI standards are usually very durable. Loads for .38 special: (Note: These are near maximum loads (in some cases ARE MAXIMUM), you should use 10%. .38 Special Results in fps. Two rounds of each load was fired into an uncovered block to establish a baseline for penetration and expansion. I believe freedom munitions loads are fairly low. However, a gun carried on the body is more effective than one that's left at home in the safe. In order to make suppressed level action whisper quiet, looking for options to keep 38 special round subsonic out of 16 inch barrel. Yea 158gr and 760fps should work. We’ll just say that the extra half inch accounts for any cylinder gap loss. These are rated below 800 fps, I’ve shot a case of them and they are definitely puffballs. A dozen loads is a small portion of the myriad factory loads available in this caliber, but it was enough to get a fair idea of what to expect from the snubbies. The .38-44 HV load used the .38-Special cartridge loaded to a much higher velocity than standard .38-Special ammunition. The barrel is responsible for most of that accuracy. There was nothing scientific about the selection process. DPX: Henry BigBoy 20" barrel: 1332: 1280: S & W Model 629 12" barrel: 1256: 1158: S & W 629-5 Classic 6.5" barrel Most of what we understand today about the terminal ballistics of pistol bullets comes from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Also tested was accuracy. Honestly, most of them. Did you measured with chrono or suppressed just works fine? I have both, 10.3” and 16”. Now, the velocity increase isn't as much, especially with the heavier projectiles, but we're not slowing down..... Is there any formula that allows to calculate increase in velocity if I know projectile weight and initial velocity, but load weight is unknown. This clothing barrier is an important factor as the materials used can plug a bullet’s cavity and render the hollow point ineffective. The .38 Special+P ammo, suitable in most medium frame revolvers, delivers a maximum average pressure of 20,000 PSI, with an average penetration of 13-14 inches in ballistic gelatin. Even prior to the introduction of the DARPA XM3, 18.5″ 308s were in use with some forward thinking shooters. Location: North Texas. Only if you see more than one load, is it less than maximum. A 4" magnum is compact and often chosen by uniformed police officers who must wear their gun and holster rig all day. On their 38 Special page, the closest to this load is Speer 135 gr Gold dot. Press J to jump to the feed. I did not test any of the loads through other FBI test barriers such as automotive sheet metal or auto glass since these barriers are probably not a major concern for the average citizen. These same loads, when fired from the lightweight LCR, were still easily manageable and I had no difficulty controlling these revolvers with any of the loads tried here. With the loads we tested, the extra barrel length of the .357 carbine paid handsome dividends. I used calibrated 10 percent ordnance gel from VYSE and fired five rounds of each load shown on the accompanying chart into gel from a distance of 10 feet. The 20 inch gave me 100 fps more velocity with warm 125 grain loads and was slightly more accurate due to the longer sight radius. In addition to being longer than average, it uses a semi-shrouded design to improve performance.The ability to fire it as either a single or double action gun adds to its versatility.The price is also fairly low in spite of the gun’s generally high quality. Wednesday, June 6, 2018. Bullet Weight: 135; $33.99 Currently Unavailable Quantity No icon name was supplied or your browser does not support SVG No icon name was supplied or your browser does not support SVG Add to Cart Warning for California Residents Gold Dot Short Barrel Personal Protection 38 Special +P Important Safety Information. lbs.) Soft Lead SWC-HC (850 fps/M.E. Cool, I looked over the data you linked, and 9mm still beats .38 special with 9mm being the top performer for penetration, expansion, and velocity out of a 3.5″ barrel. Part # 23921GD. Keep in mind that careful ammo selection may just make all the difference.Terminal Ballistics (Ruger LCR)Accuracy (Ruger GP100), E-mail your comments/questions about this site to:EmediaRifleman@nrahq.org For questions/comments about American Rifleman magazine, please e-mail:Publications@nrahq.org You can contact the NRA via phone at: NRA Member Programs1-800-672-3888, To advertise on American Rifleman, visit nramediakit.com for more information. ES 51 SD 20 Independence 130 grain FMJ round nose MV 888 fps ME 228 ft./lbs. Minimal 38 special velocity out of 16 inch barrel? Too many variables such as powder burn times, amounts, friction between the specific barrel and bullet, variations in bullet weight, etc. Short barreled 308 precision rifles are nothing new. For this testing, I used a Ruger GP100 with a 4.2” barrel. However, 30 years of laboratory testing and 30 years of officer involved shootings indicate that a bullet that penetrates deeply and expands reliably in gel also penetrates deeply and expands reliably on the street. The reason why I asked is that here http://ballisticsbytheinch.com/38special.html it says that all of them(what they tested) at 16 inch are supersonics. In order to make suppressed level action whisper quiet, looking for options to keep 38 special round subsonic out of 16 inch barrel. While a bit over-the-top, the statement holds true. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts, http://ballisticsbytheinch.com/38special.html. A place for responsible gun owners and enthusiasts to talk about guns without the politics. moments. Actual velocity from my 2-inch M-15 test gun was 833 fps. The .38 Spl., particularly when used in a full-sized handgun like the GP, is an easy cartridge to shoot and one that does not produce a great deal of recoil or muzzle blast. I dont have the exact velocity numbers, but I believe m193 and similar loads will only fragment within 25-50yds out of a 10.5”, according to crane. A .38 with a barrel of four inches or longer can serve well as a house gun. If there is only ONE load, it is MAX.