Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Would you ever load hardball for defense?

I never wrote that I carried hardball, only that it could be a viable alternative in some situations as a discussion topic. Up until a couple of weeks ago, while I have hundreds of hardball 9mm, I couldn't even find 9mm HST Federal ammo. Yeah, back in 2013 I was a heck of a lot more trusting and unprepared than I am now. Kids and loaded guns around the house wasn't an option. The detective told me the same thing that had I been prepared, the WI. Castle Doctrine would have justified lethal force. Lots of false bravado on here, but in the real world bad guys do depend on good people not being prepared for an attack because they think it couldn't happen to me. It can. My kid had a some cash in his room and these guys knew it.

That's because their would have been no need

I was raised with loaded Firearms in the house 🏠

Agree...you're not gonna hear a slide racking until the dogs quit barking and it's time to reload, in my house anyways...

"I never wrote that I carried hardball, only that it could be a viable alternative in some situations as a discussion topic."


Based on what you are saying, between this statement, and your original post, your intent is to shoot them with hardball ammo, because you just want to hurt them a little bit, but you don't want to possibly kill them.



I am dead serious when I say that you need to unload your firearm and put it away, as it is in your best interest. The application of deadly force is all or nothing. You are either willing to apply deadly force or you are not.

I don't say that to be mean or rude or anything else. I say that as it honestly is in your best interest.


Shooting someone, regardless of if it is loaded with hardball or the latest JHPs is still applying deadly force. You are intentionally applying force that is likely to inflict death or serious physical injury. This nonsense about "Just shoot them in the leg" is exactly that. Poorly informed nonsense.

Unless you are presented with a deadly threat, IE in fear of death or grave bodily injury, you have no business shooting. You can "What if" it to death and carefully create scenarios but that is simply the fact. The laws in most jurisdictions require you to be in fear for your life before you are allowed to shoot someone, and shooting to wound is not part of the picture.


Back to the shooting people in the leg idea.

The legs are filled with veins and arteries and a person can die quite quickly from a leg wound. Everyone knows about the femoral artery, there are a bunch of others such as the tibial artery, saphenous vein, etc. More than I want to type out. Hardball tends to shatter bones. Bone fragments shred veins, arteries and muscle. When that happens, the odds of a guy bleeding out in short order are very high unless you get a tourniquet on the wound, and even then with shattered bones things are sketchy. The odds of losing a leg/limb unless they reach an operating table fairly quickly are also high.




The punchline here is : based on what you have typed and the series of critical thinking errors and being misinformed, you would seriously better off putting your firearm away as it presents more of a liability to you in terms of you getting yourself into massive legal trouble. Put the gun away and go buy a big can of pepper spray. You will be far safer.

I always enjoy Sagebrush's comments. I know that he has earned this knowledge the hard way and I truly respect that.

W. Bill

How would that be? Were they your son's friends? If so, he needs to find new ones. Or, does your son just talk too much?

Coworker killed a guy w ball ammo.
Arm hit. One shot.

Guy didnt die quickly, and was rather vocal about things .
Messed my coworker up

Dude bled out before medical arrived.

Please, for the sake of your family, pay a man to be present when you are at home.

Like I stated earlier, I have lots of gun loaded with non-expanding bullets, but not FMJ. Full wadcutters in 38 and 45.

Ray, I'm sure we would all be in awe at your own ability to fend off three 20 year olds wearing ski masks intent on robbing you. Heck, it only cost me 13 stitches, a permanent scar and a trip to the hospital. Cost the kid $1,400.00 in restitution, four years in jail and six years probation.

Hardball did a number on the krauts and japs in WW1 and WW2. It will work if called upon.

Pistol that resides on my nightstand is a Springfield Armory TRP, with a magazine of 230 hardball, never lost any sleep worrying about if I "had enough gun".

The thought process that ends up with you using deadly force, but choosing less effective ammo when you do so, is flawed.

But, hey, good luck with that.

I should have just read further. This nails it.

I wouldn't have been racking no slide, nor looking for a gun like a set of car keys, that I know for certain.

I have carried many different rounds in my 1911 since 1973. When I found out that the Winchester Silvertip wouldn't penetrate both sides of an empty 55 gallon drum I started using hard cast semiwadcutters, mostly 215 grain gullets from a very old mold. Shot a couple of deer and many smaller animals no problem. One day my father asked to look at my 45, jacked one out and looked at it. He said you going target shooting? I said no that is the round I carry. Why he said? It shoots great, feeds perfectly and the flat nose profile kills better than the hardball load. He said really? His WWII era GI 45 has been loaded with ball ammo forever. I doubt he had ever fired anything else in it. He joined the Army in 1944 going to Okinawa and served in Korea, Vietnam. Mustered out in 1971. Told me he was very impressed with the GI ball ammo. Wouldn't say anymore about it though. If it was good enough for him it is good enough for me. I presently don't own a 45 ACP round loaded with anything other than hardball. My 9mm's are usually loaded with 4-5 hollowpoints and the rest of the magazine gets hardball, figuring if the opposition was still alive they would be behind cover after the first rounds were fired.

I see many here still think that the Gen 1 HPs are the same as the current variety.

I think the arguments about "Which is best?" .45 ACP FMJ or HPs is more academic than practical. Yes, HPs will expand -- usually -- but FMJ bullets have proved themselves very efficient and deadly in untold thousands upon thousands of actual self defense shootings in wars, police shootings, civilian shootings, and even criminal shootings. Also, some very experienced people have no problem with FMJ bullets and carry them in their self defense pistols.

For example, in April of 1981, I attended Jeff Cooper's Gunsite School in Arizona. There were several classroom sessions with Jeff Cooper speaking. One of the students asked him what he carried in his .45? Cooper answered he carried FMJ factory rounds. He said they always worked very well and he'd had personal experience in some dangerous places. He could have carried HPs if he wanted but he preferred the FMJs. In addition to Jeff Cooper, I know that several of the founders of IPSC such as Ray Chapman, Jack Weaver, and Thell Reed used FMJs.

As Mackay Sagebrush said previously, a .45 FMJ does a tremendous amount of damage when hitting bones, and even if it doesn't hit a bone, it still makes a .45" diameter hole. That lets in a whole lotta air which is not good for one's system. As to the lethality of FMJs as opposed to HPs, I doubt that in a down and dirty self defense shooting, IF THE SHOOTER SHOOTS ACCURATELY, I imagine the result will be the same: one bad guy out of commission. I say carry whatever you want but make sure it works perfectly in your pistol. Then practice. A bunch.

So no one will think I'm blowing smoke about being at Gunsite, here I am with Jeff Cooper. I am the extremely handsome young man on his right and a friend of mine from Oregon is on his left. This was about two weeks after Chuck Taylor had left and Clint Smith was there taking his place. Interesting six days, I assure you.

BTW, as others here said, "shooting to wound" is tantamount to begging for criminal charges and civil suits.

FWIW, Jeff Cooper carried his Colt Govt. Model 1911 in a Milt Sparks Yaqui Slide.

what to do if your betta is not eating

L.W.

I don't understand a person asking about less then lethal after getting the crap beat out of him and his family in threat.

Only a true democrat could think that way.