Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Hunting with a 10mm?

I don't know where you got that.

A properly loaded handgun in the proper caliber does not take a back seat in the terminal department. Energy is meaningless in predicting lethality and anyone that thinks other wise is misinformed.


Exit in a mature bull elk's rib cage from a 180 grain fired from a 300 win mag. Bullet impacted with about 2600 fps, calculating to 2700 FPE. I am holding a 300 win mag cartridge for size comparison.




Exit in the same elk's rib cage from a 440 grain wid flat point hard cast fired from a 500 JRH at about 950 fps for 888 FPE.




The bullet with the least energy in this case did the most damage from start to finish.

The fact that big bore revolver cartridges with a good SWC or LBT work so well, yet produce so little kinetic energy should make folks question the validity of KE as a gauge of a cartridge's effectiveness. I guess too many believe the old horse hockey about energy and 'need' a simple answer to a very complex question.

Thank you. Well said. Folks should hunt big game with a handgun prior to making sweeping and general statements about their terminal effectiveness.

Not a user of the FPE in my caliber determinations here, either. Making a hole through vital parts and motation bones is most reliable predictor of effect. The only advantage rifle bullets have is - sometimes - (velocity needs to be pretty danged high) hydraulic overload effects far from the initial bullet strike area and path. It is usually from very high velocity and thus, hydraulic overload of the liquid filled body, that we get the bangflop/DRT type kills.

While I am not in any way diminishing a handguns ability to kill cleanly and make big holes, they cannot approach high velocity rifles in terms of damage to tissue, blood vessels and nervous system upset far from the impact zone that a rifle can impart. There are good reasons why 270's and 30/06's are used more often than 45/70's on deer and the like.

I have shot big game with exceedingly high velocity rounds like the 6/284 and 257WBY and caused bruising (burst blood vessels) across the entire ribcage and front shoulders of big game animals. Usually, in these cases, the lungs and upper heart are poured out of the thoracic cavity in liquified form. Travel after the hit from the animals is usually zero or maybe a couple of staggering steps, and that is all she wrote. A big hole from a big bore revolver would also have killed, if one was close enough to make a good hit, but not as dramatically or quickly and certainly not from as far away.

BUT, we cannot make a handgun bullet of sufficient weight go that fast out of a revolver or any managable semi auto handgun (I do not consider the XP-100's or long barreled Contenders etc to be true handguns, but more of a hybrid) to create those kinds of velocities so we have to rely on adequate penetration, sometimes with SOME expansion, and great bullet placement to do the job.

There are times in the hunting fields, such as trailing in thick cover that I much prefer a handgun to a rifle. IME the handgun does not always come in second to a rifle.

Safariman, are you a handgun hunter?

I have told this story before. One day checking fences I came up on a mamma hog (Eurasia) and her piglets. She saw me. She bluffed once. I pulled out my 1911. She then charged me from 35-40 yards away. I was able to hit her twice in the head and one near miss in her shoulder. I had to jump out of the way as she ran right through where I was standing. While she was turning to come back to me, she fell and went down. If I had not jumped, she would have got me. I then finished her off with a brain shot. She was full of adrenaline because of her piglets. The two shots that hit her in the head made a mess of her head, but she was still on the hoof running. I was shooting a 45 ACP with 230gr XTP's.

I started carrying my Colt Delta elite after that. We have a growing problem with these hogs on the farm. The 10mm probably would not have made a difference in this case. But who knows.

Now, here is what I did.
I carry a 1911 all the time on the farm. You can hop on a tractor, hop in a truck or four wheeler, chop wood or do anything you want and that 1911 is comfortable all day long. Even during duress, I do not "point and spray". But, I wanted to be able to shoot faster and harder. I was looking at the 460 Roland for a long time. After this incident, I went ahead on the project. The 460 uses a chambered compensator at high pressures. You can get off a shot accurately much faster. You are shooting well into the 41 magnum power with control of like shooting a 45 ACP. You have to try one to believe it. The 1 1/2" extra on the barrel has never caused a problem on the farm. That was my solution to help my current situation. I use Hardcast bullets for the penetration aspect. Like jwp475 and I have discussed, the jacketed bullets for the 45ACP are limited in the Super or the 460. They just are not built for those velocities. The 40 Bullets have thicker jackets, and hold up better in my experience. But I am sold on the comp for quick and accurate follow up shots. This is a wilderness self protection application, not a conceal carry one.

FPE is not accurate in any manner as to predicting terminal performance as these picture perfectly illustrate.

Exit in a mature bull elk's rib cage from a 180 grain fired from a 300 win mag. Bullet impacted with about 2600 fps, calculating to 2700 FPE. I am holding a 300 win mag cartridge for size comparison.




Exit in the same elk's rib cage from a 440 grain wid flat point hard cast fired from a 500 JRH at about 950 fps for 888 FPE.




The bullet with the least energy in this case did the most damage from start to finish.


The ballistic pendulum proves positively the the belief in complete energy transfer is totally incorrect



The only total transfer is momentum which is what the pendulum measures, kinetic energy is calculated, not measured.

The grizz and moose on the left








A rifle would not have been more effective than the 475 used in the top photo or the 500L used in the bottom photo

Whitworth, I have shot a few critters with handguns, but do not classify myself as a handgun hunter. That said, I have shot quite a bit of game with large non expanding bullets in Africa and a few over here. They work, obviously, and kill stuff just as dead if one can get close enough to make a good shot. AND, if one is a far better shot with a handgun than I am!

The 475 Linebaugh with a 420 grain bullet at 1400 fps has 11.6 Newtons forces. The 300 win mag with a 180 grain bullet at 3000 fps has 10.665 Newtons force.

When converting to force the handgun does not take a back seat to 300 win mag rifle in fact the handgun takes the front seat.

Yet it is not force OR FPE that do the job. It is tissue and bone destruction, period. Secondary missile tissue damage and hydraulic overload damage to distant parts of an animals anatomy do not occur until the impact velocity is well over 2,000fps. Big bullets absolutely do work, one would have to be quite ignorant to debate that. But on some game animals, a quicker kill yet can be the result of secondary missile (pieces of bone, tissue, etc) and hydraulic pressures busting up distant blood vessels and Nerve centers via the effects of bullet velocity. This is why the fast .224's often give much quicker kills that a 45/70 or even a 30/30.

Probably the best description and explanation of this I have ever seen, and these results are backed up by experiments run by the military in the 40's and 50's as well as field observation of thousand upon thousands of hunters. A great read:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrostatic_shock


Then there is the fact that a whole lot more people can shoot a 300WinMag better than they will ever shoot a 475 anything. I can shoot my 340 and 416 Rifles, but disdain a handgun above a 44 Magnum in power and recoil.

Have we sufficiently hijacked this thread?

Do any of the last ten posts by anyone have ANYTHING to do with the 10mm? Not much, I fear

But this stuff sure is fun!

Big Bore Bullet make big holes and this lets a lot of blood out and lot of air in quick and this is what kills any animal, regardless of their size

Force is indeed a factor in producing the wound channel. I highly recommended this book on the subject.

That looks like it would be a great read. If I find it for sale I will grab it and read it.

Always willing to learn and expand my knowledge base.

"The single most expensive thing a man can own, is a closed mind"

PS Thanks again for the refferal to Jack Huntington. As soon as I sell a couple of toys and have some play money, he will be seeing my RIA 1911 in 10mm and 329PD for action and trigger work. Maybe sight replacement on the 329, as well.

The idea of damage at distant locations from the wound channel is a bit controversial to say the least.

I shoot hogs regularly with a suppressed .44 mag, using 300 - 335gr either "solid" Barnes bullets or Hard Cast at under 1100 fps. Penetration is amazing, kills are quick and sure - BUT the ranges are 75 yards or less. I have shot a large sow at 130 yards with a .300 Win Mag and 130gr Barnes TTSX that went down just as fast, with more tissue damage. The difference is the range a pistol is effective at versus a rifle of this type. Had I been able to hit the hog at 130 yards with my suppressed .44, I think the big hard cast would have penetrated, because once they start moving they slow down, but keep moving - if that makes any sense? The damage in that case, however, would not have been as much as the .300 Win Mag. Hand guns are short range weapons, with short barrels. Rifles can be long range weapons, with much longer barrels and telescopic sights. Different tools for different uses, but each can well be "better" for the use it was designed for than the other.

I consider the 10mm to be a high velocity, lower bullet weight "weapon", almost like a rifle hen compared to a larger caliber, slower velocity handgun - longer effective range, probably not as good as a heavier, slower bullet up closer. (see, Mark? I got in something about 10mm.

Not to those who have seen it hundreds of times, it isn't. Nor is it controversial to those who have studied it in depth like the US Military and others. I used a 300RUM for collecting bait animals in Africa because it, more often than not, put everything it touched right down, right now. No tracking, dragging, chasing etc. when getting as many baits into the trees as possible in as short a time as possible. Could have used my 416 Rigby with 350-400gr bullets that would have had a much higher theoretical knock out factor but on real live animals, impact speed and the resultant trauma to the not touched directly CNS etc. was the hands down winner for DRT, right NOW.

Well Mark you need to do a bit more research on the subject IMHO Dr. Fackler was a battle field surgeon before he turned his life's work to the study of wound ballistics and doesn't agree. I tend to stand on his take of the matter.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrostatic_shock



Fackler's contra-claim[edit]
Dr. Martin Fackler, a Vietnam-era trauma surgeon, wound ballistics researcher, a Colonel in the U.S. Army and the head of the Wound Ballistics Laboratory for the U.S. Army�s Medical Training Center, Letterman Institute, claimed that hydrostatic shock had been disproved and that the assertion that a pressure wave plays a role in injury or incapacitation is a myth.[16] Others expressed similar views.[17][18]

Dr. Fackler based his argument on the lithotriptor, a tool commonly used to break up kidney stones. The lithotriptor uses sonic pressure waves which are stronger than those caused by most handgun bullets,[citation needed] yet it produces no damage to soft tissues whatsoever. Hence, Fackler argued, ballistic pressure waves cannot damage tissue either.[19]

Dr. Fackler claimed that a study of rifle bullet wounds in Vietnam (Wound Data and Munitions Effectiveness Team) found �no cases of bones being broken, or major vessels torn, that were not hit by the penetrating bullet. In only two cases, an organ that was not hit (but was within a few cm of the projectile path), suffered some disruption.� Dr. Fackler cited a personal communication with R. F. Bellamy.[16] However, Bellamy�s published findings the following year[20] estimated that 10% of fractures in the data set might be due to indirect injuries, and one specific case is described in detail (pp. 153�154). In addition, the published analysis documents five instances of abdominal wounding in cases where the bullet did not penetrate the abdominal cavity (pp. 149�152), a case of lung contusion resulting from a hit to the shoulder (pp. 146�149), and a case of indirect effects on the central nervous system (p. 155). Fackler's critics argue that Fackler's evidence does not contradict distant injuries, as Fackler claimed, but the WDMET data from Vietnam actually provides supporting evidence for it.[20][21]