All over the news lately has been the ATF’s intent to ban commonly available AR15 ammunition known as M855, SS109, or “green tip” ammunition. They claim that is poses a threat to law enforcement officers, citing that it possesses unique armor piercing properties. To see if M855 poses a special threat to a lawman in body armor, I decided to perform an experiment using ammunition that will NOT be subject to the ban.

**********SPOILER********** 

Pretty much any rifle round will punch through body armor, steel innards or no steel innards.

The overwhelming majority of police body armor in use today is rated to protect against pistol ammunition only, and a ban on M855 would do nothing to protect wearers of body armor. As we adhere to our “firearms, not politics” rule on the blog and TFBTV, we will not speculate as to why the ATF is proposing this ban or provide political opinion on the matter, but I believe this experiment shows how incorrect this ban is under the guise of M855 being a threat to law enforcement.

Steve says:  Some folks are going to say “why did you make this video, now the BATFE will ban my lead core 5.56mm!?!?!”. Let me be frank: your granddaddy’s 75 year old hunting rifle chambered in any medium caliber cartridge will penetrate body armour without breaking a sweat. This is no secret. There is nothing special about a mild steel core round such as the M855. The BATFE know this … but like Alex said above we are not going to speculate why the BATFE is going down this path, just show why their technical justifications are factually incorrect.