Through the Modern Calibers series of posts, we’ve covered 40 different rifle and pistol calibers, ranging from the diminutive .22 Winchester Magnum to full power calibers like the 7.62x51mm NATO. The series was intended to give readers a baseline picture of how [Read More…]
We shoot Hornady .357 Sig 147gr XTP ammunition from a Glock 22 with a 4.25″ .357 Sig conversion barrel into Clearballistics ballistic gel to measure velocity, penetration, expansion/fragmentation, and retained weight. Buy it at Ventura Munitions. Bare gel Penetration: 23.6″, [Read More…]
In March of 1963, a man named Lee Harvey Oswald purchased an M38 Carcano rifle and some quantity of ammunition from Klein’s Sporting Goods in Chicago. Oswald would later use this rifle and ammunition (or so the official narrative goes) to assassinate the [Read More…]
The United States Marine Corps has finally officially announced its adoption of the 5.56mm M855A1 EPR round, developed in the late 2000s by the US Army, marking an important step towards ammunition commonality between the two services. Until now, the USMC has officially [Read More…]
Those eagerly awaiting the market for the new .224 Valkyrie round have something to celebrate. Gunmaker JP Enterprises recently announced that they are now offering three different barrels for the new cartridge, in 20″ light, 20″ medium, and 22″ medium [Read More…]
We shoot Hornady .44spl 165gr FTX ammunition from a S&W Model 69 with a 4.25″ barrel into Clearballistics ballistic gel to measure velocity, penetration, expansion/fragmentation, and retained weight. Buy it at Ventura Munitions Bare gel: Penetration: 11.3″, 11.7″ Retained [Read More…]
Hornady Manufacturing recently announced an expansion to its Critical Duty line with a new 9mm load. The new load uses a 124 gr FlexLock bullet that is lighter than the previous 135 grain offerings in this line. The 124 grain Critical Duty load is loaded to [Read More…]
Recently on The Firearm Blog we talked about one of the great might-have-beens, the German caseless G11 rifle developed by Heckler & Koch during the 1970s and 1980s. Today we have a video from 1990 filmed at Aberdeen Proving Grounds of a demonstration of the G11K2 [Read More…]
Is the US Army pushing for a new high-powered 6.Xmm caliber with their new NGSAR program? Recently, the listing for the NGSAR industry day in December was updated with a document describing in part the agenda of the second conference. Scheduled for 9:45 in the morning [Read More…]
The first holster to be issued with the US Army’s new Modular Handgun System, including both the M17 and M18 pistols, will be a variant of the Safariland 7TS holster, featuring both ALS and SLS locking systems. The holster is the first of at least three holsters [Read More…]
The US Army has announced a decision to field the M17 MHS as a sidearm to more soldiers than were previously issued M9 handguns. Where previously only senior leadership were authorized to carry handguns, with the new M17 and M18 Modular Handgun System squad and team [Read More…]
Bare gel: Penetration: 13.2″, 13.8″ Retained weight: 177.0gr, 175.2gr Max expansion: 0.741″, 0.721″ Min expansion: 0.540″, 0.504″ Buy it at Ventura Munitions. We shoot Fiocchi .357mag 125gr XTP ammunition from a S&W Model 13L with a 4″ barrel and a Rossi [Read More…]
Hornady Manufacturing Company rolled out a number of new loads in recent months. Several of those belong to the Match and Superformance Match lines. Match Hornady added three new loads to the Match line. The first load is a 300 Norma Magnum cartridge that uses a 225 [Read More…]
If you are a waterfowl hunter, the new ammunition line from HEVI-Shot may be of interest. The company recently announced a new series of shotgun loads that were specifically designed for snow geese and other waterfowl called HEVI-Snow. HEVI-Snow loads use steel shot and [Read More…]
A company called SlapShot USA has developed quite interesting shotgun slug concept. Their slugs are called Precision Home Defense (PHD) slugs. They are made of a proprietary polymer material and loaded to achieve a quite high muzzle velocity of 3000 fps. Besides being [Read More…]
We shoot Browning .40 S&W BXP 180 gr X-Point ammunition from a Glock 22 with a 4.5″ barrel into Clearballistics ballistic gel to measure velocity, penetration, expansion/fragmentation, and retained weight. Bare gel: Penetration: 13.2″, 13.8″ Retained weight: 177.0gr, 175.2gr [Read More…]
The bloody battle for the Syrian city of Raqqa has been since been won by the Kurdish Peshmerga with U.S. support. But while it was raging, we wrote about the Polish volunteer fighting with the Peshmerga with a public name and Facebook book title of Archer. After [Read More…]
In the comments section of my recent Brief Thoughts article regarding caseless ammunition, there was a discussion about whether the cookoff issues of caseless would also be problem for LSAT-style polymer cased telescoped ammunition. Based on conversations I have had [Read More…]
A warning against romanticism in military planning. In the early 1940s, the US Army Air Corps (USAAC) made a fateful decision that would affect the lives of tens of thousands of men over the next decade. Two years prior, the Army had just begun testing her newest [Read More…]
In the world of “might-have-been” small arms, a world of .276 Garands and NATO-standard EM-2s, none flew so high nor fell so far as the Heckler & Koch G11 caseless hyperburst assault rifle. Designed to out-match any contemporary small arm in a Cold War [Read More…]
Texas company True Velocity, LLC, has released the first images of their advanced lightweight polymer composite cased ammunition design via Instagram. Training company BAT Defense sent out an image of what appear to be 12.7×108, .50 BMG, and 5.56mm rounds made by [Read More…]
We shoot Fiocchi .38 spl 125gr XTP ammunition from a Rossi M92 lever action carbine with a 16″ barrel into Clearballistics ballistic gel to measure velocity, penetration, expansion/fragmentation, and retained weight. Buy it at Ventura Munitions. Guns in this video: Rossi M92 Thanks to our [Read More…]
Earlier this month, the Serbian Army debuted a new 6.5 Grendel weapon system, developed by Zastava. The rifle, called M17, is a heavily modified variant of the M70 AK family that has been developed by the company for decades. It incorporates a number of significant new [Read More…]
Caseless: The ammunition designer’s holy grail, and the engineer’s worst nightmare. It would obsolete the cartridge case overnight, resulting in cheaper, lighter, and more compact ammunition. Weapons would be able to carry 50, 60, or more rounds in slim, [Read More…]
CCI has introduced .22 LR ammunition with polymer coated bullets. Although the polymer coating is nothing new in the industry, looks like nobody has commercially offered polymer coated .22 LR before. These CCI cartridges are loaded with 40-grain bullets traveling at [Read More…]
With Level IV armor rising in availability, calls for “overmatch”, and the increased presence of urban warfare, will designers be able to meet the requirements for future small arms? Forumgoer Poliorcetes raised this question in a discussion at the Military [Read More…]
IMR recently announced an addition to its Enduron line of powders. The new powder is the IMR 8133. The 8133 is the fifth powder offering in the Enduron line. IMR considers the Enduron line to be one of its “improved powders” that offers increased temperature [Read More…]
We shoot Remington .357 mag 158gr SJHP ammunition from a Rossi M92 lever action carbine with a 16″ barrel into Clearballistics ballistic gel to measure velocity, penetration, expansion/fragmentation, and retained weight. Buy it at Ventura Munitions Guns in this video: Rossi M92 Thanks to our [Read More…]
If we can make a round that is significantly better than the existing 5.56mm or 7.62mm ammunition, shouldn’t the military just bite the bullet and switch, to the benefit of the servicemen and women in harm’s way? What’s stopping the powers that be from [Read More…]
“Shhh… tell everyone!” That’s how Hornady starts their marketing for their new 300 Blackout Subsonic Ammunition, and gives you a clue who might find an interest. The bullet weight is 190 grains and “Sub-X” stands for Subsonic [Read More…]