Most of the ammunition tested consisted of various flavors of .223 designed to expand on impact, but as long as chunks of lead were being chucked through simulated walls, it made sense to include some typical handgun and shotgun rounds. These would act as a control group for the rifle rounds, and maybe also put to rest persistent myths about handgun and shotgun penetration compared to rifle rounds. Hornady TAP



TAP ammo is one of the most popular self-defense and police ammunitions. It has always held personal appeal because Hornady publishes gel test results on their website and identifies the intended purpose of the cartridge (e.g. reduced-penetration or barrier breaching). Hornady's website shows noticeably different terminal behavior in gel for their 55 and 60 grain TAP ammunition, so it makes sense to test both on drywall. These two bullet weights both use ballistic tips like the A-Max design. A-Max bullets are designed for accuracy; like traditional match hollowpoints, the base is encapsulated in copper. But instead of drawing the jacket all the way forward and leaving a tiny dimple, A-Max bullets use a pointed plastic plug. The plastic tip reduces drag and, as a nice bonus, supposedly encourages bullet fragmentation on impact. After posting this article, one reader pointed out that Hornady does not sell 55- or 60-grain A-Max bullets, although they do sell V-Max bullets in those weights. Thus, it's more likely that TAP ammo is topped by V-Max bullets than A-Max--but it's impossible to say for sure.



I couldn't source any of the Hornady TAP that uses their 40-grain V-Max bullets, but found cartridges from Fiocchi using the same bullet that should serve as a reasonable stand-in. V-Max bullets are almost identical to A-Max bullets, but are lighter and have a much thinner jacket. The "V" in "V-Max" stands for "varmint", the intended target for these bullets. Their thin jacket, light weight, and high velocity encourage fragmentation sufficiently explosive to reduce woodchucks and prairie dogs to fine pink mist. Whether the ability to disintegrate hapless rodentia will translate into reduced wallboard penetration remains to be seen. Winchester Ranger JSP



Another approach to encouraging bullet fragmentation is just leaving the tip as bare lead. This school of thought will be represented by some Winchester Ranger soft-point ammunition. Like the TAP cartridges, two weights of projectiles will be used; this will provide an apples-to-apples comparison of performance at the same bullet weight. 7.62x39mm FMJ



Given the wide variety of .223 rounds, it seemed only fair to include another intermediate rifle cartridge. Commercial FMJ 7.62x39mm isn't an optimal defensive round, so this isn't so much a serious test but instead a desire not to miss the chance to shoot a common cartridge through drywall to see if it did anything interesting. .45 ACP Ball



Do all walls fall to hardball? American Eagle ball ammo represents the canonical 230-grain .45 ACP load, and should be equivalent to any of the dozens of ball ammo loadings commonly available. 9mm JHP



Another popular loading for self-defense firearms is 9mm jacketed hollowpoints. 115 grain is the lightest common bullet weight in 9mm, so it made sense to use some of those to represent the light, fast, and hollowpoint end of the handgun round spectrum. .380 Auto Ball



.380 Auto is enjoying a surge in popularity as manufacturers introduce more guns for it. Many people eschew hollowpoints in these small guns, both on the grounds of terminal ballistics (hollowpoints in .380 tend to underpenetrate) and for increased feeding reliability. When it was introduced, it was considered a powerful chambering for a defensive arm; nowadays, most people consider it below their acceptable minimum power level. Would walls feel the same way? 12-gauge 00 Buckshot



Any selection of defensive rounds would be most remiss without the inclusion of some good old-fashioned 00 Buck. The particular variety used here was Winchester "military-grade" buckshot. Guess that means it was made by the lowest bidder. Even restricting the field to 00 buck (which leaves out the increasingly popular #1 buckshot loading), there's an amazing variety of loads available. The Winchester ammo should suffice to give a general idea of how many walls buckshot will go through. Summary Cartridge Bullet Type Weight (gr.) Fiocchi Extrema V-Max ballistic tip 40 Hornady TAP ballistic tip 55 Hornady TAP ballistic tip 60 Winchester Ranger pointed soft point 55 Winchester Ranger power point 64 Wolf 7.62x39mm FMJ 122 Federal American Eagle .45 ACP FMJ 230 Speer Gold Dot 9mm JHP 115 Magtech .380 Auto FMJ 90 Winchester 12-gauge buckshot 00 Next Page