I have both a Remington 700 and AAC 9" upper in 300 BO. Love the round and rifles. Very happy with the effectiveness of my supersonic loads. Im questioning the real effectiveness of 300BO Subsonics vs 147gr 9mm. Looking at the gel tests and published numbers you get ~500ME from 300 BO 220gr. and ~350ME from 9mm 147gr in a 7" barrel. However the gel tests show that most 300BO subsonics over penatrate and do not expand. Verses most high end 147gr 9mm which have near perfect penatration and max dump of energy into soft targets.

In soft tissue will 300 BO simply zip though the target and not dump any more energy than 9mm?

Thoughts?

Yes if one uses a non expanding subsonic 30 cal bullet.

If you use a subsonic expanding .30 cal bullet it completely changes the playing field.

Other than Lehigh, what other options are out there.

outlaw state 225 grain fracturing bullets .

Right now there aren't a lot of options for expanding subsonic bullets and the Lehighs are very expensive.  I believe Fat McNasty has developed one as well, hopefully he will get setup to sell them soon.  Hopefully with the popularity of the round we will see more manufacturers design expanding subs.

I would never shoot a deer for example with a 147gr 9mm but I do not hesitate to shoot deer with
220 grain 300 Whisper.

Cast hollow point







these were not recovered from sand or dirt, but from either wet pack or water jugs

In this comparison.300 is still the better choice. For many of the same reasons .300 beats out many other rounds.
I have one but I am not a fan boy. .300 excels in a very narrow niche.

First off you can throw a 220gn round at 1050 instead of a 147gn. Starting off with increased energy at the muzzle is always good.
The sectional density is better in .300. It flys better. Slips through the air with less friction and thus carries more energy down range at Greater distances than you can get from pistol bullets.
Hi cap Mags-cheep and abundant. All your other .223/.556 AR stuff is compatible. If you reload brass is abundant. If you feel the need you can abandon the subsonics and go 110's @ 2400 wich will surpass any 9mm load.
Due to the length of the bullet and at subsonic speeds the bullet is right on the edge of being unstable. Any rapid decrease in forward motion and spin causes the bullet to tumble..or want to become unstable. A fair number of hunters claim excessive upset when using subsonics and thus causing significant internal damage.

IMO.. Within say 25 yards. You can probley use either one equally. The 9mm shines in the cost per round if you are a heavy plinker and in the area of available proven expanding bullet choices.

The safety aspect as noted in OP.   you are supposed to know your background and your target ! Shit... .22lr will go through a car door !

Again.. IMO .300 just has too many long term advantages to ignore.

Once you limit yourself to a certain velocity, in this case the speed of sound, then the only way to improve things is with raw mass.  220-gr is more than 147-gr.

Yes, you can get expanding 30-cal subsonics as others have stated.  Are there more options for 9x19?  Sure, but so what?

Frankly, if you find a pistol caliber subsonic to be a viable solution for you AND you like 200+ grain slugs then you should be looking at a .45 ACP.  There are PLENTY of expanding hollowpoints in that flavor.  It will still be subsonic from a 16" barrel.

Now if you NEED the ballistic efficiency of a slender/pointy rifle bullet then NO PISTOL BULLET will work.  None.

So in short, either go with .300 BLK or .45 ACP.

http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_1_5/1674562_OMG_success_30_cal_subsonic_expander_.html

There's a new one from hornady, they call it a 208 AMAX.  

Which doesn't reliably expand either at subsonic speeds from what I've seen.  Have they changed the composition of it to make it perform better?

Yeah it does not expand at sub velocities.

Sure seemed to when I used it subsonic out of a .308 on pork and venison both. But hey, whatever someone said on the internet has to be more accurate than personal testing. Can't put anything on the internet that isn't true.

Nosler makes one that is tactical as hell.

Its black.  

The tip glows in the dark.

Its named after Noveske Rifle Works.

Tactical as Hell.

If you would care to look back thru the 300 blk master thread you would see more then once people suggesting as you did.  But upon actual recovery of the bullet they found no such expansion.  You may have had tumbling but you did not have expansion.

And while I may be some random guy on the internet, feel free to ask dryflash3 or fats mcnasty, or a few regular posters regarding the 300 blk, and you will find I am far from random on the 300 blk

I will even take it a step further.

If you wish to have a copper jacket, lead core bullet expand at subsonic velocities it needs to be a hollow point, wider then is typical with .30 cal bullets,  It needs to have a thinner jacket then would be used on a typical 30 caliber bullet.  The jacket needs to be scored also.  Missing any one of the three above will eliminate its capacity to expand at subsonic velocities.

To continue.  if one wishes to use a cast bullet, it also will not expand at subsonic velocities unless it has a wide hollow point.   otherwise it will drill a .30 cal hole straight thru an animal.

Knowing the above to be a fact, and also knowing that the threshold for the amax to expand is much higher then 1000fps, I will unequivocally state that if you are shooting a 208 amax at subsonic velocities that it is not expanding.

Also if you can provide a single documented case of recovery and expansion of a 208gr amax at subsonic velocities shot into animal or gel and I will pay for your next Team renewal.

Guess my 300BLK subsonic test results are null and void since you posted on the internet that it worked in a .308 sub load for your then.

I will even settle for a wet pack or water jug test and recovery

Damn! It's even "stealth mode friendly" I have no idea what that means, but it sounds awesome.  Kidding aside, that sounds like it will be a nasty bullet.  I see they don't list a price, probably means it will be prohibitively expensive.  What do you think? $2 each?

no they will be in teh 75 cent range.. but they will be out IIRC last part of the first quarter of next year. but the only gel test ive seen are at 1050 at 10 feet from the gel. os if you shoot a 8 inch you will be screwed at 100 yards when the bullet hits 700-800 FPS.

Will it not penetrate/expand as well at the lower velocity?

Im like every one else right now and waiting to get a box of them.. I know what I had to do to get mine to open at the slow speeds. And im really eager to see what route they took.

Are you running all of those subsonic?

All except the first picture Crayola of death on the right.  it was super sonic everything else was subsonic

Lehighs are excellent, to date I've killed 3 coyotes with them at ranges from 90 yards to just over 320 yards. 208 AMAX, not working great killing things humanely for me.

Hey jwb47, does that bullet profile feed o.k. in your rifle?  Does your upper have m4 feedramps?

I'd like to shoot some 220gr 30-30 style round nose bullets for plinking, but I didn't know if they would cause feed issues.

Why in the blue fuck would you have a glow in the dark tip?

So you can see the tip in the dark of course.


Honestly, it might help identify which end of the bullet is supposed to go down range, such as finding a magazine in a dark, or trying to reload a magazine in the dark.  But honestly I'm not sure if there is any real advantage other than because they can.

There was some business selling Nosler/Noveske 220gr ammo a number of weeks ago for ~$17 iirc.

I should've bought some.