So, the events in Ferguson have convicted me of a need to sock away some HD ammo for SHTF, civil unrest, et. al.

The way I see it, there's two broad categories of ammo HD ammo: milsurp and then more expensive hunting/HD ammo.

Seems like milsurp (M193, M855) can be had for cheaper, but hunting/other non-mil rounds (TSX, Tap) seem more effective against soft targets (and without the risk of over-penetration).

Any recommendations, thoughts, and waxing philosophic appreciated.

*ETA: clarification, as noted above.

Just go with M193.

I use 62gr Federal Fusion, Midway has it on sale often.  Get 3 mags worth; if you need more than that, just tear open the XM193 and spray and pray.

I use  speer golddot/federal fusion(same bullet).  It has one of the lowest expansion threshold, possibly tied with 64gr nosler maybe lower, in tye 1700s if not even 1600s.  Its has a pretty good BC for its weight and soft point design.  Seems to expand out to 0.5+.  Its barrier blind but still throws off 30% or more of its weight as fragments.  Its a nice middle ground between a fragmenting otm round and a heavily bonded/copper expanding round that will retain 100% of its weight.

The SD sticky has many good suggestions.
Pistol-forum.com has an ammo section with Doc Roberts as mod and plenty of sticky threads on various calibers.
You can also google Doc Martin Fackler and read some of his research papers that will give you a technical explanation and help you decide what parts of terminal performance are most important to you.

This.

You don't need anything special, as soon as a couple members of the mob go down, the rest are going to disperse and exit your area.

If you're dealing with the mob, the over-penetration is the last thing I'll worry about.

Get 1000 rounds of MK262.

https://www.wideners.com/itemdetail.cfm?item_id=100001636&dir=18|830|845

What  is the difference between mk262 and the gold dot

Good point. I think I may go with 1200 rounds of IMI Green Tip.

Get the 193 because it tumbles faster.    You don't want to shoot a skinny person with M855-  see blackhawk down/Mogadishu.  

Great point. I'm actually reading through Paul Howe's book right now, oddly enough.

Back to gold dot vs 77gr OTM?

If three mags of Fed Fusion/GDs/TBBC/Mk262/TSXs is not enough, you are attracting the mob to yourself at which time anything that goes bang and hits Minute of Hood Goblin should be A-OK.

GoldDot/Fusions are bonded softpoints that will expand to about 0.5 and lose some of their mass as fragments.  The bonding of the core and jacket helps to keep them together through barriers.  There are other bonded softpoints including the "Federal Tactical Bonded" line with their trophy bonded bear claw bullets, Nosler's 64gr Bonded, Swift 60 & 70gr Sirroco or whatever its called, and a few others.  All copper bullets like the TSX preform very similar.  If you are worried about barrier penetration, BlackHills 50gr TSX is the recommended TSX load because it has heavier construction and its petals will not shear off in autoglass.

All of those rounds are not yaw dependent and will begin expanding at a consistent depth when they hit the target.

MK262 and the 75gr TAP loadings are OTMs or Open Tip Match bullets.  They are match bullets who happen to have a thin jacket and will fragment in tissue if they are going fast enough.  The faster/ the more severe the fragmentation.  They do not hold up well through common house hold barriers per Doc Roberts.  For 1/7 twist barrels, the standard choices are the 77gr Sierra SMK, the 77gr Nosler Custom Comp, and the Hornady 75gr HPBT.  These rounds are yaw dependent as they will have to begin to tumble and turn sideways in tissue before they can fragment.  Bullets are not completely stable in flight and yaw from 0 to about 2.5 degrees.  If the bullet impacts at 2.5 degrees, it will tumble much faster and fragment in the sweet zone.  If it impacts at 0 degrees, it will tumble later and deeper.  This is why you will see some papers by Fackler where high velocity rifle bullets do no more damage than pistol bullets when impacting only soft tissue in the extremities.  They do not have time to tumble/fragment and initiate the expansion of a large temporary cavity.  Large temporary cavities were found to be initiated by the breaking of a fluid boundary layer as the projectile tumbles, expands, or otherwise upsets in some fashion.

If you choose to go the OTM route, expect to need a minimum velocity of 2250fps to even begin initiating fragmentation in gel.  The 77gr Nosler has the shortest neck, or length traveled in gel to begin tumbling and fragmenting, followed by the 75gr Hornady.  I don't know if anyone loads the 77gr Nosler as factory ammo but the 75gr Hornady is found in a number of loadings. The 77gr SMK has the longest neck and this has been noted in a number of other SMK bullets as well.  The problem seems to be a very small opening at the point.  I believe Roberts found that opening the "hollow point" to 0.05 was able to give much more consistent and earlier tumbling.

Doubletap loads the 77gr nosler in 223 to supposedly 5.56 velocity. I've never chronoed it, but I do have some. It would be one of my go to rounds if I didn't have 5.56 75gr tap or the FBI T3 round, which leaves the gold dot  and fusion in the dust.

Haha another good point.

http://www.sgammo.com/product/surplus/1000-round-case-556x45-mm-55-grain-m193-ball-ammunition-igman-bosnia-brass-case-non-

IMO, choosing ammo for 223/5.56 is a lot like choosing ammo for .45acp; basically as long as you avoid particularly bad options, you're probably gtg, especially for personal home defense. I'd avoid the varmint loads and the non-expanding/non-fragmenting loads (m855 would be included in those imo). I like m193, fusion, and the unfortunately-discontinued winchester powerpointplus for carbine use. Longer barrel, I actually like the Privi-PPU 75 grain hp stuff; but I really don't know how it would terminally perform from a short carbine barrel. Probably wouldn't be a worse choice than the M855's of the world, I imagine.

This deal may not last long but I snagged a case just now:

http://palmettostatearmory.com/index.php/ammunition/rifle-ammunition/223-5-56/federal-5-56x45mm-nato-55gr-full-metal-jacket-boat-tail-20rds-xm193.html

OP, I went with a multi-level approach.
My approach is based on cost vs. probability of need.

I purchased 200 rds of 75gr TAP.
Eighty rds of that 200 went to zeroing and function testing my 14.5" Sabre Defense rifle.
The remaining 120 rds are in Lancer AWM magazines.
This should cover just about every possible scenario I can envision.

Buuuuuut, in case it doesn't, I've got a few thousand rds of I.M.I. M-193, packed up in ammo cans.
I have enough P-mags to carry this amount of ammunition, for when the Taliban paratroopers start their shit.

For training, plinking, and generalized fucking off, I've got a healthy supply XM-193, Wolf Gold, XM-855, etc.
I even found about 400 rds of surplus Radway Green I'd forgotten about, just today!
This ammo goes into G.I. type aluminum magazines.
Some have Magpulp followers, some have green G.I. followers.

That's how I roll, but I'm a dumb ass redneck.
Good luck.

Open tip match vs bonded soft point.

Ive got 75Gn T1, 75Gn T1C, 75Gn 5.56 T2, 77Gn 5.56 Nosler, M193 and M855, 55Gn FMJ .223Rem, 62Gn TBBC and others on hand aquired over the years.

Today: I would buy M193 and Fusion/Gold dot.

Actually a solid plan, and I laughed at the verbage.

Thanks.

64gr Gold Dot gives the best performance with minimal overpenetration risks, IMO
The TSX rounds are a bit nastier, but also a bit more prone to overpenetrate.
MK318 SOST is "cheap", but guaranteed a pass-through of the solid copper back half of the projectile. In a rural area, it's very viable.

This. Plain, simple, and you cant go wrong.

I see what you did there!

Good plan. What does that say about me?

The IMI M193 is good ammo, and more rounds for the $$ than the more high tech ammo.
Even if the IMI was a backup plan it would be a good plan.
Such as having some PMags of IMI handy, a bunch of it on stripper clips in a can or two, and even a few bandoliers of it standing by.

They are very similar, but they are NOT the same bullet.  First off, the Gold Dot is 64gr, and the Fusion is 62.

That said, they perform just about the same, though I haven't flesh tested the Fusions as much as I'd like.

If you need a ton of penetration, go with the TSX/etc.  But I'm getting 20+ inches of penetration with Gold Dots, and considering the difference in price, I don't think you can go wrong with a Gold Dot.

Came to post this.

I can assure you this, you give me 1000 rounds of Mk 262, my Mk 12 (which should be finished by the end of the year) would eat it all.

M855 is possibly one of the worst rounds to use for HD. OP you dont need 1000 rnds of HD. Just enough for zero and function checking plus a few mags worth.

Someone told me that this ammo's overall length, makes it hang up in some mags.. Is this truth or fiction? Thanks for your knowledge in advance. Tex

I would think fiction. 77gr is supposed to be the longest that can still be fed by magazine.

It's possible out of spec mags or something.

I have three 20 round mags of gold dot loaded.  I would be in a world of trouble and deaf if I had to use even that.  Plenty of q3131a if it came to that.

One of my first bulk purchases was IMI .223 w/63 grain Sierra SP's and it was accurate and reliable. That was twenty-five years ago. The brass is decent enough for reloading, better than the majority of foreign brass.

Currently Widener's has plenty of M193 and M855 in stock. I dislike fmj's so much that I can't get myself to buy them, however they also have some 77 grain Razor (or some name like that) it's an Israeli version of the M262. I was going to purchase some of it even though I've been reloading most of my ammo for the last three decades. What scared me off is that 77 grain "Razor" match ammo runs almost 100 fps faster than M262 which I consider too hot to begin with. Several people have posted chronograph results and in order to get that much velocity you're really pushing the envelope regarding pressure. So I passed.

Buy 1200 rounds of the IMI ball ammo if you want easy peasy, it's a no brainer way to stock pile some decent ammo. Don't expect it to shoot better than 3" groups at 100 yards and you won't be disappointed. Consider reloading someday, it may not be cheaper overall once you buy the equipment but you'll be shooting match grade bullets into tiny little groups for the same price. You'll also be self-supporting when it comes to ammo availability. Buying in quantity works for reloading supplies as well as bulk ammo purchases.

M193 and be done with it.

I have all sorts of 223/5.56 loadings that I reload for but every month buy another 1k of XM193. I have 20 loaded mags of it sitting aside with the rest stored under my reloading area and treated as 'storage ammo'.