I'm considering a small .22 revolver for a backup gun.  Do any .22 loads come close to 12" of penetration? I'm mostly looking at the two varieties of mini-mags.  Would there be a noticeable difference between the hollow points and round nosed types in penetration or expansion?

Quoted: I'm considering a small .22 revolver for a backup gun.  Do any .22 loads come close to 12" of penetration? I'm mostly looking at the two varieties of mini-mags.  Would there be a noticeable difference between the hollow points and round nosed types in penetration or expansion?

Penetrate what? people, bone, wood, flesh, paper, animal skin, fur..........................

If you shoot someone in the eyeball or heart, odds are pretty good youll stop them, atleast long enuff to get away. If you shoot them else where, they are goin to be pissed. lol.

The 12" I was referring to is in calibrated ballistic gellatin, and is the normal minimum for a defensive load.  I'm guessing that no .22 rounds get there.

Quoted: The 12" I was referring to is in calibrated ballistic gellatin, and is the normal minimum for a defensive load.  I'm guessing that no .22 rounds get there.

I put little to no faith in gellatin tests. They dont take into account alot of things. Angles, distance, muzzle velocity, consistancy of the jello, and make up of the human/animal body like bones, cartliage, muscle, organs, etc.

.22 = can be shot in the arm and it come out your leg.

Or so I hear, I have no idea if its a fact or not. Rumor is they bounce around inside you O_o.

The Aguila SSS 60 grn .22 rounds penetrate 24" at 200 yards. Or so they say. I know that they go through 14" of wet phone books at 100 yards. They work good on coyotes too. Hold about 6" groups at 200 with my 10/22.

well, i'd say my first piece of advice would be not to buy a .22lr revolver for defensive purposes.  if you have to go w/ something small, a Kahr 9mm or some small .380acp would be the best bet.  i would never choose a .22lr as a defensive round, but if i had to use it in an emergency, i'm sure it would suffice.

Quoted: Quoted: The 12" I was referring to is in calibrated ballistic gellatin, and is the normal minimum for a defensive load.  I'm guessing that no .22 rounds get there. I put little to no faith in gellatin tests. They dont take into account alot of things. Angles, distance, muzzle velocity, consistancy of the jello, and make up of the human/animal body like bones, cartliage, muscle, organs, etc.

That's what calibrated means.  It can only have a specific range of consistancy.

This is what gellatin simulates.

I don't put total faith in it either, but it is a useful tool.  Otherwise there is no way to predict anything.  We'd have to wait until a round had been used to shoot a lot of people to see if it worked at all, or become mass murderers.
Find what rounds work well in real life, see how they act in gellatin and other rounds that act the same in gellatin, might perform similarly in real life.

Quoted: .22 = can be shot in the arm and it come out your leg. Or so I hear, I have no idea if its a fact or not. Rumor is they bounce around inside you O_o.

I am not going to touch this one.

Actually I heard that if you get shot in the toe, the bullet can come out your mother's left eye.
Sorry, I couldn't resist.


On topic:

I wouldn't trust a .22 for a self defense pistol unless I had the barrel pressed right into the bad guy's eyesocket.  In my opinion I wouldn't trust my life to anything less than 9mm.

Why would you choose a .22 for self defense

Quoted: Quoted: .22 = can be shot in the arm and it come out your leg. Or so I hear, I have no idea if its a fact or not. Rumor is they bounce around inside you O_o. I am not going to touch this one. Actually I heard that if you get shot in the toe, the bullet can come out your mother's left eye. Sorry, I couldn't resist. On topic: I wouldn't trust a .22 for a self defense pistol unless I had the barrel pressed right into the bad guy's eyesocket.  In my opinion I wouldn't trust my life to anything less than 9mm.

Well, I've known someone whos been shot with a .22lr and the bullet did some pretty crazy things, not exactly that drastic but the hole where it came out didnt really match up with the angle it went in.

was shot in stomach (from the side)  and the bullet went in and sorta followed the skin around before it came out. Instead of just going through.

I personly wouldnt believe if shot in the arm comes out other body part, alot of people I know believe it though. I'd have to see proof

I personally wouldnt choose a .22 either. Not enough knockdown imo.

I am not doubting that bullets will veer from a straight line through the body.  Just look at the ballistic gelatin testing of bullets and you will see that the 5.56 will very often do a 180 spin and exit higher or lower than the trajectory of entry would suggest.  It just strikes me as funny when somebody will claim that a bullet hit this guy in the foot and exited the top of his head.

Make no mistake a .22LR can be deadly to humans.

A friend of mine was almost killed a few months ago with a .22LR pen gun.  He accdiently dropped the gun from a height of 1 foot and it went off.  It entered his abdomen and came to rest 3mm from his aorta.  He is doing fine now but he came quite close to death.


The problem is how often it is deadly.  It isn't a cartridge that you should risk your life with.  

I don't have a whole lot of faith in a .22 either.  That's why I mentioned this will be a backup-- in my case it will backup the USP Compact .45.  My goal here is to have something to back it up-- probably in a pocket holster, so it has to be tiny.  Even the smallest 9mm I can think of (Kahr) is prohibitively large.

If it is your backup gun, and you want it small then I would suggest one of those tiny 22mag pistols like this.

After a guy told me his buddy was shot in the knee (sitting down) and the bullet come out his shoulder/neck area, I laughed at him.

Then he said he was right next to him when it happened.

Then I felt bad.




So is it true?

I wouldnt doubt it, too many stories of that happening or simular happening with a .22lr

I would need to see some proof.

Kreutzberg, here's a site where gelatin testing was performed using a few varieties of pocket pistol.  Golden Loki

Quoted: I put little to no faith in gellatin tests. They dont take into account alot of things. Angles, distance, muzzle velocity, consistancy of the jello, and make up of the human/animal body like bones, cartliage, muscle, organs, etc.

Well of course ballistic gelatin is not going to perfectly simulate the shooting of a person.  Heck, no single actual shooting of a person adequately simulates a so-called "average" confrontation.  But that's not the point of gelatin testing.  The point is to have a reference for comparing multiple rounds.

For instance, if 9x19 outpenetrates 9x17 in gelatin, it is safe to say that 9x19 will also outpenetrate 9x17 when used in a self-defense situation.  If one round penetrates better than another, that's it.  Period.  Nobody can argue that 9x19 is better in flesh, but suddenly inferior to 9x17 in bone--unless the rounds go through denim, in which case the 9x19 takes the lead again, but if the target is wearing a silk shirt, the 9x17 will outpenetrate unless the guy is really fat, at which point both rounds just get grossed out and stop penetrating altogether.  While the numbers often won't apply literally to the penetration of a target, the numbers when compared to each other are valid enough for comparison purposes.  If 9x17 doesn't penetrate far enough to hit vitals in a specific situation, it's safe to say that anything that fares worse than 9x17 in ballistic gelatin will also fare worse against the target in that same situation.

The only person I know personally to have been killed by a firearm accidentally caught a .22LR in the back of the head out of a Ruger MkII handled by a moron.

It'll do the job in a pinch.

They say more people die from .22LR every year than any other caliber.  But that's just because there are a whole lot more .22s than any other caliber.   And dying is not the same as stopping.  They could have had hours or even days to rape or kill you before they died.

Unless you mean one of the NAA revolvers, a small .22 revolver isn't going to be any smaller than a .38 or .357 and you'd be far better off with one of those.  I'd really consider 9mm the minimum for defense, but since you say even the PM9 Kahr is too big then about the only thing left that I'd consider would be something like the Kel-Tec P3AT in .380 or the Seecamp .32.  (The KT P32 is mere tenths of an inch smaller than the P3 so why drop to a .32?)  The P3 saves 1/2" on the height and about 1/8" on the thickness, but nothing on the length over the PM9.  

If you do end up with the .22 I'd suggest Velocitors.  Or maybe the Rem. Viper.  I've tested the Velocitor into water jugs and they mushroom but don't fragment and the 40gr weight and higher velocity should help.  Viper is a light hyper-vel, but with SWC shape so it shouldn't fragment.  Stingers and Yellow Jackets fragment badly and would be the worst possible choice.  40gr RN might have the depth but the RN won't do much damage.  The cheap 36gr HP in the 550 boxes didn't really mushroom in water jugs for me but did smoosh down into a flat point so they wouldn't be the worst.  I'd worry about duds though.

.22 the best choice? No. Better than nothing? Greatly.  Better than a large caliber gun that someone can't shoot well with or can't take with them ? Absolutely.

A well placed hit with a .22 is better than a miss with a .44 Mag.

.22 a popular choice with assassins, criminals, Olympic marksmen and boyscouts.

Penetration: 9 inches - hard wood

Range - 1 to 1-1/2  miles - be careful

(printed inside every 50 rd box flap of .22 LR I've ever shot since I was 9 years old)

Actual one shot stop in torso rate: 20-25% of the time

Ability to place rapid, accurate follow up shots including head shots: better than any other caliber I can shoot with

I dunno - maybe not the best choice for defense but a double tap in the chest followed by a double tap in the head or face at 7 yards with a .22 lr would ruin a bandit's day?

   I dont feel outgunned with my ruger mk1.   hell even if I shoot you in the toe , It'll probably come out your dogs left testical.

With an NAA 22mag you can miss them and still leave them blind and burned.  Eskimo's lay under the ice using a seal skin mitten on one hand as a decoy for polar bear.  When the bear is investigating the hand with the mitten they shoot it in the temple with a 22 caried in the other hand.   That would be dangerous if it exited out of the bear's toe!

Quoted: With an NAA 22mag you can miss them and still leave them blind and burned.  Eskimo's lay under the ice using a seal skin mitten on one hand as a decoy for polar bear.  When the bear is investigating the hand with the mitten they shoot it in the temple with a 22 caried in the other hand.   That would be dangerous if it exited out of the bear's toe!

from what I've read your dead on, I hear all of those NAA mini-revolvers are nutoriously inaccurate.

It will be a back up gun.  A last chance gun.  There are better calibers to choose for this, but if you choose .22 rimfire, go with at least LR length, magnum would be better, adn be prepared to fire the whole damn mag or cylinder at you attacker to have any kind of "instant" effect.

Then, after you've shot the gun empty, be prepared to run in case you still didn't do a good enough job.

See the sig line, folks, before you complain ;-)

Dan