Stopping Power?

[locked'n'cocked]

i'm not new to guns by any means. i own many and have grown up around them. for self defence however i don't understand "stopping power". i don't know if it is just me or what but i don't care what somebody shoots me with. if its a 9mm or a 45 it would suck. if it was a .22lr or a .25 or something i think it would suck just as much. i can understand if somebody was on drugs or something like that and needing to fold them up but a .22 hole in your head is just as bad as a .45 right? if somebody can enlighten me on this i would love it.

[Twycross]

"Stopping Power" is just that. The capacity to stop an opponent's progress.

if its a 9mm or a 45 it would suck. if it was a .22lr or a .25 or something i think it would suck just as much.

True. But it also sucks to get shot with a paintball gun. The issue is the amount of damage done. As you pointed out, a .22LR to the CNS is just as bad as a .45ACP. But most shots are not to the CNS, although that is a desired target. Most shots are to COM (which is not an instant-kill zone) because that is chock full of important stuff, and comparatively easy to hit. So the amount of damage meted out is important. Can I keep coming after being shot COM with a .22LR? Probably, unless you hit me right in the heart or spine. That is a very small hole, with little to no tissue damage. Can I keep coming after being shot COM with a .45ACP? Maybe, maybe not. With a good hollowpoint, it is perhaps a .60 inch hole, with a lot of transmitted energy. If we could all keep our cool under fire, and shoot perfect groups into an attacker's head while being shot at ourselves, then I suppose that the .22LR would be a perfectly fine self-defence round. Until then, cartridges such as the 9mm, .40S&W, and .45ACP are here to stay.

[XavierBreath]

Someone will be along shortly to explain hydrostatic shock etc..... I'll not go into all the one shot stop testing that has been done. It has been argued back and forth until it reallky cannot be seen as definitive. My experience as a nurse has taught me several things about gunshot survivability.
Bullet size matters. Bullet type matters. Number of bullet holes matter. Penetration matters. Wound channel location matters.
I would have to conclude that the same matters when it comes to stopping power.

[mete]

Stopping power is not the same as killing power.Hydrostatic shock is a misnomer ,there is nothing static about a bullet going 1000 fps. Stopping power is the ability to shock the nervous system.A BG on drugs is often immune to stopping power because the drugs alter the nervous system greatly and adrenaline can have similar effects. But don't worry about stopping power of 1 round .The rule is shoot and continue to shoot until the BG is no longer a threat.

[Para Bellum]

...is what you need. And how to achieve that is a question on your personal skills. So what matters the most is: which gun/caliber you like the most and feel most comfortable with. With this particular gun/caliber you will give your best performance when the shoot hits the fan (nice pun, eh?).

Even every hand-to-hand trainged fighter has a style or philisophy. Same applies to handguns. No style or school (Karate, Jiu-Jitsu, Kickboxing, .45, 9x19mm, .357 Mag. or .40 etc) is superior to another one. It's always the person applying it. If you manage to hit a moving head with .22s repeatedly and like the caliber - go for it. The best shooter I know carries a .22 Beretta in his of LEO-duty time. I am sure that he would perform well with it.

I wouldn't. But that's just my style...

[Dre_sa]

i have come to define stopping power as such...
the likelyhood or chance of a projectile, to stop a human being from advancing either towards you or in his use of a weapon against you.

i have also come to the conclusion that pistol calibers are highly innefficient and are more likely to produce pain, thus incapacitating the target, than they are to produce enough energy to knock a man to his butt.

i think the key issue for pistols and thusly concealed carry is creating a massive shock to the CNS, as has been said before.
and never underestimate the importance of shot placement in creating said pain.

[NSO_w/_SIG]

Threads galore on this use the search function

[big daddy 9mm]

bigger bullet+800fps or higher=more shock to the BG. better chances for droppage

[steve154]

There was a very interesting article in the January 2003 issue of Police magazine on stopping power. The basics of the article were that contemporary thinking on stopping power based on muzzle energy is skewed towards lighter, faster bullets when it shouldn't be. The author stated that a much better guage of stopping power would be the Josserand energy delivery index(JEDI). I obviously can't post the entire article, but the jist of it is that bullet diameter and weight make a huge difference in actual stopping power and that lighter and faster bullets are not superior.

The JEDI "factors in the projectile size by multiplying the standardized kinetic energy at the muzzle by the cross section (area) of the bullet".

Take the muzzle energy of a particular load and multiply it by the area and you come up with the JEDI index.(To figure the area you square the radius and multiply by pi: 3.1416)

Using the JEDI a 115 grain 9mm@1225 FPS would have a JEDI of 38. A 185 grain .45@830 FPS would have a JEDI of 85.

Some numbers for comparison:

40 grain .22 has a JEDI of 5
55 grain .223 = 50
125 grain 7.62mm = 117
438 grain 12GA slug = 986

For what it's worth...

Steve

[stephen426]

The Ultimate in Stopping Power...

[Sturmgewehr-58]

A 185 grain .45@830 FPS would have a JEDI of 85
55 grain .223 = 50

I wonder why the military even issues rifles? They could issue 1911s with super Jedi powers!

[Mannlicher]

the term hydrostatics is a misnomer? Not really. There might be some misundrestanding about it............
"hy·dro·stat·ics ( P ) Pronunciation Key (hdr-sttks)
n. (used with a sing. verb)
The branch of physics that deals with fluids at rest and under pressure. "

Stopping power is like a lot of other technical things. We might not know the definition, but you sure know it when we experience it.

Make mine a .45.......

[steve154]

Sturmgewehr-58,

That is why I qualified the post with "for what it's worth".

However, how many stories have you heard about the 5.56 and dismal failures to stop with multiple rounds COM? I don't think it is too far of a stretch to believe that in CQ(pistol range) that a .45ACP with hollow points would be a better stopper than 5.56 ball. However, I am not a ballistics expert and don't know for sure. Obviously a rifle is a better battle weapon for many reasons: Range, easier to hit with, more rounds in the mag, rate of fire...but, what about a sub gun in .45ACP for QCB?

[JohnKSa]

Using the JEDI a 115 grain 9mm@1225 FPS would have a JEDI of 38. A 185 grain .45@830 FPS would have a JEDI of 85.

I've never seen ANYTHING approaching a reasonable TEST/EXPERIMENT that suggests that the .45ACP is more than twice as effective as a 9mm. Even the TESTS/EXPERIMENTS that give the .45ACP the biggest edge don't give it 2.2x more performance than 9mm. And as Sturmgewehr-58 pointed out, I don't think many with any experience would rate a .45ACP as being more effective than a .223 rifle--not even at close range.

I'd have to say that this is just another example of a number twiddler trying to come up with a number that supports his favorite theory of "stopping power."

[Jehzsa]

Make a fist with your hand. Place it in the middle of your chest cavity, right between your nipples if you are a man. That's your heart, in approximate size and location. That's where you aim at to save on ammo and your own butt-cheeks.

Take a look at yourself in a mirror. That's your head. That's also where you aim at to save on ammo and your own caboodles.

Choose your caliber. Choose wisely. Some are more flexible than others. For example, if BG is hiding behind a refrigerator, shooting him with a 7.62x25 is better than with a .25.

[Model520Fan]

Stopping power is not really fully understood, but the best approximation useful for comparing different cartridges is to estimate the amount of light that a wound lets in to the body. Larger calibers let more light in, therefore result in more stopping power. Same for wadcutters and expanded hollowpoint bullets. Letting in light from both sides of the body can almost double the stopping power, particularly if the diameter and shape of the bullet is already adequate, thus one can see that penetration is important. This is usually a function of sectional density and velocity, but the bottom line, as before, is "How much light does the bullet let in?" Needless to say, this basis for comparison holds true only when shot placement is held equal. It is much more effective to shed light on the CNS, or even the heart, than to illuminate the buttocks (at least from behind or beside; lighting up the buttocks from the front may actually do a pretty good job of putting a person on the ground, which makes it much easier to shoot him until he lets go of his weapon).

For reasons that are not yet fully understood, a cartridge that is adequate in daylight is usually adequate at night, even though the actual ambient light is often limited.

Hope this clears things up a little.

[KC135]

Junk science at its worst!

223 works fine according to everything I read....when you hit the target! Loud noises will not make your opponents fall down .

Been a subscriber for more than 25 years..but almost canceled after that article.

Many years ago, in a book that is still cussed and discussed, Ed Sanow started Chapter one of the book Handgun Stopping Power (Marshall and Sanow), with this statement "Stopping power is an illusion".

I am not going to indulge in a M/S argument. I will advise reading the first 6 chapters of this book. Chapters that have little or nothing to do with the street results that are argued.

These chapters give a look at " Stopping Power".

[Para Bellum]

JEDI, mhm
...that's a JEDI, right:



I bet that the light-sabre has a Jedi-Index of 1 Gazillion.
Anyway: I bet I can stopp any Jedi with my 9x19mm and .223 and 12ga, bet?

[bdc]

You are going to read a lot of bs in gun magazines and on the boards about stopping power.

Let me express some common sense thoughts.

1. If you neglect shot placement, it doesn't matter whether you miss with a cannon ball or a baseball.

2. The loaded firearm that you have on you and the skill to operate it are considerably more important than a choice of one caliber round or round design over another.


Personally, I have seen highly trained people who can clear stoppages on any weapon system turn in real world shooting performances that make a discussion of stopping power irrelevant.

The other day, I watched a video of a bomber being shot and killed by Turkish Police. Being shot a few times with pistol rounds did not immediately terminate the BG's existence. In fact, a couple of policemen motioned for people to stop firing before the threat was neutralized. Then they had to continue shooting.

Conversely, a guy in my unit was killed by friendly fire with a .308 round through the chest at a distance of 4 feet. He was incapacitated by the hydrostatic shock before he hit the ground.

I was trained to draw fire rapidly at 1/4 inch string hanging at 21 feet with strong side retention and without prescription lenses. You have to do it. You will have to pay for that kind of instruction. The round caliber or design isn't going to do it for you.

[Bravo25]

Lets simplify this down to bottom line plain english. Which would stop you better. A small ballpine, or rock hammer, or a 12 lb. sledge hammer?

[JohnKSa]

Which would stop you better. A small ballpine, or rock hammer, or a 12 lb. sledge hammer?

In plain english, it depends on where they hit you and how fast they are going when they hit you.

In plain english again: This subject has been the topic of endless debate for many decades. What is known for certain is that WHERE a bullet hits is by far the most important factor in "stopping power". The homemade formulas, the speculation, the down-home analogies all fall short because this is not a simple topic even though everyone LONGS for it to be simple and most people secretly think they understand it.

[tshadow6]

Here's a true story about two shootings in two weeks in the same city (tampa, fl). Bad guy attempts to rob off duty firefighter at a red light. Firefighter shoots him once with a .380, DOA. two weeks later Deputy Sheriff orders his bad guy to drop the knife, bg refuses gets shot twice with a .45. Makes full recovery to stand trial. Accuracy is what really matters.

[sm]

JohnKSa's post +1

Stopping an immediate threat. What does it take to "stop" said threat?
The verbal commands, the reaching for CCW, the drawing of CCW, firing, once or more...too many variables to be a definitive answer.

FWIW I have been in the OR. Seen the "Immediate Threat Stopped" and the Victims too.

Sometimes a .22lr stopped the threat , sometimes other handgun calibers, shotguns are downright nasty. Seen the perp and victims die from .22lr and seen them survive from <name favorite caliber here>

I will never forget what a busted beer bottle did to carotid artery to stop an immediate threat...BG died.

1) Don't be where trouble is.
2) Run like hell if trouble finds you.
3) Placement of whatever the hell you got to Perp is the key to survival if it comes to that point.

Be it vehicle, gun, knife, beer bottle, OC spray, hands , feet, cupie doll - placement is the key.

[zzirg]

if you had a choice and had two pick one ,which would you pick ,being hit in the head by a pebble at 1000 fps or hit in the head with a boulder at a 1000 fps , there's your difference 22 or 45.

[sm]

NO absolutes.

Fellow stuck a Med frame Revolver loaded with full house .357 rds into his mouth and pulled the trigger.

He lived.

Lost teeth, part of his tongue, roof of mouth, sinuses and nose as meets frontal skeletal bone ( forget what else).

He is under supervison now will be for sometime too.

Another fellow, 300#s ...

Seems the piss poor .25 ACP fired from less expensive semi, nicked the SA. [heart]
Had to pass thru a denimn jacket and heavy shirt, to do it- still dead is Dead.