45 vs 9mm interesting test

[Webleymkv]

Originally posted by JohnKSa
One could argue that as long as he does this with all the calibers in his comparison, it should all even out. That's if the difference is actually due to caliber and not to bullet selection.

One could argue that, but in order to do so we would have to assume that roughly the same proportions of .45 shootings were with FMJ as 9mm ones and that .45 JHP would have roughly the same statistical increase in effectiveness over .45 FMJ as 9mm JHP does over 9mm FMJ. Ellifritz himself seemed to think it was an issue:

Originally posted by Greg Ellifritz
One other thing to look at is the 9mm data. A huge number (over half) of 9mm shootings involved ball ammo. I think that skewed the results of the study in a negative manner. One can reasonable expect that FMJ ammo will not stop as well as a state of the art expanding bullet. I personally believe that the 9mm is a better stopper than the numbers here indicate, but you can make that decision for yourself based on the data presented.

https://www.activeresponsetraining.n...stopping-power

So, this naturally begs the question why did Ellifritz, if he thought the high proportion of 9mm FMJ shootings skewed his data, not separate FMJ and JHP shootings when he tabulated his percentages? Unfortunately Ellifritz hasn't answered that directly but I think there are a couple of reasonable explanations. I suspect that for some calibers, particularly the small ones like .25 and .32, the vast majority of shootings were with non-expanding bullets. In order to account for the differences in bullet type when comparing one caliber to another when one is predominantly with FMJ, it would be logical to simply lump all bullet types together. The other likely issue is that, in at least some of the shootings included in the study, is quite likely that the bullet type was simply unknown. As I said before, the majority of data comes from police reports and those aren't always as complete as we'd like. For instance, you could have a shooting in which shell casings are recovered thus telling you what caliber was used but the bullet itself passed completely through the person shot and was not recovered thus making identification of the bullet style very difficult if not impossible. This leads me to my next point:

Originally posted by JohnKSa
Quote:
While the Marshall/Sanow method of identifying the exact make and model of bullet would've been nice, I realize that that's probably not practical given the data Ellifritz had at his disposal.
Why does it make sense to assume that Ellifritz only has access to data that is poorer than what M&S had? Given that he's operating decades farther into the future and during the information era where data is more available and more transportable than ever, just the opposite assumption would seem to be more reasonable. Of course one of the accusations against M&S was that they manufactured data.

This is not an assumption on my part but rather something specifically stated by Ellifritz himself:

Originally posted by Greg Ellifritz
I really would have liked to break it down by individual bullet type, but I didn’t have enough data points to reach a level of statistical significance. Getting accurate data on nearly 1800 shootings was hard work. I couldn’t imagine breaking it down farther than what I did here.

Originally posted by JohnKSa
But maybe the best observation is that if the difference is too small to see if one doesn't separate the data out by bullet type, then it sounds like we've just found one of the variables that is important enough to obscure differences due to caliber. One of many, it would seem. Not a very convincing point if the goal is to prove one caliber is significantly better than another.

I agree, but I'm not trying to prove that one caliber is significantly better than another. I have said repeatedly that based on the data we have, or rather lack thereof, we really can't come to a conclusion one way or another. You're absolutely correct that there's no data proving that .45 is more effective than 9mm, the point I'm trying to make is that there's not data disproving it either so saying that .45 isn't significantly more effective than 9mm is just as incorrect as saying that it is because, in reality, we really have no way of knowing either way.

Originally posted by JohnKSa
Quote:
The bare minimum for his data to be useful, in my opinion, would have been to at least separate the data for expanding and non-expanding bullets so that the performance, or lack thereof, of one isn't skewing the data for the other.
Get with him and see if he's willing to re-run his numbers with your suggestions.

I could certainly ask him, but given the above-referenced statements I highly doubt he'd be willing or able to.

Originally posted by JohnKSa
The question is, what if doing that still doesn't show a difference? Will you be satisfied then, or will you have a reason to dismiss the new results? How will you know when you've got a valid result--when it confirms your current opinion?

My current opinion is that we don't have sufficient data to make a call one way or the other. I'm honestly quite ambivalent about the results of Ellifritz's or anyone else's study, it's the methodology I'm more concerned about. If Ellifritz were willing/able to re-run his numbers after separating the expanding and non-expanding bullet data, then the numbers would show what they show and I see no reason to get emotionally invested in it either way, all I really want is a study that I feel I can trust the results of regardless of what the results happen to be. Unfortunately, given the credibility issue of Marshall/Sanow and the methodology of Ellifritz, it appears that no such study exists.

[BJung]

Early this year I did a hollow point cast bullet expansion test into milk jugs filled with wet newsprint type paper pressed so the density was like my leg. My 9mm loads penciled through but expanded. The 9mm +P left a golf ball size cavity. But the .45 blew the newsprint on the topside of where the cavity was left (leaving a mess), bursted the plastic container, and left a cavity the size of a baseball. Of the two, I do not want to be on the receiving end of the .45. From another thread I once read online, the person on the forum said he spoke with a doctor that dealt with gunshot wounds. From what was spoke, the doctor said that those shot with a 9mm usually lived. Not so with those shot with a .45.

[Shadow9mm]

Originally Posted by JohnKSa

That's one take.

Another take is that the FBI, eager to come up with a reason for the Miami fiasco that didn't involve any criticism of policy and tactics blamed the whole thing on the performance of one single round. They came up with a testing protocol that justified this approach and switched calibers in response to the results of the testing protocol. They stuck with it until advances in ammunition engineering allowed them to switch back to 9mm with the blessings of their protocol.

Two questions:

1. Did they do that in spite of the fact that they had lots of real world data showing that .40S&W was better than 9mm, or because they couldn't prove superiority one way or the other?

2. Why did they even come up with the protocol in the first place when they could just look at the real world shooting data. Oh, wait, their expert told them that it would essentially be impossible to choose a winner based on real world shooting data--so they HAD to come up with some other way of picking a winner. So the real question is this: Does their testing protocol actually choose winners in the real world? Or does it only allow the FBI to justify choices made for other reasons. Like the choice made after Miami and the recent choice to move back to 9mm.If you look at Ellifritz's data, it suggests that you're not giving up much by choosing to use it. That said, it won't meet the FBI's pass/fail threshold and it struggles making sufficient penetration numbers to consistently reach the vitals with expanding ammo.

I would say that that it is most likely part of the answer but I doubt it is the whole answer. I suspect they determined that needed a round that performed better in an semi auto even if it was nothing more than a knee jerk gut reaction on their part. That was something they could control and change to hopefully prevent this short of issue happening again in the future.

In relation to point #1, were getting in the weeds a bit, but at the time it was full power 10mm, which i think few would debate, is definitely more potent than 9mm.

in relation to question #2, I disagree strongly. In order to compare, cartridges, bullet designs, and loads you need consistent testing conditions and testing mediums. You will never get that from real world data.

The real question. Yes, I feel it helps choose winners in the real world. I think that rounds that pass the FBI testing have a excellent chance of performing very well in the real world, and round that fail will most likely perform poorly in the real world.

One last important point, I believe this testing is also the primary reason that bullet engineering and design has advanced so far. Is it perfect, no its not, but I think it is very good and there is a lot that has and will be learned from it.

[JohnKSa]

In relation to point #1, were getting in the weeds a bit, but at the time it was full power 10mm, which i think few would debate, is definitely more potent than 9mm.

They selected 10mm, but never issued it at full power. They found they could get the results they needed from a downloaded version and issued that. For a little while. The downloaded version was duplicated in a more compact package in the form of the .40S&W. The 10mm, the FBI version of it and the .40S&W all would be rated higher than the 9mm in terms of momentum/energy/bullet diameter/bullet weight. As far as whether that made any difference in the outcomes of shootings goes--they never released any information on that.

I guess we are supposed to assume that the FBI lost all interest in looking at shooting outcomes and tying them to caliber after 1986 and just winged it from there, basing everything on the results of their testing protocol.

In order to compare, cartridges, bullet designs, and loads you need consistent testing conditions and testing mediums. You will never get that from real world data.

Ok, so you've got your comparison data generated in controlled conditions with artificial testing mediums.

What does it tell you about the outcome of real world shootings? There's no benefit to being able to rank cartridges if you can't prove that the ranking relates to some real-world advantage to a defender basing their buying decisions on the rankings.

I don't think this is any sort of revolutionary concept. We aren't ranking them for some arbitrary theoretical purpose, the idea is to rank them in a manner that lets us know we're going to have some detectable advantage in the real world if we choose one over the other. Otherwise, we could just rank them by UPC code or something other irrelevant designation.

Yes, I feel it helps choose winners in the real world. I think that rounds that pass the FBI testing have a excellent chance of performing very well in the real world, and round that fail will most likely perform poorly in the real world.

All the service pistol calibers pass the FBI testing with at least some loadings.

From another thread I once read online, the person on the forum said he spoke with a doctor that dealt with gunshot wounds. From what was spoke, the doctor said that those shot with a 9mm usually lived. Not so with those shot with a .45.

Interesting assertion. What I've heard from those in the medical profession, they don't bother trying to determine the caliber of the projectiles they find. Their focus is on keeping the patient alive, not prosecuting crime so they don't have the time to be playing around with the bullet--the caliber is irrelevant to them.

I think your forum poster is either making things up or quoting someone else who is making things up.

A huge number (over half) of 9mm shootings involved ball ammo. I think that skewed the results of the study in a negative manner. One can reasonable expect that FMJ ammo will not stop as well as a state of the art expanding bullet.

Two observations:

1. Sounds like he knows what kind of bullets were used, (generally at least) and so you might actually get some traction trying to have him re-run his numbers just comparing "like" bullets with like.

2. Let's take a look at his numbers, assuming that he's right and that the 9mm numbers should be better than they really are. You claim that failing to differentiate the numbers based on bullet type could be hiding a difference due to caliber.

9mm Luger
# of people shot – 456
# of hits – 1121
% of hits that were fatal – 24%
Average number of rounds until incapacitation – 2.45
% of people who were not incapacitated – 13%
One-shot-stop % – 34%
Accuracy (head and torso hits) – 74%
% actually incapacitated by one shot (torso or head hit) – 47%

.45 ACP
# of people shot – 209
# of hits – 436
% of hits that were fatal – 29%
Average number of rounds until incapacitation – 2.08
% of people who were not incapacitated – 14%
One-shot-stop % – 39%
Accuracy (head and torso hits) – 85%
% actually incapacitated by one shot (torso or head hit) – 51%

What becomes obvious is that if we fudge the 9mm numbers by improving them a little to take into account Ellifritz's idea that they would be better if there weren't so many FMJ shootings in the 9mm data, the numbers don't become more different from the 45ACP, they become more like them.

So in this case, it seems like correcting for non-expanding vs. expanding would actually make this theoretical difference harder to see, not easier.

You're absolutely correct that there's no data proving that .45 is more effective than 9mm, the point I'm trying to make is that there's not data disproving it either so saying that .45 isn't significantly more effective than 9mm is just as incorrect as saying that it is because, in reality, we really have no way of knowing either way.

Well, sorta. Assuming that something exists in the absence of evidence of its existence is not really a great approach to getting to the truth.

For example, if you have two people, one of them assuming unicorns don't exist because there's no evidence about the existence of unicorns in spite of years of people looking for that evidence and the other person assuming unicorns do exist, because the lack of evidence doesn't disprove their existence, the validity of the two assumptions is not equal.

[44 AMP]

Not being formally trained in statistics, or voodoo, I ponder how some things work. Hopefully, some of you more learned folk can explain them in terms I can understand.

My first question is, how can you find small differences using "real world data" when the real world shooting are not uniform. General trends, I can see, but aren't small things rather canceled out by the inconsistency of real world shootings??

And what is actually the data used? isn't the goal an instant stop with a proper hit? Or is the data just what was available after the guy was stopped??

How do we account for people shot multiple times before being stopped (or falling down) when trying to evaluate the performance of a single round of a given load??

I ponder things like that, and many other things. Seems to me counting all the hits and not just the good hits would distort things a bit. And I don't think that there is a lot of data reflecting detailed information on bullet path and performance, only general things.

Should ball ammo be its own category?

I have other questions, but these are a start.

[JohnKSa]

My first question is, how can you find small differences using "real world data" when the real world shooting are not uniform. General trends, I can see, but aren't small things rather canceled out by the inconsistency of real world shootings??

If there's some kind of consistent effect, it can be pulled out of the noise using the proper techniques. The principle is that the variable effects will tend to cancel out, while the consistent effect will actually become more prominent with the application of the proper techniques.

However, if you have to resort to that kind of approach, it's usually telling you that there are other things that affect the outcome much more strongly in practice than the effect you're trying to find. It is likely that means that the effect you're looking for is going to be swamped in the overall outcomes from a practical perspective. That is, it may be detectable but still not practically significant.

And what is actually the data used? isn't the goal an instant stop with a proper hit? Or is the data just what was available after the guy was stopped??

If you hit someone in the CNS with just about any caliber you get an instant stop. Sure, that's the goal, but we're also interested in outcomes when the attacker isn't instantly stopped. I think I speak for everyone when I say that we would like to remain uninjured and stop the attack as quickly as possible even in the cases when the CNS is not hit.

You're looking for decreases in failure to stop. Decreases in time to incapacitation. Decreases in injury to the defender.

You want to see that the choice you make is buying you something.

Seems to me counting all the hits and not just the good hits would distort things a bit.

1. Throwing away data is problematic. You can get any result you want by throwing away data. You just keep the data that says what you want the outcome to be and throw away the data that is ambiguous or that goes against your premise. If you are clever, you can probably find ways to do that in such a way as to make it unlikely someone looking at your results would figure it out.

2. In the real world, you don't always get good hits because it's the real world. I think people still want to minimize the time it takes to stop the attack and minimize injury even if they can't make good hits for some reason.

3. If caliber choice has an effect on shootability or anything else that might relate to getting good hits, do you want to eliminate that from the data?

Should ball ammo be its own category?

If all the compared calibers have roughly similar representation for expanding and ball ammo compared to each other, (or if the choice of expanding vs. ball ammo isn't a factor in the real world) then it shouldn't matter. If there's a difference due to caliber, it will show up whether comparing ball ammo or expanding ammo.

On the other hand, if, for example, one data set is 90% ball ammo and 10% expanding ammo while the other is 10% ball ammo and 90% expanding ammo, then maybe that's not a fair comparison based on the assumption that the choice of ammo type affects the real-world outcomes.

Not being formally trained in statistics, or voodoo, I ponder how some things work. Hopefully, some of you more learned folk can explain them in terms I can understand.

Yeah, it's really not complicated at all, when you get right down to it.

This topic tends to draw a lot of obfuscatory input, some intentional, some not. But the basic concept is not at all hard to understand.

Here it is in a nutshell. No formal training, voodoo or fancy terminology required. Not even any pondering is necessary.

If caliber choice makes a worthwhile difference in the real world, then we should be able to see it making a worthwhile difference in the real world. If we can't see it making a worthwhile difference in the real world, then we should be very skeptical of claims that it does.

[603Country]

All that verbiage. I’m still in the 45 camp for ‘man stopping’. BJung’s data was interesting.

[Shadow9mm]

Originally Posted by JohnKSa

They selected 10mm, but never issued it at full power. They found they could get the results they needed from a downloaded version and issued that. For a little while. The downloaded version was duplicated in a more compact package in the form of the .40S&W. The 10mm, the FBI version of it and the .40S&W all would be rated higher than the 9mm in terms of momentum/energy/bullet diameter/bullet weight. As far as whether that made any difference in the outcomes of shootings goes--they never released any information on that.

I guess we are supposed to assume that the FBI lost all interest in looking at shooting outcomes and tying them to caliber after 1986 and just winged it from there, basing everything on the results of their testing protocol.Ok, so you've got your comparison data generated in controlled conditions with artificial testing mediums.

What does it tell you about the outcome of real world shootings? There's no benefit to being able to rank cartridges if you can't prove that the ranking relates to some real-world advantage to a defender basing their buying decisions on the rankings.

I don't think this is any sort of revolutionary concept. We aren't ranking them for some arbitrary theoretical purpose, the idea is to rank them in a manner that lets us know we're going to have some detectable advantage in the real world if we choose one over the other. Otherwise, we could just rank them by UPC code or something other irrelevant designation.All the service pistol calibers pass the FBI testing with at least some loadings. Interesting assertion. What I've heard from those in the medical profession, they don't bother trying to determine the caliber of the projectiles they find. Their focus is on keeping the patient alive, not prosecuting crime so they don't have the time to be playing around with the bullet--the caliber is irrelevant to them.

So I look at the FBI testing a little different. I look at it as a list of loads on a pass/fail basis. From this you can parse out data and extrapolate, one could say more of cartridge X loads pass the test than cartridge Y loads to extrapolate performance data on a specific cartridge. but it is simply a list of cartridges that passed and or failed the test.

But the fundamentals of the test, did the bullet expand or clog. Did it reach minimum acceptable penetration depth. Did it stay within the maximum acceptable penetration range. They are all good criteria on which to base real world performance.

And I would say that having loads that reliably pass those standards offers a real world advantage to a defender. again, not as a ranking, but simply as a load that passed the testing criteria.

I would say that bullet engineering/design and real world performance has increased rapidly since the advent of these testing protocols. If not for this testing and its well defined goals, to what do you attribute this advance?

[Koda94]

Yes, small differences are canceled 9ut by the inconsistencies in real world shootings.
Its a scale issue.
The 45 is significantly bigger than a 9mm. .098" bigger. Side by side thats significant. But .098" compared to the size and mass of a human target is virtually nothing.
Thats why one is not better than the other.

[Shadow9mm]

Originally Posted by Koda94

Yes, small differences are canceled 9ut by the inconsistencies in real world shootings.
Its a scale issue.
The 45 is significantly bigger than a 9mm. .098" bigger. Side by side thats significant. But .098" compared to the size and mass of a human target is virtually nothing.
Thats why one is not better than the other.

sure its a .096 seems like a small number, and it is. But as you said bullets are very small in relation to the mass of a human. But going from .355 to .451, well that's a 27% increase in diameter.

[JohnKSa]

So I look at the FBI testing a little different. I look at it as a list of loads on a pass/fail basis.

I agree. I was responding to this comment:

"In order to compare, cartridges, bullet designs, and loads you need consistent testing conditions and testing mediums. You will never get that from real world data. "

And I would say that having loads that reliably pass those standards offers a real world advantage to a defender. again, not as a ranking, but simply as a load that passed the testing criteria.

Again, all of the service pistol cartridges will pass the test with some loadings. Which means it's not really that helpful in terms of ranking cartridges to answer the question posed by the OP.

I would say that bullet engineering/design and real world performance has increased rapidly since the advent of these testing protocols. If not for this testing and its well defined goals, to what do you attribute this advance?

I think gel testing has been great for bullet design. Do I believe that you can rank ammo in a performance class using the relatively small differences seen in gel testing and expect those rankings to translate into something that relates to being able to rank them in terms of real-world shooting performance? Well, since no one has been able to show that caliber differences can do that, it's hard to see how the even smaller differences due to bullet performance could be managing it.

But .098" compared to the size and mass of a human target is virtually nothing.

That's part of it, but really only a very small part of it. The main reason that real-world shooting outcomes can't be tied directly to caliber differences is swamping.

Swamping, in engineering is the general principle that if you have two effects on system performance and one of those effects is consistently at least 10 times greater than the other, you can generally speaking, for practical purposes, neglect the smaller effect.

There are multiple things that affect the outcome of real world shootings that have a much larger effect on the outcome than caliber. The effect due to caliber is just too far down in the noise to show up in the outcomes.

[Sharkbite]

Is a difference that is too small to show up in any kind of trend (over 100+ years) worth debating? The other differences between calibers are so much easier to quantify.

[JohnKSa]

But going from .355 to .451, well that's a 27% increase in diameter.

Some questions to consider. I'm not saying the answer to this whole question is contained in their answers, but they are worth thinking about.

1. How much weight of tissue is damaged, on average, by a single hit from a service pistol bullet. If you increase that by 27%, then what how much weight does it damage? What about if you double it, then how much weight is damaged? What are the percentages of those weights to a 180 lb body?
2. If a human body weighs 180lbs, how many pounds of that body can be damaged without resulting in physical incapacitation? What percentage is that?
3. What is the percentage ratio of the weight answers from 1 to the weight answer from 2?
4. What percentage of the time is the physical incapacitation of the attacker the outcome of a successful defensive shooting?
5. What percentage of the time does the person scoring the first "good hit" win a gunfight?

[Koda94]

Originally Posted by Shadow9mm

sure its a .096 seems like a small number, and it is. But as you said bullets are very small in relation to the mass of a human. But going from .355 to .451, well that's a 27% increase in diameter.

Its the percentage relationship with the target that matters. Not the two different projectiles.

[Shadow9mm]

Originally Posted by Koda94

Its the percentage relationship with the target that matters. Not the two different projectiles.

Says who? projectiles are being compared. Sure you can compare their size relative to the target, but the ratios between the bullets will be the same. 27 % more diameter is 27% more. And 10% more ft-lb of energy is 10% more.

[Koda94]

Originally Posted by Shadow9mm

Says who?

The laws of physics.

[Shadow9mm]

Originally Posted by Koda94

The laws of physics.

its all the same ratio....... it will be 27% larger in relation to my body than a 9mm will. You are just shifting the decimal points around.

[Webleymkv]

Originally posted by JohnKSa
Quote:
A huge number (over half) of 9mm shootings involved ball ammo. I think that skewed the results of the study in a negative manner. One can reasonable expect that FMJ ammo will not stop as well as a state of the art expanding bullet.
Two observations:

1. Sounds like he knows what kind of bullets were used, (generally at least) and so you might actually get some traction trying to have him re-run his numbers just comparing "like" bullets with like.

Again, Ellifritz's own commentary doesn't seem to support this:

Originally posted by Greg Ellifritz
I documented all of the data I could; tracking caliber, type of bullet (if known), where the bullet hit and whether or not the person was incapacitated. I also tracked fatalities, noting which bullets were more likely to kill and which were not. It was an exhaustive project, but I’m glad I did it and I’m happy to report the results of my study here.
emphasis added

Originally posted by Greg Ellifritz
I really would have liked to break it down by individual bullet type, but I didn’t have enough data points to reach a level of statistical significance. Getting accurate data on nearly 1800 shootings was hard work. I couldn’t imagine breaking it down farther than what I did here.
emphasis added

What I take from Ellifritz's comments is that, if he'd had enough data to break it down by bullet type, he would have. Let's bear in mind, also, that depending upon the other details of a shooting, it is sometimes possible to infer the loading used even if it wasn't specifically stated in the report. If a particular shooting involves a police officer shooting a suspect and we know what the duty ammunition issued by the department at the time of the shooting was, then we can make a pretty safe assumption as to what specific loading was used in the shooting. For this reason, I don't think it would be too far a stretch to assume that Ellifritz probably had more information regarding the specific bullet used in his 9mm and .40 S&W data as those have been the two most popular calibers for police duty handguns over the last 30ish years. While .45 ACP has certainly been used by police, it has never been as popular as 9mm or .40 S&W so it would make sense that a lesser number of the shots fired in Ellifritz's data for .45 were fired by police officers and thus he would likely have less data regarding which specific .45 ACP loading was used in a given shooting.

Also, we must take into account that there are some very large organizations which are known to use 9mm FMJ ammunition exclusively or at least did so in the past. Nearly any shooting involving the military is more than likely going to be with FMJ ammunition as, outside of a few very specialized roles, military handgun ammunition is almost exclusively FMJ. Likewise, as I mentioned in a previous post, NYPD issued 9mm FMJ ammunition exclusively for the better part of a decade and, seeing as they are one of the largest LE agencies in the country, it's quite likely that at least some of Ellifritz's data came from NYPD.

Originally posted by JohnKSa
2. Let's take a look at his numbers, assuming that he's right and that the 9mm numbers should be better than they really are. You claim that failing to differentiate the numbers based on bullet type could be hiding a difference due to caliber....

...What becomes obvious is that if we fudge the 9mm numbers by improving them a little to take into account Ellifritz's idea that they would be better if there weren't so many FMJ shootings in the 9mm data, the numbers don't become more different from the 45ACP, they become more like them.

So in this case, it seems like correcting for non-expanding vs. expanding would actually make this theoretical difference harder to see, not easier.

This assumes that the .45 ACP numbers had a roughly equal or lower proportion of shootings with FMJ as compared to 9mm, but that's data we don't have. I suspect that, because .45 ACP is and always has been significantly less popular than 9mm for police use, that a higher proportion of Ellifritz's data for .45 ACP had unknown bullet types. Also, it's worthy of note that Ellifritz had over twice as much 9mm data (456 shootings) as .45 ACP data (209 shootings). Even if we assume that both calibers had roughly the same proportion of shootings with FMJ ammo, the larger data set for 9mm should mitigate that variable to a greater degree than the smaller data set for .45 ACP.

Originally posted by JohnKSa
Quote:
You're absolutely correct that there's no data proving that .45 is more effective than 9mm, the point I'm trying to make is that there's not data disproving it either so saying that .45 isn't significantly more effective than 9mm is just as incorrect as saying that it is because, in reality, we really have no way of knowing either way.
Well, sorta. Assuming that something exists in the absence of evidence of its existence is not really a great approach to getting to the truth.

For example, if you have two people, one of them assuming unicorns don't exist because there's no evidence about the existence of unicorns in spite of years of people looking for that evidence and the other person assuming unicorns do exist, because the lack of evidence doesn't disprove their existence, the validity of the two assumptions is not equal.

I'm not assuming that anything does or does not exist, all I'm saying is that we have insufficient data to make any assumption. Yes, people have been searching for an answer without satisfaction for decades, but they've not all been searching in the same places. The majority of the study on the topic has been laboratory testing such as those done by the FBI and the work of people like Dr. Martin Fackler and Dr. Gary Roberts. While laboratory testing is useful, it can only tell us so much. Laboratory testing is very good at telling us what a given bullet will do when it strikes its intended target, but it doesn't tell us much about how the intended target will react to being struck.

Live animal testing might shed a little light on how a living organism reacts to being shot, but even that has problems. For one thing, humans are the only erect biped animals currently extant and all of the animals used in past live animal testing such as sheep, goats, swine, horses, and cattle are quadrupedal which means they have significant anatomical differences as compared to humans. Also, live animal testing has fallen out of favor due to ethical concerns as many consider it to be cruel. Very old live animal tests like the Thompson-LaGarde tests were so poorly done as to render them useless and newer tests, due to the animal cruelty concerns, generally don't have results easily available to the general public. The most recent live-animal tests with available results that I'm aware of were the supposed Straousburg Tests on goats which are extremely controversial with many claiming that the results were fabricated and that the tests never actually occurred.

That leaves us with the topic of discussion which is study of real world shooting of humans. Unfortunately this method of study inherently contains the highest number of uncontrolled variables though those variables can be somewhat mitigated through means such as segregating certain data such as expanding vs. non-expanding bullets and large data sets to offset the effect of outliers. This method of study has, IMHO, the best potential to give us answers as to the significance of performance differences between calibers and bullet types if and only if we can gather enough quality data. Unfortunately, gathering enough quality data seems to be extremely difficult if not impossible due to a variety of factors.

As I've stated repeatedly, the only two such studies that I'm aware of are the Marshall/Sanow study and the Ellifritz study. As you yourself pointed out earlier in this thread, the Marshall/Sanow study has credibility issues so it is of very limited utility as the results are suspect. The Ellifritz study, on the other hand, does not sufficiently segregate its data and thus likely skews the results from what might be reasonably expected in the real world.

As I stated, the biggest issue I have with the Ellifritz study is that it does not segregate the data for expanding and non-expanding bullets. While this probably isn't quite as problematic with small calibers like .22, .25, and .32 as so-called "expanding" bullets in those calibers quite frequently fail to do so, it is a problem with "service pistol" class handguns and "magnum class" handguns as we know from laboratory testing that expanding bullets in these caliber perform drastically differently than non-expanding ones so I don't see it as unreasonable to assume that lumping them together would skew the data. I think its a reasonable assumption that most people interested enough in terminal ballistics to bother reading Ellifritz, or any other study for that matter, are probably going to choose some sort of expanding bullet in a "service pistol" or larger caliber handgun so all that the inclusion of FMJ and other non-expanding bullet types does is artificially skew the data downward.

While not quite as big an issue as the expanding vs. non-expanding bullet, not knowing the type and barrel length of handgun is also problematic with certain calibers. While 9mm and .45 both seem to perform reasonably consistently with modern JHP bullets regardless of barrel length, calibers like .38 Special and .380 Auto (which are both still quite popular defensive handgun calibers) can show drastic performance differences depending on the barrel length they're fired from even if the same ammunition is used. For example, the .38 Special +P 158 gr LSWCHP (commonly known as the "FBI Load") performs quite well from a 4" or longer barrel and can rival the performance of even modern premium 9mm JHP, but it routinely fails to expand when fired from a snubnose.

Now, before anyone gets upset with me for "attacking" Greg Ellifritz, that's not what I'm trying to do at all. I genuinely believe that Ellifritz did the best he could with the data that was available to him. The fault in the Ellifritz study is not laziness or sloppiness on the part of Ellifritz, but rather the limited amount and type of data that he had to work with as is evidenced by Ellifritz's own statements.

As I explained earlier, the goal of a police investigation into a shooting is to either solve a crime or determine whether or the shooter was legally justified in shooting. The goal of the investigation is not to determine the effectiveness of the firearm, caliber, or specific bullet used in the shooting. As such, details about the gun, caliber, and specific bullet are often omitted from the report as they're not deemed relevant to the investigation. Likewise, shootings are generally investigated after the fact and, like it or not, the information that makes it into the report is sometimes inaccurate. Finally, information about police investigations can be quite difficult to obtain as the reports are often simply unavailable to people outside of law enforcement or, in some cases, people outside of the specific department investigating a given shooting. Simply put, the information available from police reports is limited to begin with and collected by people with different purposes for the information than what we're trying to glean from it.

The only way I can see that we can get the information we need to draw any sort of informed conclusion is to convince several large police agencies which investigate large numbers of shootings to begin collecting the specific data that we need. Unfortunately, I don't think there are many police agencies interested in doing this so, for the forseeable future, we're probably going to get little, if any, useful data. The way I see it, the question as to whether .45 ACP is significantly more effective than 9mm in real world shootings is something of a Shrodinger's Cat type proposition: due to the lack of data we can neither assume that .45 is significantly more effective than 9mm nor can we assume that it isn't.

[Koda94]

Originally Posted by Shadow9mm

its all the same ratio....... it will be 27% larger in relation to my body than a 9mm will. You are just shifting the decimal points around.

Its not the same ratio though.
27% larger compared to those two bullets does not compare that difference to the size of a human.

Lets exaggerate this example, say the target is a charging elephant. I dont think anyones going to argue the 27% difference between a 9 or 45 is going to make any effect on the elephant. Obviously, nobodys going to choose either as a hunting caliber for elephants but that reason shows why the size ratio between the two bullets is not the same compared to the size if a human.. 098" wouldn't even be a quarter of a percent of the size of a person.

The average size and mass of the intended human target also has a tolrance that is much greater than the 27% which is why the diameter difference alone does not even have a measurable ( noticeable) effect. Were talking a .098" difference spread out over the size of a person, is so negligible its never going to be measurable.

[Webleymkv]

If we're going to compare bullet diameters, it might be more useful to compare the measurements of the total wound track. For example, a per vista outdoors law enforcement website, a 9mm 124 gr HST penetrated to 11" and expanded to .880" in bare gelatin while the .45 230 gr HST penetrated to 12" and expanded to .980". If we simply calculate the wound track by the volume of a cylinder (3.14 x radius squared x depth) we come up with approximately 6.7 square inches for the 9mm and 9 square inches for the .45. So the .45 crushes 2.3 square inches more tissue which, depending on which way you calculate your percentage, is 26-34% more.

[Koda94]

It would still be only a fraction of the size of a human.

Theres simply not enough difference between the two cartridges for their intended target.

[Shadow9mm]

removed

[Koda94]

I didnt say they weren't effective calibers for self defense.
Im saying the differences between them isnt enough to make one stand out above the other.

Your own numbers show that.

[Shadow9mm]

removed

[Koda94]

What ball size hole does a 9mm leave?