Is 38super really as bad ass as the numbers say it is?

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Iamduck82

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I like guns. I like everything about them. The thought of functioning a rifle or a pistol is actually calming for me. Some people knit, I go to my gun safe. I bought another gun........ A colt 80 series (lame I know) 1911 in 38 super. To date I love my 1911's in 45acp. I'm partial to that caliber in that pistol. Bought the pistol because I wanted a colt and I don't own anything in 38 super. Perfect reason to buy something right? I didn't have one.

This got me curious about opening my eyes to caliber performance other than 45. For the longest time I went along with the thought bigger bullet wins. Bought my first 45 because a friend said "9mm is effective on an enemy, 40 is better, but a 45 makes it hard for them to walk when they're missing their spine".

So here is the big question. Who really wins?

When comparing calibers what's makes it more effective? Energy of the projectile? Velocity? Penetration? Cavity it creates? Recoil?

Forget cost per round... When reloading it kinda becomes negligible..

What round is the jack of all trades? High velocity, high energy, low recoil, best terminal ballistics.

I thought 45 was the bad ass mofo, but some of the numbers I see tells me 38 super can be a vicious #####.


Thoughts? Is 38super under rated?
 
The best caliber is the one you can put on target accurately and quickly with. Caliber and terminal ballistics alone don't make any round the "best". There are stories out there of 22lr beating 45 acp in straight up shootouts. Having said that, the 38 Super was made to compete in the Major power factor category in IPSC. It's another compromise round of damage of 45 acp and firepower of 9mm, like the .40 SW, the 10 mm, the .357 SIG. They were popular in the 80s and early 90s but you don't hear much about it anymore.
 
If Elmer Keith is to be believed ( I do anyhow) it was built to penetrate the armoured vests, up armoured sedans and bulletproof wind-shields favoured by post WW1 gangsters.
Which it did quite handily.
But as a man stopper it falls far short of 45 ACP, 45 LC or 44 special.
Got to have a big bore with a decent meplat to put men down handily ( again; Keith's opinion...surely not mine as I've '0' experience shooting people).
 
OP- also be careful with your loading. Lots of IPSC guys load well beyond recommended SAMI specs for 38s to meet power factor. Shooting out of STI raceguns is fine but out of a Colt, not sure.
 
I understand the history of the round and that at the end of the day it's essentially a magnum version of the 9mm. I'm not a fan of 9mm other than it's cheap, low recoil and you can find it everywhere. But evolution of powders and projectiles have been able to bring it to a point where some say it can "compete" with the 45. I'm not talking about reloading. I'm talking about factory hot loads. Just so we don't go off point I'm not arguing 9mm is a replacement for 45.

What I'm asking is would a 38 super (or any similar caliber) be a fight for a stronger alternative to 45? Higher muzzle velocities allow to generate more energy with a smaller projectile. Can't argue that in order to penetrate armour you need momentum to penetrate. Mass means momentum.

Side by side. From a number stand point 45 beats 38 super in one maybe two categories. Generates a larger cavity and I think has slightly better penetration (some test I found on google.... Google is king of info). Where 38 super has higher velocities and greater energy and maintained energy through its flight path. Again from what I've read the 38 has much more manageable recoil even in a stack pistol.

Is 38 super under rated? I guess the same can be said for 10mm?
 
What I'm asking is would a 38 super (or any similar caliber) be a fight for a stronger alternative to 45? Higher muzzle velocities allow to generate more energy with a smaller projectile. Can't argue that in order to penetrate armour you need momentum to penetrate. Mass means momentum.
Click to expand...

You have just re-worded the argument between 5.56 and 7.62.

What do you want to do with your pistol? If you are preparing for an apocolypse, buy rifles.

The biggest user of .38 super is (was) IPSC shooters who found that Super could be safely (over)loaded beyond factory to Major Power factor and that gave higher magazine capacity because of the smaller case diameter, before the mag capacity laws came about. The smaller, lighter, and faster bullet worked well with compensators that all the serious shooters once had on their race guns.

That was the days of the equipment race. Since then .357 Sig and others have come to the fore, as well as limited, standard, and production divisions. Super is still viable in Open and I still like mine but it became popular for competition, not penetration or what size of body cavity it would create.
 
I have rifles... 5.56 vs 7.62 argument is a different animal. 75gr 5.56 vs 165gr 7.62 isn't the same as a 147jhp 38super vs a 185jhp 45acp.

I'm not looking for what made it popular, but more what is it capable of? Kind if like a modern diesel. Built and popular for towing heavy loads. But is capable of doing the quarter mile in 13 seconds.
 
If you already reload, reload your .45 ACP to .45 Super levels and get a 1911 platform that can handle that kind of pressure.
 
38 super
Bullet weight/type Velocity Energy
90 gr (6 g) JHP 1,557 ft/s (475 m/s) 485 ft·lbf (658 J)
100 gr (6 g) FMJ 1,450 ft/s (440 m/s) 467 ft·lbf (633 J)
115 gr (7 g) FMJ 1,395 ft/s (425 m/s) 497 ft·lbf (674 J)
130 gr (8 g) FMJ 1,305 ft/s (398 m/s) 492 ft·lbf (667 J)
150 gr (10 g) FMJ 1,148 ft/s (350 m/s) 439 ft·lbf (595 J)

45acp
Bullet weight/type Velocity Energy
185 gr (12 g) Bonded Defense 1,225 ft/s (373 m/s) 616 ft·lbf (835 J)
185 gr (12 g) Speer Gold Dot JHP 1,050 ft/s (320 m/s) 453 ft·lbf (614 J)
200 gr (13 g) Speer Gold Dot JHP +P 1,080 ft/s (330 m/s) 518 ft·lbf (702 J)
230 gr (15 g) Federal Hydra-Shok 900 ft/s (270 m/s) 414 ft·lbf (561 J)
230 gr (15 g) US Army Ball FMJ 830 ft/s (250 m/s) 352 ft·lbf (477 J)

Seems comparable to me....
 
I'm a 9x23 fan (38 super +P+), which ups the velocity a bit: 125 gr silvertip hp at 1450 fps and 583 ft·lbf.
And for the other plus: you get an additional two rounds in a single stack 1911.
That, and this will fit in a TT33 too.
R
 
Interesting question - one which has bought more beer over the years than anyone can count.

The .38 Super has better penetration than the .45 ACP. Beyond that, IMHO, it's just paper and academics. The .45 ACP has a century-long track record of excellent performance, man-stopper-wise. A centre hit with it will put a man down every time. I frankly can't see you can do better than that.

Nothing wrong with the .38 ACP, mind.
 
ATOM said:
Interesting question - one which has bought more beer over the years than anyone can count.

The .38 Super has better penetration than the .45 ACP. Beyond that, IMHO, it's just paper and academics. The .45 ACP has a century-long track record of excellent performance, man-stopper-wise. A centre hit with it will put a man down every time. I frankly can't see you can do better than that.

Nothing wrong with the .38 ACP, mind.
Click to expand...

This is where I am torn. The 45 has a long standing record of being effective. What is it that makes it so effective? And "superior" to other calibers. Saying its worked well in the past is like answering the "question why do things that way?" With "I dunno it's always been done that way."

If you look at the numbers factory ammo to factory ammo the 38super and 45acp produce similar energy numbers. Is that what makes the 45 punch so hard? Or is it it's ballistics once mushroomed (almost double in size depending on projectile)?

Guess the mechanics of it could be similar to the 5.56 and the 300blk comparison. 5.56 has high velocity with a small projectile. in close quarters it had issues because it traveled too fast and would punch through a "target" before the projectiles ballistics would come into play. 300blk (and similar calibers) bring a solution/compromise to the table. Slower projectile with greater mass.

Would the 38super velocities be similar (in situation not literal) to the 5.56? And the reason 45 is so functional is that it hits like a tank and doesn't need the speed?

Ok someone with ballistic gel make I video and answer my question for me. Chop chop... Lol
 
Iamduck82 - Well, the why of it is Terminal Ballistics and that's where science starts square-dancing with the occult.

There are a number of theoretical systems to measure stopping power. Julian Hatcher (who was in charge of US Army ordnance at one time) came out with one in the 1920s, using bullet profile, diameter, weight and velocity. The reference is his classic book Pistols and Revolvers . In it, he describes trials which led to the adoption of the .45 ACP. They involved, among other things, shooting cattle with various rounds. The .30 Luger was under consideration and had about the highest kinetic energy, but proved very poor compared to the .45 Colt, .45 ACP, .44-40, .44 Special, etc. This was despite the .30 bullets not penetrating all the way through, meaning that its entire KE was indeed dropped in the cow. Hatcher's formula puts the 45 ACP at about three times as effective as the ,38 Super.

In the late 1980s, the FBI (distressed by several incidents where their issue handguns didn't cut it) did a fairly major study. Their conclusions stressed penetration to do damage to the central nervous system.

Personally, I'll stick with Hatcher. Despite the theoretical advantages of small, fast bullets, at pistol velocities, big and slow has a better reputation.

Once you get into rifle velocities, things change. The 5.56mm, so far as I have been able to determine, is an effective 'stopper' only when it has a very high velocity. Without going into some very complicated equations, at high velocities, the 5.56mm tends to become unstable and tumble once it moves from a less dense medium (air) into a more dense medium (water-based body). It often fragments in doing so, increasing the damage. Once the velocity drops below a certain point, the bullet tends to remain stable and just drill through. That may be lethal, but it doesn't put men down as well. (Despite the tacticool nature and handiness of shorter M-16 variants, this is why I think longer barrels are a better choice. The shorties trade off velocity for handiness and there have been many reports from Afghanistan and Iraq of enemy being hit and not going down at ranges much beyond 150m.)

Like I said, nothing wrong with the .38 Super. It has some advantages (penetration, weight, etc), but empirical evidence suggests it's just not as effective. There ar5e a lot of variables and getting a firm answer is essentially impossible.
 
Penetration is nice but even comparing a round nose 45 ACP to to a flat nose Keith style 45 LC or a wadcutter; the bigger meplat will usually win out ( or so I've been led to believe).
I realize these types of bullets will not be readily digested by auto-pistols, but if you can get your head around this theory, then it'll become apparent why the big bores are better stoppers than the fast movers.
Or not...lol
Stay safe
 
so far after the feed back i've gotten on here, and the reading it lead me towards.... i came to this conclusion.

projectile expansion and damage generated is fairly similar between 9mm to 45acp. where performance differs is how these cartridges transfer their energy to said target. as i had earlier speculated smaller projectile at a higher rate of speed punches through a target before it can effectively transfer energy and create stopping power. with the 45acp and similar cartridges their weight to speed ratio allows them to transfer that energy more effectively.

At the end of the day the 45 packs more punch than a 9mm, 38 super and the 40S&W. With that being said i see my new 38 super as a more effective round than the 9mm (allows for higher velocities with heavier projectiles). But then again with proper shot placement a 22lr does the trick.

thanks for the help guys.
 
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