Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

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CanOfWhooppass
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Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by CanOfWhooppass »

Title says it, I've got cans on the way and both of my current loads are too fast:
Win 9mm +P+ 127gr Ranger SXT
Corbon 45ACP +P 185gr JHP

I'm looking for factory made, nickel case preferred, top shelf ammo. Idealy it will have lower flash signature when shooting unsuppressed, not throw up a smoke screen and suppress well to boot.

Cost isn't a major issue on these.

If anyone has a 9mm or 45 you really like, please let me know what it is and what you are shooting it out of. I have a bunch of guns in each caliber and hope to find a round that functions well in all, but at least cover my 3-4 go to guns for sure.

Thanks for looking.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by BlogSarge »

I'm not too familiar with 45 ballistics but have looked into 9mm quite a bit. Bonded bullets like the Speer Gold Dot always perform well on the gelatin test protocol. I've been to real world gelatin tests and can vouch for the Gold Dot's performance.

You can drive yourself to drink with the study of ballistics. In the end, choose a few samples of good bullets and try them in your gun, then select the one that works flawlessly in your gun and has good performance in tests. And then, if things go to poop on you, put one of the chosen bullets into the bad guy, send a few more bullets there to keep the first one company and let them do their job.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by doubloon »

What about "Oath Ammo" in 9mm and 45? There's been buzz about it recently with the release of their 12ga defense round.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by CanOfWhooppass »

BlogSarge wrote:I'm not too familiar with 45 ballistics but have looked into 9mm quite a bit. Bonded bullets like the Speer Gold Dot always perform well on the gelatin test protocol. I've been to real world gelatin tests and can vouch for the Gold Dot's performance.

You can drive yourself to drink with the study of ballistics. In the end, choose a few samples of good bullets and try them in your gun, then select the one that works flawlessly in your gun and has good performance in tests. And then, if things go to poop on you, put one of the chosen bullets into the bad guy, send a few more bullets there to keep the first one company and let them do their job.
I don't drove my self crazy wondering if one may have a slightly better wound chanel. My desire for premium is mostly the added reliability that comes from better components and quality control.

I have noticed that not all premium loads shoots the same. I landed on 185gr +P 45acp instead of 230gr because it has faster follow up shots in my magnaported officers model.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by CanOfWhooppass »

doubloon wrote:What about "Oath Ammo" in 9mm and 45? There's been buzz about it recently with the release of their 12ga defense round.
Thanks for the sugestion I'll take a look, but I tend to chase the tried and true rather than what's new.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by doubloon »

CanOfWhooppass wrote:
doubloon wrote:What about "Oath Ammo" in 9mm and 45? There's been buzz about it recently with the release of their 12ga defense round.
Thanks for the sugestion I'll take a look, but I tend to chase the tried and true rather than what's new.
Same here, I don't like gimmick ammo but you never know who likes what.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by RJT »

Federal Hydra Shok is my go to. 9mm 147s are 1000 fps, and the .45 230s are 900 fps.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by CanOfWhooppass »

RJT wrote:Federal Hydra Shok is my go to. 9mm 147s are 1000 fps, and the .45 230s are 900 fps.
Thank you, lots to like with those, will try both.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by doubloon »

I guess I should have said I use hydra shok as well but never paid attention to speed or flash.

Lucky Gunner did an article a while back about muzzle flash. I'm guessing there are a couple more articles like this somewhere out there.

http://www.luckygunner.com/lounge/muzzle-flash/

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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by 5th_Amendment »

I'd be curious to know what ammo was selected and any thoughts and observations? I am in a similar quandry at the moment. Tnoutdoors9 on Youtube has a host of good ballistics tests and starts most with a day/night muzzle flash look. Agree too, some fairly smoky loads out there. I'm going to standardize on supersonic 9mm 124gr +P gold dot ammo. It is quality ammo, even through auto glass and other barriers, has been (and still is) low flash for 20 years and burns clean. For subsonic performance, I want to buy 147 gr 9mm Gold dots. They are safely subsonic as far as I can tell given the literature and videos. My cans should be here around Christmas but my form 1s should arrive in the next 2 weeks. Soo excited to start shooting.

Another load that is popular is Federal HST. Flash and smoke look minimal and performance is good in most situations ... though I don't like the look of the auto glass test results. Not bad, just not great in my opinion. Performance everywhere else is pretty much picture perfect.

Same comments on .45; gold dot and HST perform well. The luckygunner ballistic tests are easy to find too and a great reference point. All the tests are chronographed, so all you need to worry about is whether your barrel length will exceed the test gun and by how much.

I'd love to hear what works for everyone, and what to avoid if you have had bad experiences. Both are instructive.
Last edited by 5th_Amendment on Mon Oct 03, 2016 8:02 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by JeffWard »

I use Federal HST 147 in 9mm, and 230 in 45.

Both are subsonic, great terminal performers.

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Re: Your favorite premium defense subsonic 9mm and 45ACP rounds for suppressed shooting

Post by CanOfWhooppass »

I ended up using 147gr HST for 9mm as well, great reliability and accuracy out of every 9mm I own.

45 is easy, anything 230gr, I had a mix of brands around and since I can't hear a difference, I go with what each gun shoots best.
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