5.7 x 28 - Speer Gold Dot 40 gr. Would you carry? Gel Test: 3/10/23. Old vs New compare w/ Ruger 57
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- čas přidán 5. 09. 2024
- Gel test comparison of Speer's 2020 version of 5.7 x 28 Gold Dot vs 2022's version.
Let's hope the 16" barrel comparison fares better for the new stuff?
(update - link to LC comparison:
• 5.7 x 28 - Speer Gold ...
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2020 Lot# 219101008:
1856 fps / 306 ft-lbs
15.7" penetration with expansion & retention (.3735" & 100%)
3x decent stretch-cavities & permanent-track
2022 Lot# 926272022
1735 fps / 267 ft-lbs
14.75" penetration with little expansion and fair retention (.3100" & 90%)
nearly entirely absent of any stretch-cavity or permanent-track
0:00 - intro
0:24 - 2020 LOT firing
0:29 - 2020 slo-mo
1:08 - 2020 gel-review
2:00 - 2020 recovered bullet
2:27 - 2022 LOT firing
2:33 - 2022 slo-mo
3:06 - 2022 gel-review
3:53 - 2022 recovered bullet
4:21 - side-by-side
4:26 - summary
Great info. Thanks for the comparison. Glad to know how to differentiate between the loadings.
yw
Very good video, thank you for taking the time to put it together.
thanks - I was motivated from the phone call I made to them to tell them their ammo doesn't work in gel and he was dismissive and said, "oh, that's because it's not organic gel". I told him he might want to get one posted of it actually working, but haven't found one yet. I carried this crap around in a magazine for 8 months thinking it was the same stuff I bought in 2020. Potentially dangerous.
@@ShastaBean that is ridiculous, I felt both did well in the video, but there was a huge clear difference of the two & you proved that hands down. I just ordered some Gold Dots which led me on a journey to searching for your video, now I am searching for other types of ammo. Was going to invest heavily in Speer, but not if they're treating ppl like crap. Too many options to support that kind of nonsense.
to be fair to them...the older flavor wouldn't cycle at all reliably in the PS90 feeding system@@nationnoise4565 . There's some vids of that out there. I assume they changed it because of that. Although I believe that explains the new tip, and not the >100 fps slower. The Federal AE was also slowed down, considerably. The rifle video showed the newer LOTs did fine in clear-gel. So I feel if they just got it back up over 1800 fps, it might be ok. Or, if someone takes the time to test it in the organic 10%, it might also prove it's ok. There is a slight difference in expansion between organic & synthetic and I would HOPE they actually tested their ammo's performance? So I'm open to it perhaps working in real tissue, but just would need to see evidence. I bought a bunch of the new stuff, and at least I could use it in the rifle, for defense. So it wasn't a complete waste of money. But of all the bullets I put into gel, the 2022 LOT of Speer GD was the only one that neither opened, nor tumbled. It was just a blank, straight line and basically a .224" hole. I'm waiting to see organic test, otherwise I'll be pulling the bullets and upping the charges and seating & crimping them. Then I'll have decent rounds for carrying.
I slightly disagree with your suggestion there's too many options. There's almost nothing out there that I trust for defense. The 27gr doesn't penetrate very far. And everything else is too slow. IF the VMAX was at 1900 fps, it would be fantastic. My handload video of it at 1950+ shows great result. Others have done vids of the factory stuff showing it also didn't open at times.
R&R is who am leaning towards, but availability is rough & Paul Harrel's video...just wow. That might help w/availability, though. haha.
Incredible video!!!
thanks. I'd love to hear Speer's explanation for this. Does the new stuff perform better out of a 30" barrel?
PO'd that I carried that junk around for many months thinking it was the same.
Well done keep em coming.
that's it for 5.7 gel for a couple of weeks. I have others to do though; The handloads velocity/group/POI from the R57, 1x 10mm in gel, a few 10mm handloads, and a couple 5.7 @ 100 yards and the 35 gr NTX in .223 velocity/POI/group. Much to do.
I've seen both versions of these do much better in actual organic FBI calibrated gel. Which makes sense since that's what they would use to test it in development and building the rounds.
Speer representatives have stated the bullet design change was required to improve function in new guns like the Ruger. That much velocity difference seems odd though.
where have you seen the new version in organic gel? I wasn't able to find any back when I searched.
And yes, I've seen plenty of videos where the old design failed miserably with cycling in the PS90. I never saw any of it failing in the LC, though.
They backed it down to make it less likely to penetrate a ballistic vest.
@ShastaBean I'm sure the new round is great out of a PS90. It sure seems like they wanted to make sure it couldn't penetrate a IIIa vest out of a pistol though.
Those are impressive differences!
I didn't know Speer _made_ a load for 5.7 FN, a Gold Dot hollow-point or any other bullet for it, until this month! All that I was aware of were the FN branded ammunition that, so far as I know, is made under label by someone else, and Federal American Eagle; and some hand loading forums.
I would have expected Speer to be a little higher velocity, because in forum there are handloads based on pulling the bullet from American Eagle, dumping the powder to preserve the factory staked primer, and loading with powder optimized for pistol under the same bullet to achieve velocity well in excess of 2,000 f.p.s. from the FN Five-Seven pistol while remaining within safe pressure. Those loads are an absolute, "Do NOT Use in carbines!" The powder keeps burning in the barrel, continuing to drive up pressure, resulting in the direct blowback action opening prematurely and creating a very unsafe condition as the cartridge cases ruptures.
I have been a fan of the FN P90 since I was introduced to it around 1997, then basically forgot the cartridge as a civilian until I saw a 5.7 upper that used P90 magazines for the AR lower. While I very much wanted exactly that but with a 10.5-inch barrel, when I was called back up post-9/11 and stuck with a basically _functioning_ lower and a ludicrously abused upper.
(My issue Colt M-16A2 with H barrel and National Match sights was ordered handed in, and replaced with a Franken-rifle assembled from several damaged National Guard rifles. When issues to me, the lower receiver and barrel were filled with compacted sand, the firing pin was broken and held together with the spring from a ballpoint pen, and the recoil spring was no longer springy. Oh, and the sights were broken. Physically broken.
So I spent much of my time trying to obtain alternate personal weapons, since our orders authorized them, but my First Sergeant did not allow them.)
But as a civilian in prairie dog territory, that 16" upper with the FN V-Max ammunition seemed like a brilliant idea! My go-to varmint rifle for years was the Mini-14 rebuilt by a custom gunsmith. He applied the M-21 rebuild from a standard M-14 to Mini-14's to make a superb varminter. 24-inch Douglas bull-profile match barrel, redesigned balanced gas system to mitigate barrel vibration, improved action blocks for stability, glass-bedded barrel, custom stock, the works. Rifled 1:14 for 52-grain varmint and competition bullets. Much though I might _want_ the new AR upper, once it was clear my medical-out was not going to be reversed no matter how much pressure the Army applied on the doctors or me, it just wasn't a priority until my Mini-14 got stolen.
Wow! I just realized how much I said about things that have *nothing* to do with this video! I had the opportunity to buy an FN Five-Seven more than a decade ago at Gander Mountain for $600, new, marked-down from $1,199 because it had sat there so long. It remains almost unused, in a safety deposit box, because it just isn't any better as a handgun for varminting than a Ruger Mark II and CCI Stingers are usually a whole lot cheaper!
Seeing that there is now what appeared to be an actually plausible defense load for it made me sit up and notice, but it looks like I've missed out on actually decent ammunition!
If you aren't familiar with them, Vanguard Outfitters makes what most consider to be decent defense loads. Their Black Fang 34 gr & their GPM 36 gr (I have video of that in gel & velocity+ groups). Buffman R.A.N.G.E is a good channel and I'm almost certain he has testing of the Fang. They are often available (the 36 gr currently is). I might start carrying that, after I test reliability some more. For now, it's the 2020 Speer from this vid.
Elite Ammunition is another, but is usually out-of-stock unless you subscribe to his channel (Jay Wolf Elite Ammunition) and get the notify of a pre-sale. The other "boutique" maker is R&R weapon systems. They currently look to have their IS130D-v3, which is the same bullet as one of my recent videos that I loaded myself using the Cutting Edge 30 gr Raptor. Theirs is actually faster than what I loaded, if my glance at chrono info is correct. AAC is a new maker and currently just doing the 40 gr VMAX to my knowledge and same basic velocity as FN flavor. Fiocchi is who you are talking about "makes" all the ammo for Federal, FN & Speer. They also came out with their own offerings of the 40 gr VMAX but also the 35 gr NTX. Both are pretty weak.
All that other stuff you went on about is info I find super interesting!! And could legit make for a good book to read. And the part about carbine vs pistol & pressure is something I took notice of. I bought off a guy on G*nbroker who listed 40 gr @ 2600+ fps from the 16"...which if it translates to what I've seen to a pistol of speed of diving by ~1.24, means a vel over 2100 fps. I shot one round from my Ruger LC and it ended my day with a shoulder-separation. I might have to still give it a try from the Ruger 57 and hope for the best. I bought 7 different kinds from him, so I'd really like to see if they work...as his velocities are far beyond what I'll ever load to (on purpose). His listing on that site are the seller name of DarkestHourDefense. I'm by no means recommending or even suggesting, other than to see that it's there and see if it wrecks your awesome-buy $600 FN. heh.
Good to know. I’ve always thought speer was premium. Wouldn’t think there bullet tech would regress
I called Speer to let them know. They weren't all that receptive. I asked the guy at Speer to please get a video posted of someone shooting the new round into 10% organic gel from a pistol because this is all I am going to do and it failed. It might work in that stuff. He said something about me shipping my ammo to them to test. I said, "yah no, you have your own and I'm not inspired to do that for your benefit"
To be fair, I am pretty sure they changed the tip so it would cycle in the PS90. I found out from other videos that their old version would fail in those. I haven't seen someone do a video to check if the new ones have solved for that.
Great comparison! Shows you what just 100 fps velocity and a larger nose opening will do! One is forced to wonder why Speer would deliberately "detune" the cartridge to be less effective - oh wait, because that's been the story of the 5.7x28 ever since introduction and the Ft. Hood shooting! Even with 40 grain Vmax the round proved to be devastatingly effective and almost got the round and guns for it banned!
The fastest I've ever pushed a 40 grain American Eagle slut is 2,060 fps / 377 fpe (511 joules) "average" from a FiveSeven handgun. But I ended up backing my own loads down because the lock system isn't made to handle the 37% higher breech face stress than the original design load. Having said that, it's EASY to achieve 1,850-1,900+ fps with 40 grain Vmax, and over 2,000 fps with Barnes 36 grain VG, and 2,150 fps with their 30 grain VG.
This comparison shows just how much difference that 100 fps makes.
I agree with all, except with the 30 & 36 gr VGs, I got 2312 & 2100, respectively. Probably a bit higher than necessary and primers a bit more flowing than ideal, but still both of those are right around 350 ft-lbs. I've come to the conclusion that ~350 is a pretty reasonable load with beyond 375 starting to ask too much. It seems when nearing 400 ft-lbs, is where problems really start to show up. My 40 gr VMAX look nearly perfect in gel at ~1980 - right around that 350#. Same with the Blitzking which was a bit slower at 1935.
There's a guy's channel called Trigger-Bar Philosopher that recently posted videos of S4 where it was over 2600 fps! His final shot was 2662 and it broke his PSA ROCK. That's 441 ft-lbs!!
I have rounds I bought off a guy on auction that are 375-400 ft-lbs. I fired ONE shot of the 40 gr ZMAX and it was 2621 fps from the Ruger LC. It had a shoulder-separation and the neck stuck in chamber and ended my day. That 16" vel would translate to approx ~2110 fps from the Ruger 57. I just finished polishing the LC chamber and cleared all of the lacquer and am going to again try to test the 7 types I bought from him, and will be posting those results. I didn't want to upload that single firing just yet - like it always seems, he went straight to blaming the gun. And to give the benefit of the doubt, I decided to polish and hopefully reduce any extra pressure that buildup might be contributing. That 2110 fps would amount to 396 ft-lbs. I am hopeful it will cycle and at least not fail the brass. I have little to no desire to load that hot, but very much want to know just where I can back off from, and feel confident.
Of course all bullets are different and the 35 gr NTX (341 ft-lbs) pierced the WSR primers on me on both the LC & R57, but repeated the load with CCI-400 and they were ok.
As for Speer, they changed the GD because of videos showing cycling problems in the PS90 with the old design. Whether that was just the tip, and the nerf'd it for "other" reasons is a mystery. I do think just changing the tip could have solved the feeding issues but will never know. I have not seen anyone shoot the new variety into 10% organic, so I have to leave that possibility open that it might open at that ~1730 fps. Still obviously VERY different terminal ballistics with what they did to it. From the rifle, both worked decently, but even then the old looks a bit better imo.
New one looks like Federal American Eagle ammo with different bullet.
The older AE, yes, velocity-wise...although they slowed the AE down to 1600 & below. But I'd at least expect that TMJ to possibly tumble.
If they could get that bad boi up to 2200 MV from a 5 inch handgun barrel it would be outstanding. I know they could do it to. Shit they could probably hit 2500 if they really tried. Man at 2500 this projectile would perform extremely violent in soft tissue.
That's not going to happen with a 40 gr projectile. It would have to be 33 gr or under to do that. We'll likely never see any factory load that goes above 1900 fps for 40 gr. 2000 if someone gets super brave (risky). Case separation will start to happen after that. The R&R 30 gr are at 2200 fps and those are good sturdy loadings.
I have a showing these from the rifle, where velocities are ~2300 & 2200 respectively with these rounds.
czcams.com/video/xag-CA2qoRQ/video.html
It doesn't much change the performance, other than the slower one actually expands but probably would hurt more.
Have you done a comparison to the blue tipped ss197 v-max? I am considering getting a M&P 5.7 but unsure of the ammo to carry for self defense purposes.
I didn't, because I've already seen it in some other videos. Plus it's too slow, imo, and wouldn't be in my top 5 for carrying. Because I have the old Speer, that's what I currently carry.
And I think they've slowed ss197 even more than the older boxes I have. The Gun Dungeon put it through the denim into gel and his velocity was down at 1600 fps for one firing, so 1635 avg...that's 100 fps slower than my boxes. The boxes I have are mid-1700s. So I might get around to ordering some new stuff and see if they indeed slowed that too and do a video like this Speer vid. I am pretty sure they have, just like the Speer & the Federal AE were slowed. The ss197 tests I've seen mostly just deform the tip and maybe tumble backwards. I have a video of the vmax in a handload that I had at 1979 fps. I feel it works very well at that velocity. It probably works fine at 1800, too. I do think even at 1600 it would be pretty devastating in tissue, though. But I'd opt for something from R&R, Vanguard, or Elite...or even better, my own.
czcams.com/video/61eIMX5kBUU/video.html
The M&P will give even slightly lower velocities than the Ruger. I can't recall the exact amount, but being gas operated it's slightly slower. New boxes of SS197 from that could be in the 1500s. It feels like fiocchi is trying to sabotage the progression of the darn cartridge.
Why did they ruin it? I bought a lot of 500rds thinking I was getting the good stuff, but then all the information came out about them neutering this round.
I too bought rounds thinking it was the same as my 1st purchase and was carrying it around in a magazine for several months.
I believe they changed the tip due to cycling issue in the magazine style in the PS90.
As for velocity, believe Fiocchi, and any company that they load 5.7 for, is being leaned on by certain agencies to keep the round from certain capabilities, if you know what I mean...
I guess the Speer is no longer top tier.
I was not at all happy to learn I was carrying these around in a magazine, thinking they were the same. I have the old ones in there now. The new ones were ok from carbine barrel. But would be a bit awkward carrying that around. If someone puts out a video showing the new ones actually expand in tissue or 10% organic, then maybe I'll feel a bit differently. But until then? Hard pass.
What would be the best ammo to carry in a 5.7?
sadly, all that I have had are inconsistencies. Right now, I'd say R&R 30 gr or 37 gr X. I haven't shot enough of that to know if there are same problems. But Paul Harrel had someone send him some that had FTfire issues. Although he bonked that opportunity to test it in his LC to confirm if his pistol might be striking just lightly enough to not set that off. I'm getting the 37 gr in a few days so I can test that, but also bought the Maker 37 gr X to load my own. For me, it's going to be a handload. Lots of bullets that work well.
The big brand stuff is too nerf'd and the boutique stuff has all shown so much variance...likely due to supply issues and having to change recipe.
I'd probably choose SS198 if nothing else can be had and even that isn't so easy to grab. So, maybe the AAC 40 gr VMAX? I haven't tested VMAX at lower vel, so take that w/grain of salt.
and if Vanguard worked out their 36 gr GPM and now is consistent...that'd be the one I'd carry. That bullet does what I'd want it to, for carry.
I plan to buy another box or 2 to see if it's better now. The 3 I bought suffered from too much variance.
neutered
Gimmick round I see no advantage I'll stick with my pistol calibers that start with a 4........
ok.
Although it seems you may have missed the point of the video. It has nothing to do with trying to convince anyone of, or reveal, the advantages of the cartridge.
If a person has no concept of what recoil and round-count capacity means already, then they are likely not going to be able to comprehend what a 5.7 x 28 can bring to the table.
One might have to wonder why you said "start with a 4...", and not "start with a 5...."?
Isn't .50 cal the big-dude that all shooters should be using? If not, why not? Presumably you have some concept of the advantages of smaller/faster rounds? But have dug your feet in on the one you decided and that's supposed to be all there is?
Try this, take (not) your 5.7 x 28 pistol and your .44 mag revolver (or whatever .4x pistol) to the range and see how rapidly you can put 20 rounds into the bullseye of two targets.
Or go watch Paul Harrel's video where he does this with his AR vs the Ruger LC. His time went up by ~35% with the AR. 1st try.
In the meantime, hopefully you aren't the person in charge of handing a pistol or rifle to a new shooter, or the one in charge of sending a daughter off to college and off-campus housing and trying to decide what her best protection might look like. You'd be handing her, what? A .44 mag Desert Eagle?
So yeah, NATO gimmick.