"Pan Ohco" > wrote in message
...

>>is something pretty rare to find (about as rare as black steel
>
> If you are referring to Black Talons, they are teflon coated, not
> steel and they do not explode on contact.


In case she *is* thinking of that ammo, here's some interesting reading. She
won't read it, but it cost nothing to post it:


Winchester Black Talon Revisited

There appears to be continuing confusion surrounding the different
versions of the Black Talon bullet, its legality for possession by private
citizens, as well as its alleged "cop-killer bullet" armor-piercing
capability. Here's the lowdown:

Black Talon SXT: The original Black Talon handgun bullet. It was
introduced in 1991. The cartridge consists of a black colored bullet seated
in a nickel-plated case. The black paint-like coating on the bullet is a
Winchester proprietary lubricant called Lubalox. The bullet has six
serrations on the rim of the hollowpoint cavity (meplat), and six talons.
The talons deploy when the bullet expands. They are described by Winchester
as: "six uniform, radial jacket petals with perpendicular tips." Winchester
voluntarily discontinued sales of Black Talon SXT to the general public in
late 1993/early 1994 due to intense negative media and political pressure.
Some political activists derisively referred to it as "Black Felon" ammo.
Black Talon is packaged in boxes of 20 cartridges.

Ranger SXT: Ranger SXT is a less expensive version of the original Black
Talon cartridge intended for the law enforcement market. It consists of a
black Lubalox coated bullet seated in a brass case. The bullet has six
serrations on its meplat, and six talons. Ranger SXT is packaged in boxes of
50 cartridges marked "Law Enforcement Ammunition."

Supreme SXT: Redesigned "civilian" version of the original Black Talon
bullet. The cartridge consists of a copper-jacketed bullet seated in a
nickel-plated case. The bullet has eight serrations on its meplat, and no
talons. Supreme SXT is packaged in boxes of 20 cartridges.

According to Olin-Winchester public relations, the Supreme SXT bullet
design has not been factory tested in standard ordnance gelatin because it
was not designed to meet police ammunition performance specifications. As a
result, there's no valid and verifiable performance data available from
Winchester or the FBI.

We find Winchester's attitude troubling because they're marketing a
personal defense bullet (a life safety device) in which they confessed to us
that they've no idea how well (or poorly) it performs. Therefore, we advise
you not to buy and use Supreme SXT until Winchester gets its act together
and coughs up performance data for this cartridge.

Ranger Talon: The second generation version of the original Black Talon
SXT bullet. The cartridge consists of a copper-jacketed bullet seated in a
nickel-plated case. The bullet has six serrations on its meplat, and six
talons. Ranger Talon is packaged in boxes of 50 cartridges marked "Law
Enforcement Ammunition."

There is no Federal law that prohibits a private citizen from purchasing
or possessing any of the Black Talon bullet variants. Additionally, there
is no Federal law, which forbids private possession and use of "law
enforcement" handgun ammunition, except specifically defined armor-piercing
handgun ammunition. Black Talon, Ranger SXT and Ranger Talon do not meet the
criteria for armor-piercing handgun ammunition as defined by Federal law.
However, there may be State or local laws that ban private possession of
Black Talon and its variants.

The negative media frenzy of late 1993 produced untrue assertions that
Black Talon was an armor-piercing "cop-killer" bullet. We've fired both 9mm
and .40 S&W Black Talon bullets into threat level IIA soft body armor and
the armor easily stopped the bullets. The "armor-piercing" myth may have
originated from the markings used on certain military small-arms ammunition.
U.S. military cartridges with a black painted tip indicates the bullet is
armor-piercing.

(Federal Nyclad ammunition is often mistaken as armor-piercing
ammunition too, due to the blue-black nylon coating on the lead bullet.)

The black Lubalox coating on the Black Talon bullet is meant to reduce
in-bore friction and chamber pressure. Once the bullet leaves the muzzle,
the mission of the coating is completed. Lubalox does not give the bullet
any special property that allows it to blast through police soft body armor.

Recently, the newer Winchester 9mm 127 grain +P+ Ranger SXT bullet
(product number RA9SXTP) has been found to penetrate some lower threat level
soft body armor. Second Chance Body Armor Company recalled one of its vests
in response to officer safety concerns posed by this particular bullet.

Click here to read the Second Chance vest recall press release.

In the latest issue of the International Wound Ballistics Association's
journal, Wound Ballistics Review, there's an article written by Duncan
MacPherson, "A Body Armor Penetration Rumor," that explains the reason why
the RA9SXTP bullet can penetrate some body armor. According to MacPherson,
it's not due to any special aspect of the bullet design nor does its
performance represent any new dynamics in armor penetration. He says it's
due to a minor flaw in the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) body armor
certification test protocol:

"There are two principal limitations in [the NIJ] rating system. The
first limitation is that all armor with the same rating (e.g., passes level
2A and fails level 2) does not have identical performance; this is obvious
(because there is no attempt to, or mechanism, for evaluating intermediate
performance), but is often overlooked. The second limitation is that
different bullet designs do not necessarily have the same relative
efficiency in penetrating the quite different armor designs of different
manufacturers; this whole area is not well modeled either analytically or
experimentally."

Winchester tightly controls distribution of its RA9SXTP cartridge. When
we last checked, Winchester did not permit its distributors to stock this
load. It had to be shipped from the factory directly to a law enforcement
agency address.

Finally, Winchester also produced and manufactured a line of centerfire
rifle ammunition under the Black Talon name, which has since been renamed
Fail-Safe. The Black Talon rifle bullet was completely different from the
handgun bullet design. It did not expand to deploy talon-like claws.
Instead, it had a solid copper nose (similar to a Barnes X-Bullet), with a
lead core base encapsulated in a steel liner to prevent jacket rupture upon
impact. This bullet had a baked on coating of molybdenum disulfide, which
gave it a distinctive black colored appearance also.