# Converting range ammo to hollow point - any reason not to?



## Glock17 (Nov 29, 2017)

Since Walmart stopped selling 9mm I went to the nearest gun store. They would sell you lots of range ammo but would only sell one box of self-defense rounds. According to them manufacturing is spotty because of Covid.

I don't anticipate going through a lot of defense rounds, hopefully none out of necessity - to date I've fortunately never been in a situation where I felt the need to draw or anything even approaching it but at some point I feel like the supply needs to be kept fresh - fire the old ones at the range and replace them. What I have is probably going on around two years old.

I found a video on Youtube about making hollow points out of range ammo. Do you feel like there's a **No! DON'T DO IT!!** reason not to? Or do you think it's okay if you take reasonable care.

Or are they full of crap - is defense ammo readily available? If so what are your favorite online sources?

Thoughts, insights?

Thanks.


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## SSGN_Doc (Mar 12, 2020)

How much does all the tooling cost? How much time and effort has to go into each round? What is your time worth?

Getting consistent concentric HPs that will be balanced in rotation will be difficult. Accuracy will suffer from each variable that is not identical in each round. Bullet set-back into the case could be an issue which would increase pressure. Reliable feeding could suffer after your efforts.

Defensive rounds have jacket design elements to achieve a desired penetration and expansion result. Jackets on defensive rounds often feature skives and tapers to control expansion. Jackets are often bonded to the lead core, to prevent separation of jacket and core in defensive ammo. The lead and jacket alloys are chosen for their purpose. 

You can decide.


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## Yusrilha (Apr 20, 2020)

SSGN_Doc said:


> How much does all the tooling cost? How much time and effort has to go into each round? What is your time worth?
> 
> Getting consistent concentric HPs that will be balanced in rotation will be difficult. Accuracy will suffer from each variable that is not identical in each round. Bullet set-back into the case could be an issue which would increase pressure. Reliable feeding could suffer after your efforts.
> 
> ...


+1


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## pic (Nov 14, 2009)

Glock17 said:


> Since Walmart stopped selling 9mm I went to the nearest gun store. They would sell you lots of range ammo but would only sell one box of self-defense rounds. According to them manufacturing is spotty because of Covid.
> 
> I don't anticipate going through a lot of defense rounds, hopefully none out of necessity - to date I've fortunately never been in a situation where I felt the need to draw or anything even approaching it but at some point I feel like the supply needs to be kept fresh - fire the old ones at the range and replace them. What I have is probably going on around two years old.
> 
> ...


If you're getting great reliability out of range loads, go for it , as is ( we know they're dependable without any alterations.

If you decide to alter a dependable range round, I would make sure to fire off a bunch of rounds to ensure it's reliability hasn't been altered. 
I personally wouldn't alter a range round, Use it as is. 
Creating your own hollow point may not expand or function as a hollow point. 
Food for thought,,,, hollow points aren't perfect in their expansion even after much testing is involved.

If you decide to create your own hollow points,, I'm curious to know of your results, keep us posted, thanks. GLOCK17

Pic


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## mdi (Jan 11, 2020)

I believe there's more to hollow point SD ammo than just a hole in the end of the bullet. Manufacturers go to great lengths to design an accurate, expanding bullet with decent penetration and consistency. Drilling a factory round nose bullet so that the cavity is centered as to not throw the bullet out of balance, the consistency of the drilling, and even controlling the shape of the hole may be quite difficult unless a dedicated jig, tooling, and method are carefully used. You may be able to modify a round to get acceptable performance but I think it would entail much more work and testing in various media to be worth the time and effort, unless it's done for the fun of the chase...

I've played with "adding to the efficiency" of bullets from drilling noses to "Dum Dum" cutting, flattening FMJ bullet noses to get a round nose soft flat point, and mold modifications, but none have even approached the performance of factory designed, manufactured bullets, but it was fun...


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## DOUBLESHOT (Aug 19, 2018)

Altering ammo and using it for self defense could get you in trouble if you have to use it for such. Here in the People's Republic of New Jersey (Phil Murphy - Tyrant King), we can't buy or use holler point ammo. I don't believe we are even allowed to think about it. We can however buy and use Hornandy Critical Defense ammo. After all, the the tip is not hollow.


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## LostinTexas (Oct 1, 2018)

You're trying to put lipstick on a pig and call it a princess.
SD ammo is designed from the ground up and only a small percentage of those designs actually work. Construction, structure and weight all factor in.
Of course thee is always the drilling into a live round. What could possibly go wrong?
If in a bind, just use the range ammo. It is far from worthless.


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## Usafammo3 (Jun 8, 2020)

Some disagree with me but I think proper shot placement with "target" fmj ammo works fine. I've carried fmjs in my daily carry b4 and the military has been using them to make bad guys have sleepy time for many years. There are other considerations for civilians(overpenetration) but(IMO) you would be better served by some range time than the time and effort this project would consume. If you are only using the jhps for self defense, how many do you need?


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## mdi (Jan 11, 2020)

Agree with Usafammo3, The main down side of using FMJ, in my opinion, is over penetration, but only dangerous if there are innocent bystanders behind the intended target. In my guns FMJs are very accurate and feed/chamber 100%, unlike some SD designs...


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## pic (Nov 14, 2009)

Another view, 
Most rounds will penetrate drywall, pine doors. FMJ, JHP to an extent anyhow.

My thought is to know what you're shooting and use it to your advantage. 

I don't mind a penetrating round to protect my family, before the perp shoots with his possible penetrating Ammo. 

Id rather have the penetrating ability if needed.


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## paratrooper (Feb 1, 2012)

No matter how hard it might be to find some self-defense ammo, it's out there, albeit, maybe a bit more expensive.

Don't waste your time / effort on converting range ammo to hollow points. Buy a box or two of the self-defense stuff and be happy.

BTW......range ammo is just as deadly as the hollow-point stuff. If I didn't have *ANY* ammo at all, then I'd be worried.


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## Cypher (May 17, 2017)

Causes more problems than it solves?


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## DJ Niner (Oct 3, 2006)

There is a potential safety problem with doing this kind of ammo modification.
First, some background on bullet styles and construction.

When Jacketed Hollow Point (JHP) bullets are made, they put a thin little bullet-sized zinc/copper "cup" into a machine, and a chunk of lead-alloy core into the cup, and then the machine forms the bullet core to fit the cup using a special bullet-forming die and thousands of pounds of pressure. Sometimes each bullet is struck/squished several more times to form the ogive (front curve) and the hollow-point opening. The important thing to remember here, is while the base of the bullet jacket (the zinc/copper cup) is flat, it's actually part of the sides of the bullet.

When Full Metal Jacket (FMJ) target/range type bullets are made, the process is reversed, in that the open end of the cup becomes the bullet's base, with the pressure on the core and cup forming the bullet's nose and sides. In this style of bullet, the base is usually left open, meaning you can see a flat surface of bare lead-alloy at the base of the bullet. Bullet integrity is maintained by the cup going from the sides up over the nose, all in one piece.

If you take this style of bullet with an open base and punch or drill a hole on the tip to make a hollow-point-type design, you are left with a "tube" of copper material that is technically now open at both ends. In some cases, when this type of modified bullet is fired, when the bullet hits the rifling, the copper jacket can stop due to friction and lead core can be blown/fired out without the jacket, as the core is no longer anchored/enclosed at the front OR rear by the copper jacket.

When this happens, you can be left with the remnant of a bullet jacket stuck in your barrel, and when you fire the next shot, you may experience what happens when a gun is fired with an obstructed/partially-plugged barrel (the stuck jacket stops the next bullet before it can leave the barrel, and pressures skyrocket, possibly blowing-up the gun or venting hot high-pressure gasses into the shooter's face and hands/arms). This is potentially VERY dangerous, and can cripple or kill a person.

Now, understand that not _all_ FMJ bullets are formed as described above, and not all JHPs are formed with a separate copper cup nowadays, so some of this info may be dated or not apply here.

However, I would *not* recommend this type of bullet modification for ANY use, due to safety concerns. I'd rather carry tested, high-quality FMJ target/range ammo for defense (and have, before) than try to modify it into something that may or may not function safely, reliably and accurately.


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## Usafammo3 (Jun 8, 2020)

The converting range ammo to hp reminds me of a guy I knew that used to take lead wad cutters and put a knife across the lead- he would then smack them into the table(primer down) repeatedly and then go across from the other direction. The idea was the lead would open up or split into pieces when it struck the target. He never had a problem but I cringed every time.(IMO), smacking, drilling, squeezing any explosive that is rigged to go off by being struck is prob a bad idea. I'm no expert but I did work with explosives(small bullets to 2,000 pound bombs)for a few years and I can tell you that It's just a bad idea.


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## Glock17 (Nov 29, 2017)

pic said:


> If you decide to create your own hollow points,, I'm curious to know of your results, keep us posted, thanks. GLOCK17
> 
> Pic


Not likely given the responses I've seen here - lol. Which is why I asked.


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