Hornady announced a new line of law enforcement ammunition called Critical Duty. This new ammo was designed to meet the specific requirements of police use. Critical Duty ammunition will be available in two 9mm loads and one .40 S&W load initially.
The Hornady Critical Duty ammunition uses a new bullet design that incorporates elements from previous company designs to perform well in the FBI ammunition testing protocol. The bullets use the Flex Tip technology, which is a polymer filled hollowpoint. The Flex Tip prevents the hollowpoint from being filled when passing through clothing or another barrier, yet it also helps expansion when striking the target.
Hornady also uses an InterLock band to hold the bullet jacket to the core, rather than using a chemical bonding process used by many other manufacturers. The benefit to the Critical Duty line of ammunition is that Hornady can use a heavier, antimony-rich core rather than a soft, pure (or close to pure) lead typically used with bonded bullets.
Critical Duty ammunition use low-flash powders and nickel cases.
The initial loads will be:
- 9mm: 135 grains @ 1010 fps, 305 ft-lbs
- 9mm +P: 135 grains @ 1110 fps, 369 ft-lbs
- .40 S&W: 175 grains @ 1010 fps, 396 ft-lbs
As mentioned previously, the Critical Duty ammo was designed to perform well in the FBI testing protocol. The protocol is an arbitrary set of standards developed by the FBI to measure ammunition performance. While I do not think the protocol is proportionally reflective of law enforcement shootings, it does provide a standard by which two ammunition designs can be compared.
Hornady states the FlexLock bullets in the Critical Duty line perform very well in the FBI protocols. This is good from a static testing standpoint, but actual performance in the street remains to be seen. There have been some rounds that performed very well on duty, but failed to meet the standards of the FBI protocol.
Likewise, I’m sure the reverse is true. I’m cautiously optimistic about the performance of this ammunition, but will not be swapping any of my ammo over to it yet.
[Note: I am a firm believer that shot placement trumps bullet design. Rapidly putting multiple rounds into vital areas is more likely to stop a fight than the choice of Federal vs. Speer vs. Winchester vs. Hornady. However, there are clearly some designs that perform better than others. So, given my druthers, I'd rather rapidly put multiple good hollowpoints into a target than the same number of cheap FMJs.]
About Richard
Richard is the publisher of BlueSheepdog.com. In addition to writing here, he publishes GunsHolstersAndGear.com and is a regular contributor to places like Human Events, Police & Security News and The Firearm Blog.
[...] initially ship two 9mm loads and a .40 S&W load. I put together a more in-depth look at the Hornady Critical Duty line of ammo at [...]
So lighter than a 147gr but heavier that then start 124gr. Interesting. I’ve always liked the concept of Hornandy’s flex tip bullets. Hopefully this will propel Hornady into the mainstream of self defense rounds.
If these perform like the Hornady LeverRevolution rounds, SST, or GMX rounds (all of which use the Flex Tip technology) than these will be winners. I’ve come to have great respect for Hornady ammunition, and I’m glad to see them add new technology to duty/defensive handgun rounds.
I agree with Richard, though, the FBI tests are OK, but not perfect indicators of a round that will get the job done. And I also agree with his shot placement comments – if you want to win a gun fight train for body armor drills! Upper chest shots, head shots, and shots to the pelvic girdle!
Actually, the FBI protocol has been very well vetted against real world results including cadaver studies. Reference the work Fackler. Other things like intuition, individual experience, and personal opinions lack this diligence. When it comes to terminal ballistic performance you will find those that are informed, like Hornady engineeering, go with FBI protocols because that’s where the science is. Put your trust in opinions with no scientific or statistical basis and you are not likely to get a repeatable result.
As stated, I believe the FBI protocols are useful as a unit of comparison. A yardstick so different loads can be compared. However, the standards are still arbitrary and the lab is far different from the street.
While I do not have any direct experience with the Critical Duty line, I think it will perform well on the street. The former XTP line was designed around the FBI protocols and didn’t perform well on the street. It is a pretty good bullet for hunting, though, where deeper penetration and limited expansion are needed.
-Richard
A market-based manufacturer would be unwise to not tailor some of their ammunition in general to the FBI findings, considering there are approximately 800,000 law enforcement officers in the nation offering a guaranteed money source.
However I offer two examples of cartridges that appeared to do well in laboratory studies, but actually do not perform well in their intended use during real-life situations. Those are the Federal Hydro-Shok pistol rounds, and the Federal and Remington Sierra Match BTHP rifle round. With Hydro-Shok real-life told us that the unique design would clog on clothes and even body tissue and not expand properly. With Sierra we found an incredibly accurate target round that also did not have the desired expansion qualities and therefore suffers from over-penetration concerns. Most of the law enforcement sniper community (including FBI snipers) use Federal Sierra Match grade 168-grain BTHP bullets.
The issue then is a disconnect with lab testing and real-life results.
The research on Hornday’s flex-tip design shows this design’s superior expansion qualities, reduced drag factor, and reduced over penetration problems, as compared to traditional hollow-point ammunition. The Hornady TAP line even looks to address the over penetration problems of police snipers by offering an amazingly light 110 grain bullet that has the endorsement of the American Sniper Association as being perhaps the ideal police sniper round. You won’t hear that from the FBI lab – yet.
The statement, “intuition, individual experience, and personal opinions lack this diligence”, may be very true in most circumstances – especially in the blogosphere. However, these experiences and opinions may just have real-life experience to back them up, and should not be casually discarded simply because they don’t have the FBI seal.
[...] Introduced late in 2011, the Critical Duty line of ammunition originally featured two 9mm loads and a single .40 S&W load. This line of ammo uses a FlexLock bullet which combines two existing Hornday bullet technologies: the Flex Tip and Interlock. The Flex Tip uses a polymer plug in the hollowpoint to prevent clogging that would affect expansion. The Interlock is a band the binds the lead core to the copper jacket to prevent separation. [...]