Winchester Black Talon ammo...

[PHATSPEED7x]

Coworker gave me a couple speed loaders with some .357 magnum ammo. In one of the speed loaders were 6 Winchester Black Talon bullets...



Now I did some research, and found out this bullet was "too good for it's own good". A 1993 shooting in CA that these were used caused mass panic among the liberal media, and other butt hurt people in the medical field as well.

They don't look any different than the modern day PDX1 bullet from Winchester. Just because it's a "black" bullet people automatically think it's more evil, and can cause more harm than a "standard" bullet...

People can be so stupid!

[xd ED]

As I recall there was a super-evil round in existence about then: It could defeat body armor, penetrate more deeply than any other round, and expand more readily than any other round. I don't recall who was doing all the bs-ing, but these might be those.

[photogpat]

Wasn't there a (literally) exploding round as well...?

[gdubya]

Wow, blast from the past. I actually remember buying and shooting those. The story as I recall it was that they were Teflon-coated so fragments could slip through body armor. Total BS, of course, it was just an oxide coating. Young and dumb(er) at the time, buddies and I just HAD to have some. Like anything, especially when someone starts trying to ban it.

[xd ED]

Wasn't there a (literally) exploding round as well...?

I recall during the confusion in the immediate aftermath of the Ronald Reagan shooting, there was concern that exploding bullets were used, and they were un-exploded inside the President, thereby endangering him, and the medical team. Whether such rounds actually existed, I don't know.

[xd ED]

double-tap

[smurfman]

As I recall there was a super-evil round in existence about then: It could defeat body armor, penetrate more deeply than any other round, and expand more readily than any other round. I don't recall who was doing all the bs-ing, but these might be those.

Federal Nyclad.

Originally developed for S&W's line of ammo in the 1970s, Federal bought it out and did a slight design change in the 1980s. Part of the intent was to lessen lead particles in the air but it also allowed for very positive expansion when used in place of a brass jacket with hollow points. It fell by the wayside along with Black Talon as the bullet with its nylon jacket was confused with the KTW tungsten core bullet with its Teflon coating.

The Black Talon bullet was shown on the TV series "ER" as an exploding one. The couple of minutes in the emergency room during which one of the "exploding" Black Talon bullets was shown was all the more of the series I watched. An episode of "COPS" in Philly had one of the officers showing off some of the blue Nyclads found in a suspects revolver describing them as being "Cop killer" bullets which could penetrate body armor. Of the 20 some rounds of mixed 125 gr 38 Spl +P and 124 gr 9mm +P Nyclad HP bullets we fired at an old Point Blank IIA vest, none of them penetrated. The vest looked pretty banged up but might have held.

[arizona98tj]

Nylon jacketed 115 gr 9mm. I use it during my training courses so I don't feel bad about leaving brass on the ground.

[Seismic Sam]

What little I recall about Black Talon bullets were that they were nasty because they would spread open like a flower, and the inside of the tips of the petals were razor sharp. This caused greater tissue damage, and also was a serious risk to the doctor trying to fish the bullet out, as it could cut the surgical glove and the doctor, and this is back in the day when the AIDS epidemic was in full swing. They do sell a bullet similar right now for the 500 S&W, and it opens up and there are indeed razor sharp edges on the inside tips of the hollowpoint petals. Wolf's Den has a sample of this bullet, and for that matter they have a couple of boxes of the original Black Talon rounds up in their old/rare ammo stash. Look up at about the 8' - 9' height on the west wall..

[hornswaggle]

Here's some examples I have of Black Talon in 45ACP. One was shot into a phone book and the other two into water jugs. Really amazing expansion considering the low velocity of the .45 and the 'talons' are very sharp.

[Erik_Pakieser]

I have some 10mm Black Talons in my junk drawer.

[gunsmith]

I remember reading that the Winchester Ranger T was an even better performing bullet than the BLACK TALON but without the scary name.
It does have scary hooks.
Nice Nickel plated case and the box says 'Law Enforcement only'
I like to annoy Anti's when I tell them I carry a special bullet called THE BLACK TALON with razor hooks that fan out to slice away at the bad guy.


Here's something from the National Review TEN years ago, Sounds Familiar.

March 01, 2004, 9:26 a.m.
The Return of a Legislative Legend
Debating “cop-killers.”


As the Senate considers legislation to prohibit abusive lawsuits against Second Amendment rights, Sen. Ted Kennedy is offering an amendment to ban ammunition. Kennedy claims that he is aiming at "cop-killer" bullets, but he appears to be badly misinformed on the issue.

There never has been any such thing as a "cop-killer" bullet. The issue is a fiction, invented for purposes of politics, not public safety. In any case, since 1986, federal law has prohibited the rare types of handgun ammunition that have unusual abilities to penetrate body armor.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives reports that current ammunition laws are fully sufficient to protect the police, and that attempts to change these laws could actually lead to increased police fatalities. Notwithstanding this strong warning, some lobbyists and politicians continue to play on public misunderstanding, by using the so-called "cop-killer" issue to demand the power to ban standard rifle ammunition used for hunting.

POLITICAL ORIGINS
The story of the nonexistent "cop-killer" bullet actually begins in 1976 in Massachusetts, when a handgun-confiscation initiative was defeated in a landslide. Then, in 1982 in California, a handgun-"freeze" initiative also lost overwhelmingly. The gun-prohibition lobbies began to realize that they would have to work more incrementally, rather than pushing for prohibition outright.

The prohibition lobbies also realized that the police were one of their worst problems. While a few police chiefs or sheriffs could always be found to support prohibition, the vast majority of police — both commanders and line officers — were "pro-gun," and extremely skeptical of gun control. Something had to be done to turn the police (or at least their Washington lobbyists) against the National Rifle Association.

The something, ironically, was an obscure type of ammunition invented by police officers two decades before. These bullets were known as KTW bullets, after the initials of the three persons who invented them for use in SWAT teams: Dr. Paul Kopsch and two police officers named Turcus and Ward.

While ordinary bullets have a lead core, the KTW bullets used brass or iron. The KTW bullet has a conical shape, and was especially designed for shooting through glass or a car door. Of course neither the KTW bullet nor any other bullet was invented for the purpose of killing police officers.

KTW bullets have not been available for sale to the general public since the 1960s.

TEFLON BULLETS?
"Cop-killer" bullets are sometimes called "Teflon bullets," but this name reflects a serious misunderstanding. For example, in the movie Lethal Weapon 3, a so-called "Teflon bullet" from a medium-power handgun was supposedly able to penetrate several inches of hardened steel on a bulldozer blade. In the real world, however, no bullet could possibly perform such a stunt.

[mrShinola]

Before I started shooting, I attended a First Shots class at Bill's, where the woman instructor was telling a story about her family finding a loaded weapon in a deceased relative's home. The relative had worked in some sort of high clearance government job, and the gun and bullets weren't legal for civilians to have. I asked instructor what sort of ammo could it be, and she told me "why would you ask that? You don't need to know".

What could they have been? Steel core? Black Talon? Something to make a story better for a bunch of noobs?

Thanks to all who reply,
Mrs. Shinola

[photogpat]

This is what I was talking about...Devastator bullets....the ones Hinkley used to shoot Reagan.

http://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/03/us/ex ... overs.html

[Erud]

Before I started shooting, I attended a First Shots class at Bill's, where the woman instructor was telling a story about her family finding a loaded weapon in a deceased relative's home. The relative had worked in some sort of high clearance government job, and the gun and bullets weren't legal for civilians to have. I asked instructor what sort of ammo could it be, and she told me "why would you ask that? You don't need to know".

That's when I would have started laughing and asked for a full refund for the class.