Quote:
Originally Posted by BlueSkyJaunte
I haven't seen this as I pretty much stopped paying attention to the .327 as soon as it came out.  But billing the .327 as a deer hunting round? Sounds utterly irresponsible to me. Many factory 9x19 loads have more oomph. |
It caught my eye until I saw it was going in the full sized Blackhawk. No reason for that, other than it's too long to fit in traditional .32 sized guns. Stretching the little .32 like that was merely an effort to impress those who are impressed by "muzzle energy" as some measure of worth. Too bad Ruger didn't just bring the Single Six back out in the .32 H&R; that was a proper .32 that knew its place.
The first article I read about the .327 was in the American Rifleman, where it was touted as a deer hunting round on a par with the .357. All that says to me is that it is not a deer hunting round. Other magazines have since suggested the same, when teamed with the 6" barreled adjustable sight Blackhawk.
I suppose all of this is meant to appeal to the crowd who seems to think handguns are like rifles; i.e. that they kill in the same manner. They simply do not, and handguns can't (at least real ones, like revolvers and pistols). They simply cannot match the velocity and energy of rifles, even relatively "underpowered" rifles, so compromises have to be made. It boils down to an either/or choice: expansion or penetration. Rifles are capable of both, handguns are not. At least not in hunting terms.
Hunting handguns kill by driving bullets all the way though the animal and out the other side. They won't do that with an expanding bullet; they simply do not carry the energy (or more accurately, momentum) to do so. So we look for bullets that
cut a full diameter wound channel all the way through, removing tissue as they go, so that wound channel cannot close up on itself. Round noses won't do that; expanding bullets won't do that. Flat nosed semi wadcutters will. Think paper punch vs. sticking a pencil through a sheet of paper. Both leave a hole, but the latter can be closed back on itself.
When used with proper hunting semi wadcutters, the .32's just leave too small of a hole in big game. Switching to the nifty looking jacketed soft and hollow points shown in all the ads stymies penetration too much with such a small caliber. Those beautiful mushroomed bullets shown in the ads will only penetrate a few inches - not nearly enough for deer hunting. We're looking for several
feet, like stem to stern. No .32 will ever do that, even on its best day. It's just not a deer hunting round.