Great Chicken test- Sabers and Buffalo Bore

The Set up-

2 leg thigh back combo stacked on top of each other. 3 inches of meat and small bone. On top of 2 inches of ziti. 4 wet books under to stop bullets. Left side of box is for Buffalo bore Gold dots. Right side is for Remington Golden Sabers.
Phot of Entry by Sabers, Second photo showing exit into second piece.. Recovered after blasing through 2 inch phone book, showing 3 holes, and into last book. Total Penetration 9.5 inches. Excellent penetration and expansion. Need more?



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Buffalo Bore Gold Dots, pretty hot load, snappy, entry holes, top piece of meat shows power, split meat on entry, second piece showing severe wounding after 3 shots. Penetrated only into the first inch of top book. Total penetration 6 inches. Not sure why the rib tests show so much penetration. I am not finding it at all. These rounds act like a frangible. BIG WOUND CHANNEL, below average penetration, rounds will always lose mass.
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You decide. For me I would not use Buffalo Bore Dots exclusively. If you use them I would stack them with FMJ or Sabers.

 

Tasty indeed. Actually to clarify, the BB act not like frangibles exactly, wrong term, more like Triton Quik shot, it dumps energy quickly and powerfully and shreds into several pieces. You can see the food blown apart in the inside of the box. If it hits heavy bone like in my roast test, then it will completely break apart.
I wouldn't trust my life on the penetration on these alone.

I don't think I noted it but regular speer gold dot did pretty well, penetrated another inch over BB, expanded well, and held together good. But it's lighter and the mass is not close to the sabers so I cannot imagine a scenario why anyone would chose it over sabers.

Federal hi shoks which is just your basic hollowpoint went through everything, and was not recovered, no doubt no expansion but great penetration.

I have tested roasts, chicken, wetpaks,and bottom line it's hard to beat sabers. Haven't done the DPX but what can it do that sabers cannot? For a 380 round it looks like a winner!

 

The lineup

Speer gold dot on left, sabers in the middle, Buffalo bore on the right.

Sabers weight, penetration, expansion are pretty awesome.

 

All rounds shot were with a p3at.

(Which functioned flawlessly as usual. I don't know why some people have such bad luck with the guns. I have owned 2, and both were great.) I also own an lcp I left at home, I like shooting the keltec.

 

Also look closely at the picture of the phone book with 3 holes in it close together. The saber rounds were already open upon entering, and still went another 4.5 inches. Impressive.

 

The DPX is absolutely the one round I want head to head with Sabers. I am aching to shoot some bird with that one. I've seen other tests but I want to do it myself. When I see with my own eyes those Corbons blow the Sabers away is the day I will change. It will be a good shooting, The battle royal of the two 380 heavyweights. However, I Dont have the bullets and don't have an extra $30 at the moment for some DPX since I just spent about $200 on Rangers for my nine. Sucks to be broke. :'(

But I am comfortable carrying the Sabers for now, they perform extremely well on meat. I got 5 in the gun along with a couple of BB dots just for the heck of it.

 

As I mentioned earlier and as you can see in the shot of the phone book, the sabers were fully expanded after leaving the Ziti. Same as the Dots. 3 inches of meat and thin bone and 2 inches of ziti were enough to open both rounds. Which it should!
That's five inches of meat, bone, and loose wet material. If a round won't start opening by then it might as well be a FMJ. Measure a man's chest, I want if fully open by 5 inches and then go another 4 if needed. That my friends is the best performance you can ask for in a 380. I think my test was valid and as realistic as any gelatin tests or ribs with dry plaster behind it.
You got meat simulating muscle, small bones to break through, loose wet ziti consistent with organs. The phones books were just there to stop the rounds after going through the other material. I'm not saying it was a lab test and cannot be improved upon, it's just backyard testing, but the results were consistent with the other test I made with these two bullets.

They Sabers went another 4+ inches after being FULLY EXPANDED. The dots went in 5 inches and stopped at the first tougher obstacle. Same thing they did in the roast test. Which tells me that after going through meat and "Tissue" and expanding, the sabers had retained a lot more speed to keep pushing a fully mushroomed round through 3 more wet books. They start out much slower but maintain their speed consistently.

So the Sabers expand greater, they penetrate much deeper, they weigh more which is good if encountering heavy bone. What they don't do is create a big wound channel in the first few inches, and they dont shed their jacket leaving 70 grains here and 10 there and 20 there. You get a lump of lead at the end of that 9.5 inches.

If you weight the pluses and minus I don't see how Saber doesn't win hands down against Dots. Next up- DPX.

 

This is an easily duplicated test, go buy $5 worth of thigh quarters and 6 pounds of ziti, sauerkraut, Beef tripe, kidneys,whatever. Stick it in a box and shoot the heck out of it. Recover bullets, wash and photo.

I place no faith in phone books either, or wetpaks, or gelating, or 4 jugs of water. I like meat and filler. The books were just there as a backstop to stop and recover the expanded slugs. The fact that the Sabers could barely be stopped after 4 books and the dots barely dented one book cannot be ignored.

I know you like the BB, I wanted to love them to after hearing of the rib tests, but I just don't see it in my testing. You're up my friend. Next test is yours.

 

PM sent to all requesting their favorites tested. Hope all get here by next Saturday. I'm going to change it a bit per Wheelguys request next time. There is going to be more filler and tripe added under the birds. Anxious to see DPX against Sabers since those seem to lead the voting as the most popular 380 rounds.
Also would like to try the 380 rangers as well since that is my 9mm carry round. ( I retired my 124 +p's HST and +p gold dots after both got smoked pretty well by 147 grain subsonic talons. Well in honesty the HST's are pretty good stuff but the talons edged them) I have heard the 380 rangers are underperformers but would like to give them a shot(pun)

For the 380's it is going to be hard to beat the Sabers, but may the best bullet win.