F/S Black Talons .45ACP
- Thread starter redtail
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I ended up with a few more than anticipated @ auction.
Well this turned into quite an interesting thread , lol. Here is the skinny.
"Introduced at the 1991 SHOT Show, Winchester’s Black Talon was the ammo company’s answer for a more effective self-defense bullet demanded by the FBI following the 1986 Miami Firefight. In a shootout with two bank robbers—William Matix and Michael Platt—eight FBI agents, mainly armed with .357 Magnum revolvers loaded with .38 Special went up against Matix and Platt armed with .223 Remington rifles and shotguns. Despite being riddled with bullet holes from the FBI, Platt was able to continue firing back. In the end of the nearly five-minute shootout, five FBI agents were wounded and two—Jerry Dove and Benjamin Grogan—were killed.
The FBI agents had loaded jacketed hollow point bullets into their firearms. However, after medical examiners performed autopsies on the bank robbers’ bodies, it was discovered that one bullet stopped just less than an inch from the heart. John Hall, FBI Firearms Training Unit Director at the time called the tragedy “an ammo failure.” The aftermath encouraged the FBI to seek new guns, more effective ammunition and set precedence for the FBI’s protocol on ammunition evaluation and testing. For ammo to pass FBI protocol, it must meet a minimum of 12 inches of penetration in ballistics gelatin, but no more than 18 inches and penetrate clothing including heavy jackets, denim and leather.
Black Talon has a black bullet with six serrations at the nose seated on a shiny nickel-plated cartridge. The round is a traditional hollow point bullet, but with a then-innovative “reverse taper” (the bullet jacket is thicker at the tip than at the base) and a Lubalox—not Teflon—coating. The Black Talon, like all hollow point bullets, opens up (commonly called expansion or mushrooming) when it hits soft tissue. What sets the Black Talon apart is its six sharp pointy edges. At the time, Winchester’s Black Talon was one of, if not the most effective self-defense round you could buy.
When a hollow point bullet hits a soft target, it mushrooms out to what looks like a flower with petals. This creates a wider wound channel. The Black Talon’s petals look more like… well… talons, essentially making the wound channel even wider. The wider wound channel makes the round more likely to stop a threat—something usually referred to as “knockdown power”—when compared to other hollow point rounds. In fact, for the first two years Black Talon was on the market, it received an award from Shooting Industry magazine. Even now, people still claim Black Talon was the best defensive round and search for its modern day equivalent.
When a hollow point bullet hits a soft target, it mushrooms out to what looks like a flower with petals. Image courtesy of Oleg Volk.
Winchester pulled it in 1993 and permanently discontinued the ammo in 2000. Due to all of the controversy, the Black Talon has now become a notorious legend of almost mythical proportions.
Two high-profile mass shootings in 1993 led to the Black Talon’s demise. In December, Colin Ferguson killed six people and injured 19 more on a train in New York. Supposedly, he loaded his handgun with Black Talon. Seven months later, Gian Luigi Ferri loaded his gun with Black Talon and open fired in a law office in San Francisco, California, killing nine people. Gun grabbers jumped at the chance to push their anti-gun agenda. Time magazine described the Black Talon as a bullet “designed to unsheathe its claws once inside the victim’s body and tear it to pieces.” A surgeon in Houston said Black Talon “explode inside a person like a thousand razor blades.” The media called it exotic and “designed to do greater damage than ordinary ammunition.” Many politicians called for an outright ban on Black Talon ammunition. Even a family member of a victim from the New York shooting attempted to sue Olin Corporation for the manufacture, sale and marketing of Winchester’s Black Talon ammo. "
Well this turned into quite an interesting thread , lol. Here is the skinny.
"Introduced at the 1991 SHOT Show, Winchester’s Black Talon was the ammo company’s answer for a more effective self-defense bullet demanded by the FBI following the 1986 Miami Firefight. In a shootout with two bank robbers—William Matix and Michael Platt—eight FBI agents, mainly armed with .357 Magnum revolvers loaded with .38 Special went up against Matix and Platt armed with .223 Remington rifles and shotguns. Despite being riddled with bullet holes from the FBI, Platt was able to continue firing back. In the end of the nearly five-minute shootout, five FBI agents were wounded and two—Jerry Dove and Benjamin Grogan—were killed.
The FBI agents had loaded jacketed hollow point bullets into their firearms. However, after medical examiners performed autopsies on the bank robbers’ bodies, it was discovered that one bullet stopped just less than an inch from the heart. John Hall, FBI Firearms Training Unit Director at the time called the tragedy “an ammo failure.” The aftermath encouraged the FBI to seek new guns, more effective ammunition and set precedence for the FBI’s protocol on ammunition evaluation and testing. For ammo to pass FBI protocol, it must meet a minimum of 12 inches of penetration in ballistics gelatin, but no more than 18 inches and penetrate clothing including heavy jackets, denim and leather.
Black Talon has a black bullet with six serrations at the nose seated on a shiny nickel-plated cartridge. The round is a traditional hollow point bullet, but with a then-innovative “reverse taper” (the bullet jacket is thicker at the tip than at the base) and a Lubalox—not Teflon—coating. The Black Talon, like all hollow point bullets, opens up (commonly called expansion or mushrooming) when it hits soft tissue. What sets the Black Talon apart is its six sharp pointy edges. At the time, Winchester’s Black Talon was one of, if not the most effective self-defense round you could buy.
When a hollow point bullet hits a soft target, it mushrooms out to what looks like a flower with petals. This creates a wider wound channel. The Black Talon’s petals look more like… well… talons, essentially making the wound channel even wider. The wider wound channel makes the round more likely to stop a threat—something usually referred to as “knockdown power”—when compared to other hollow point rounds. In fact, for the first two years Black Talon was on the market, it received an award from Shooting Industry magazine. Even now, people still claim Black Talon was the best defensive round and search for its modern day equivalent.
When a hollow point bullet hits a soft target, it mushrooms out to what looks like a flower with petals. Image courtesy of Oleg Volk.
Winchester pulled it in 1993 and permanently discontinued the ammo in 2000. Due to all of the controversy, the Black Talon has now become a notorious legend of almost mythical proportions.
Two high-profile mass shootings in 1993 led to the Black Talon’s demise. In December, Colin Ferguson killed six people and injured 19 more on a train in New York. Supposedly, he loaded his handgun with Black Talon. Seven months later, Gian Luigi Ferri loaded his gun with Black Talon and open fired in a law office in San Francisco, California, killing nine people. Gun grabbers jumped at the chance to push their anti-gun agenda. Time magazine described the Black Talon as a bullet “designed to unsheathe its claws once inside the victim’s body and tear it to pieces.” A surgeon in Houston said Black Talon “explode inside a person like a thousand razor blades.” The media called it exotic and “designed to do greater damage than ordinary ammunition.” Many politicians called for an outright ban on Black Talon ammunition. Even a family member of a victim from the New York shooting attempted to sue Olin Corporation for the manufacture, sale and marketing of Winchester’s Black Talon ammo. "
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