I was the fellow who reported that Karl said he uses Silvertips.
What Karl told me is that he just finds the Silvertips to be reliable performers, with a decent MV (in the 1060s from the R9 he carries) and a solid record for expanding. Later, in another conversation, he told me that he preferred Winchester
primers based on his extensive IPSC performance (you hear this a lot from the race-gun reloaders, the Winchester primers are held by many to require less force to detonate than CCI or Remington primers) - perhaps that had something to do with his choice, as well.
The only reason Karl mentioned the STHP was in response to my telling him that I was planning to carry 147-gr Gold Dots (I've changed my mind on that, btw, but not because I think GDs are a
bad load, or anything . . . I carry them in my Hi-Power), and it was sort of just in the context of two gun guys discussing loads.
I appreciate the idea of tailoring your load to your carry pistol. Frankly, all modern hollowpoints seem to perform about the same, inasmuch as each shooting is profoundly different. As I mentioned on another thread, I've worked on over 100 handgun killing cases, and there's not much difference between the wounds left by (.38 spl and bigger) handgun
calibers, let alone
bullets. To some extent, all this idle bullet selection talk is counting angels dancing on the heads of pins - performance in the firearm is the primary concern, performance in the air to the target is the next (obviously, you want accuracy so that you can pinpoint those difficult-to-hit stop zones on a human target), and performance in meat is probably the least important. As long as it can hit the right part of the attacker and adequately penetrate to get to "the good stuff," expansion is not much more than gravy.
As I mentioned earlier in the thread, I carry the 147-gr Gold Dots in my Hi-Power, and Winchester's 127-gr +P+ RA9ATs in my Glock 26. I carry Remington 158-gr +P LSWCHPs in my .38 snubs, backed up with Federal +P+ 147-gr Hydra-Shoks on my speedloaders and speed strips (the jacketed Hydra-Shoks won't deform in my pocket). I carry Double Tap 200-gr XTPs in my 1076. I carry Buffalo Bore 158-gr LHC .357s in my King Cobra and Federal 250-gr JSPs in my .41 Blackhawk. It's all good.
And in the Rohrbaugh? I'll carry the light version of the STHP in my R9s based on nothing but Karl's recommendation - because he of all people ought to know what
works in the gun, and because he has a solid tactical and training background to support his thoughts on bullet performance. But I think that all of the choices mentioned thus far should work just fine in the gun.
