Interarms PPK home defense ammo question

These models have been known to be ammo-sensitive: What works in yours may not work well in mine, and what works in mine may not work well in yours. The best advice might well be to take your pistol out to a local range and run a variety of ammo through it from a variety of manufacturers, noting the operation of the pistol during each experiment. Then simply select the ammo that works best, time and time again, in your PPK. It can be a bit on the expensive side, but we are talking about life, after all.

Welcome to the forum, by the way. Enjoy your time here.

What HE said.

The Remington "Golden Saber" JHP 102gr. runs reliably thru all three of my IA .380 PPK/S weapons. Worth a try.

I use Corbon DPX in my Interarms PPK/S and all my other 380's glaser not worth time or money. If won't go thru a wall won't be much account on person . Learn to shoot. and use a good HP that feeds relieable in your pistol.

Speer Gold Dot makes a good defense round. I find it feeds reliably through my Interarms PPK. Sgammo.com has ammo at good prices. I agree with the others, test it before you depend on it.

If you are not in a "terribly nice part of town", maybe you shouldn't worry so much about your neighbors...

M

GonzoGeezer said:

...Sgammo.com has ammo at good prices...

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From their website: "No Shipments to Massachusetts". What a shame. They really do have some good deals there, too.

lflank, go and get yourself a box of Hornady Critical Defense cartridges. I have never heard anyone here complain about feeding problems with them - and that's saying a lot! They work wonderfully in my PPK (same as yours - Interarms) and I sure as heck wouldn't want to be in front of one of those nasty, deviously designed bullets.

MGMike said:

If you are not in a "terribly nice part of town", maybe you shouldn't worry so much about your neighbors...

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Whoa...

-Pilotsteve

MGMike said:

If you are not in a "terribly nice part of town", maybe you shouldn't worry so much about your neighbors...

M

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Wow, nice. I guess if he lives in an area that's not a "terribly nice part of town" he doesn't deserve to live anyway and therefore shouldn't worry about self-defense in the first place since his intrinsic value as a human being is so low due to his geographic location?

Your comment shows a basic lack of regard for the intrinsic right of every human being on this planet to life and liberty until they infringe on someone else's right to the same. In short, people that think like you are the reason I carry a gun.

MGMike said:

If you are not in a "terribly nice part of town", maybe you shouldn't worry so much about your neighbors...

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WOW! What an incredibly stupid thing to say!
If it was said "as a joke" that proves it to be both stupid and insensitive.

michael t said:

I use Corbon DPX in my Interarms PPK/S and all my other 380's glaser not worth time or money. If won't go thru a wall won't be much account on person . Learn to shoot. and use a good HP that feeds relieable in your pistol.

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As noted, I do understand that the frangible round sacrifices some stopping ability. I'm willing to sacrifice that in favor of not having bullets flying through my neighbor's apartments (whether or not they have first passed through the body of an intruder)--I am after all completely responsible for where every bullet goes, and I'd rather not kill some innocent kid in the crossfire. I'm a pretty good shot, and at apartment-level range (less than ten or fifteen feet, most likely) I'll very likely not miss--but I prefer to take precautions anyway to try to prevent stray bullets from endangering nearby innocent bystanders. Hence my interest in the frangible round.

MGMike said:

If you are not in a "terribly nice part of town", maybe you shouldn't worry so much about your neighbors...
M

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Your sense of humanity really underwhelms me.

I worry about my neighbors because they are human beings, and I prefer not to kill or wound human beings unnecessarily. Even the ones who are not personal friends of mine.

searcher451 said:

These models have been known to be ammo-sensitive: What works in yours may not work well in mine, and what works in mine may not work well in yours. The best advice might well be to take your pistol out to a local range and run a variety of ammo through it from a variety of manufacturers, noting the operation of the pistol during each experiment. Then simply select the ammo that works best, time and time again, in your PPK. It can be a bit on the expensive side, but we are talking about life, after all.

Welcome to the forum, by the way. Enjoy your time here.

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Thanks for the welcome.

Yeah, I guess the thing to do is to bite the bullet (so to speak), get a few clip's worth of (unfortunately very pricey) frangible 380s, and see how the pistol likes them.

It looks to me, from reading various things on the web, that nearly all of the problems that people have with the PPK not feeding or not ejecting or whatever, come from using ammo that the PPK was not originally designed for (as a police/military pistol, the gun was designed to use round-nose FMJ's, period).

That's why I keep the Golden Saber rounds for SD, lflank. They're round-nosed enough to feed with no issues.

lflank said:

It looks to me, from reading various things on the web, that nearly all of the problems that people have with the PPK not feeding or not ejecting or whatever, come from using ammo that the PPK was not originally designed for (as a police/military pistol, the gun was designed to use round-nose FMJ's, period).

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It seems more like some guns just like what they like independent of what the manual says. The manual says to feed it only 95gr FMJ. My range bullets are 100gr TCBB hard cast lead and my gun eats them like candy. I haven't had any problems with my IA gun eating anything. HP, FMJ, TCBB....it just eats everything I've fed it. That being said your best bet is to try different loads and see what your gun likes.

The best thing you can do to avoid over-penetration of missed shots is to seriously practice so you don't miss when it counts. Unless you're rich you probably won't be able to afford enough factory ammo to properly train so you might think about investing in reloading equipment. It's kinda pricey to get going but the savings generated from every round you load will pay it off in time. The earlier you start reloading the better.

lflank said:

It looks to me, from reading various things on the web, that nearly all of the problems that people have with the PPK not feeding or not ejecting or whatever, come from using ammo that the PPK was not originally designed for (as a police/military pistol, the gun was designed to use round-nose FMJ's, period).

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Ammo and magazines; magazines and ammo. And don't believe everything you read on the internet, or even here. The original PP and PPK model will handle hollow-point rounds just fine; for the most part; you just have to find the brand that works best in your pistol. I use Speer Gold Dots in my PPK/S and have never had a problem.

Home defense + apartment building..... Spells SHOT GUN to me.

Just a thought.

Tool

pntool said:

Home defense + apartment building..... Spells SHOT GUN to me.

Just a thought.

Tool

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I did actually think of that too---at apartment ranges of ten feet or less even a .410 with birdshot would blow a lethal hole in somebody.

Colt40five said:

The best thing you can do to avoid over-penetration of missed shots is to seriously practice so you don't miss when it counts.

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Oh, I think at apartment ranges (10-15 feet) I won't miss very often. It's been a few years, but back in my younger days I did my share of target shooting (though I was always better with a rifle than with a pistol.) I learned to shoot as a kid by hunting groundhogs with an old bolt-action .222 rifle--ya had to drill the little suckers through the head so they'd drop right then and there, otherwise they'd run into their holes and you never got them.

I always liked target shooting, wanted to take it back up again, and that's really why I got the pistol. But I figure as long as it's gonna be here anyway I might as well keep it ready for defense if need be.

lflank said:

Your sense of humanity really underwhelms me.

I worry about my neighbors because they are human beings, and I prefer not to kill or wound human beings unnecessarily. Even the ones who are not personal friends of mine.

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.
If you'd read a few hundred more of MGMike's posts you might understand how far off you are from understanding what he actually said. He's not telling you to kill your drug pushing neighbors (you did say the entire neighborhood is bad)...he's saying that if you live in a dangerous area your primary focus should be keeping yourself alive. If you're really worried about not killing your neighbors learn to shoot so you don't miss. If the meantime buy a 12ga shotgun and load it with beanbags...or #12 dust shot. Then if you do miss you'll just need some drywall work...

lflank said:

Oh, I think at apartment ranges (10-15 feet) I won't miss very often. It's been a few years, but back in my younger days I did my share of target shooting (though I was always better with a rifle than with a pistol.) I learned to shoot as a kid by hunting groundhogs with an old bolt-action .222 rifle--ya had to drill the little suckers through the head so they'd drop right then and there, otherwise they'd run into their holes and you never got them.

I always liked target shooting, wanted to take it back up again, and that's really why I got the pistol. But I figure as long as it's gonna be here anyway I might as well keep it ready for defense if need be.

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When the adrenaline is flowing, the lighting is bad, the target is moving etc etc you'd be surprised how easy it is to miss even at 10 feet. Handgun proficiency is a perishable skill. If you don't use it(often) you lose it. A good rule of thumb I was taught a long time ago is to multiply the size of the groups you are able to shoot when you are relaxed at a well-lit range and shooting at a stationary target by 3 and that is how well you can reasonably expect to perform when the shit is hitting the fan.